Wim Delvoye is another artist I've been into for awhile. There is something punk or rock about him - like Banks Violette I tie him to music. I think they listen to different music though - I'm only making that statement from looking at their work. Banks is a hard industrial grind or heavy metal grind (which he does tie to his music in speaking of his work): grind being the operative word when I look at his work. Delvoye has something punk rock going on with his tattood pigs...and something gothic with his heavily filigreed machines- that also fit in with the machine punk aesthetic. (Machine punk - i've liked it's look and been drawn to and also turned off by its sense of nostalgia.)
Wim's Work- The Tattooed Pigs
Delvoye has an Art Farm where he raises pigs in order to tattoo them. I've seen images - like the ones above - where the pigs are alive. And I've seen stuffed tattooed pigs in galleries. This work makes me uncomfortable because I feel like the pigs are tortured with the tattooing.
I found further information on his Art Farm project on Wikipedia - of course:
'Though Delvoye started tattooing pig skins taken from slaughterhouses in the United States in 1992, he began to tattoo live pigs in 1997. Delvoye was interested in the idea that “the pig would literally grow in value," [7] both in a physical and economic sense. He ultimately moved the operation to an Art Farm in China in 2004 where restrictions regarding animal welfare were less strict. The pigs have been inked with a diverse array of designs, including the trival, such as skulls and crosses, to Louis Vuitton designs, to designs dictated by the pig's anatomy. The designs are created by Delvoye and his three colleagues in residence."[8] In an interview with ArtAsiaPacific's Paul Laster, Delvoye described the process of tattooing a live pig,"we sedate it, shave it and apply Vaseline to its skin.""[9] As another manifestation of contradiction in Delvoye’s art, he owns a pig farm though he is a practicing vegetarian.'
Wow - he's a vegetarian! It does make me feel better that he sedates them...the after burn of a tattoo isn't painful like the actual moment. His idea of the pig increasing in value is interesting...and when you see the stuffed pigs (I guess the ones from the slaughterhouse in 1997) - it is fascinating. I wanted to say a fascinating 'object' but I was conflicted in calling a taxidermy animal an 'object'. But then they are - all taxidermy animals are objects. And the difference is that their bodies are preserved as an object or cut up and consumed. Although I believe taxidermy animals do have their insides /meat taken from them for consumption and the preserved part is merely the outside? This opens up an entire thought process in my head about embalming and burying humans, carnivores, vegetarians, the dead body and how/if it cycles through the earth. Mind opened.
Gothic
One of the first pieces of his work that I saw and loved was one of his gothic pieces - specifically the filigreed dump truck or cement truck models similar to the cement mixer above. It was in a gallery space amongst some of his Xray stained glass pieces - also similar to those above. Many of these stained glass pieces are homoerotic in nature along with some S+M imagery. They blatantly refer to Catholicism in their stained glass shapes and blatantly thumbed their noses at Catholicism and maybe Religion in general with their erotic nature.
Aside from the amount of skill and work it'd take to make one of the filigreed pieces - I was attracted to the ridiculousness of having an overly-decorated representation of a functional object. The decor is Flemish Baroque and the objects that are made range from dump trucks to buildings. I think that this decor also speaks Catholic to me - only in that it is about decoration and elaborateness Catholic churches often contain much decor.
Cloaca
Cloaca is Delvoye's digestive machine. Food in = waste out. I've heard it stinks too. He wanted to see the digestive process and comment on the uselessness of life. The fact that he made this machine - this body - is interesting. It only functions to turn food into waste - but it does move machine and body closer to each other from a certain point of view.....
I found an interview with Wim Delvoye and Nicolas Bourriaud.
From the article:
'I’m a boy and I’m not ashamed of what I’m made up of: science, trucks, cars, models, and to a certain extent my aggressive side. And I never use the female body. Except in stained glass windows. Most of the time, however, I explore scatology: the colon and the stomach. Sexuality interests me less than digestion does as a subject and as a metaphor. I’m more interested in themes that unify. In the 1990s, women artists began focusing their work on a new subject: their sexuality. This quasi-institutionalized separatism of the 1990s shocks me. It’s politically correct: all of a sudden, during the post-cold war period, people could no longer hide behind the flag. The United States of Mickey Mouse was over. Everyone had to invent an identity for themselves. There were so many good social projects camouflaging a kind of visual poverty…Art is not by definition morally good. I’ve never believed in justifying one’s good heart or intelligence through art.'
He does have a masculine side to his work that I never fully recognized as being masculine. It isn't over caricatured masculinity that yells out MAN to me. I probably didn't recognize it because what he considers overtly masculine, I consider the norm- since femininity is the Other. At first I wasn't sure if what he was saying about feminist art and identity art in the 90s was a dig on those artists or on feminists...I'm still not sure. He does say 'social projects camouflaging a kind of visual poverty' which makes me think that he may think that socially critical work doesn't focus enough on the image???? He says he is interested in digestion because he is interested in art that unifies - not separates as sexuality does. Can that really be done though? It seems like he is creeping towards universality there....
There is definitely something within Delvoye's point of departure -mentioned above- which confuses me. But I do know what I am attracted to in his work - regardless of his intentions:
1. reference to Catholicism
2. use of heavy decor for images of functional objects
3. the body that is created by making the digestive machine
4. something dark in his sense of humor and his work
