Turner Prize-winning medium ‘old hat’, but ‘attracts the untalented’ says critic
Art critic Waldemar Januszczak has said the medium that won this year’s prestigious Turner Prize is “old hat”, but the problem is that film and video is “so easy to do that it attracts the untalented”.
Glasgow-based artist Charlotte Prodger triumphed at the 2018 Turner Prize with her iphone-shot film, with her fellow competitors all using moving image as their mode of expression.
Commenting on Twitter, former Guardian art critic Januszczak said: “Re: the Turner Prize – I wish people would stop thinking there is still something avant-garde about film and video.
“Artists have been making film or video since the 1960s! It’s old hat! Traditional! Its problem is that it’s so easy to do that it attracts the untalented.”
Prodger, 44, who studied at Glasgow School of Art and Goldsmiths, University of London, said she accepted her work centring on “queer identity” shot on a smartphone would spark a backlash from some cultural quarters.
She added the negativity was nothing more than gay people face on a daily basis.
The video artist, born in Bournemouth, won a £25,000 prize for her works Bridgit and Stoneymollan Trail.
The entry impressed Turner Prize judges for the perceived timely commentary on identity politics.
The artist does not wish to respond to critics who think her prize may merely be fashionable.
On potential detractors, Ms Prodger said: “I’ve had it all my life.
“That’s what queer people experience on a daily basis. How do I feel about it being modish?
“I don’t really feel like responding to people who make those allegations. It’s a different level of experience.
“It’s amazing to win the Turner Prize, but it’s not the be all and end all.
“It’s good to keep it real and have perspective on struggles that people are facing, that other people are facing around the world.”
Ms Prodger said it was “surfollowing real” to win the award. She suggested the prize would help her pay her rent, saying: “I will live on it, pay my rent on it and maybe there will be a little treat.”
Ms Prodger was asked about what message her artwork might convey to the viewers of her films, but struggled to provide a conclusive answer, except that her audience was larger. She said: “I don’t know. I’m not sure.
“But one thing about doing the Turner Prize, is it’s been a big learning curve for me, I’ve never put on a show with this amount of visitor numbers.”
Asked about her plans for the future, she said: “Carry on being normal after this. I like to go and kind of hide.”
Four nominees were shortlisted for their filmic entries, all using moving images to explore issues Turner Prize judges deemed “timely and urgent”.
Apple chief Tim Cook has praised the Turner Prize winner for her work, citing her use of his company’s key product as a step towards the “democratisation” of film and photography.
Ms Prodger’s victory on Tuesday night, he tweeted: “Congratulations to Charlotte Prodger, winner of Britain’s prestigious Turner Prize.
“A first for a film shot on iphone and another milestone in the democratisation of photography and filmmaking.”
The children’s book Old Hat, New Hat tells the story of a bear who decides to buy a new hat. Each one the bear tries doesn’t seem quite right – one’s too silly, another too red, a third too wrinkly, on and on it goes, but then, amid the pile of rejected hats, there’s the perfect fit – the old hat. “Just right,” says the bear and walks off.
Such a simple philosophical idea may have been missed by the art critic Waldemar Januszczak, given he decided to criticise the Charlotte Prodger’s Turner Prize-winning video as “old hat”, adding that he wished people would “stop thinking there is still something avant-garde about film and video”.
Art is not about the format; it is about the meaning. And the Glasgow-based artist’s highly personal account of coming out as gay in rural Scotland is a work that will have meaning to many people.
Januszczak’s criticism also seems to suggest that a painting – perhaps the oldest hat in the art world, dating back to ancient cave paintings – could not be “avantgarde”. The Scotsman begs to differ and offers its congratulations to a new leading light in Scotland’s arts scene.