Returning to my riveting series on whether AI thinks an artwork is by a child or professional, it’s adamant that this one was created by an artist. Asked about the meaning it’s going with:
“I’d say the meaning is probably somewhere around abundance, softness, bodies, craft, colour and maybe the boundary between sculpture and textile work. It has that modern-art confidence of being friendly and inviting at first, then gradually making you wonder whether you are looking at something joyful, biological, decorative, unsettling or all of those at once. In technical terms, it is doing a lot.“
It was created by Joana Vasconcelos (1971-) in 2011 and has the title Shoreditch. It’s made from wool, murano glass, polyester and wood. It seems that the piece is named after the vibrant part of London which used to contain my favourite bar (namely Goose Island), until the bloody thing shut. This means that it remains culturally significant, although perhaps not in the way intended by the artist.
I don’t know, I can’t see any point in it, but AI likes it and has found meaning. It’s going down the route that artworks have traditionally been painted by men and have been of grand sculptures and paintings, whereas this shows everyday materials can be used to create art and that has feminist undertones. And, it appears that AI is right, reading some magazine articles, this is exactly what the artist has been doing. This is why galleries can be difficult. You can think you are looking at something decorative and then suddenly it is interrogating the patriarchy. But there’s a perspective I wouldn’t have realised, so all really rather lovely.