#this post is specifically about the girl who intends to climb a giant tree to collect a branch and make a bow and arrows from it

[mechaffeine]

I love having friends who are Extremely Fucking Weird

[lana-shhhhthoughts]

A Girl, A Bull, and Two Raging Men.

Here are my shhh-thoughts about the Fearless Girl, Charging Bull and an ugly Piss-y Pug that literally no one wanted. I call this palaver, “The Old Lady who Swallowed a Fly Real Life Play of the Art World” - cos apparently not all reactions to taking offence are equal and opposite (sorry Newton) - as in this case, where one seemingly swallows the other until they explode. Fortunately for the Pug (and for all of us), it was removed before someone else made a statue of a flea infestation, and someone else, a flea treatment, ad infinitum.

Before I continue with my thoughts about that dumb Pug, we need to discuss the history of the story. And before we do that, I would like to publicly state my sincere admiration for how each artist seems to deploy the character traits reflexive of their own sculptures in dealing with this palaver: Di Modica is stomping his feet and snorting at the misappropriation of his work, Visbal appears to be quietly standing her ground (check out her quote below), and Gardega, well, he just snorted, took a piss on some art and was forcibly removed from public space for being allowed off-lead. It is also intensely interesting to me that both male artists chose animals who are well known for snorting. #notallmaleartists

So. Back to the history. Way back in mid-December 1989 (that’s almost 30 years ago, kids), the world was a very different place to what it is now. Yes there had been a wave of feminism in the 70s, sure, but let me tell ya, women were still push overs in the business world in the 80s. If you don’t believe me, check out my old favourite films of the day, 9 –5 and Working Girl (where unbelievably, Melanie Griffith must have had the ONLY female boss in the firm). Great films. Great. Yuge. And then watch the film Wall Street, if only to count the number of women not relegated to being secretaries. It’s no secret that finance is dominated by men and I don’t think anyone would deny it, though they may debate the reasons behind it.

Meanwhile, in a studio not far away from the Gordon Geckos of New York but in an antithetical world, an artist by the name of Arturo Di Modica had spent $350,000 of his own money and worked for 2 years on the beautiful, massive bull that we now know and love as Charging Bull - his response to the Wall Street crash of 1986. His artistic intention was for Charging Bull’s symbol of virility and courage to be a “celebration of the can-do spirit of America … where people from all over the world could come … and through determination and hard work overcome every obstacle to become successful.” But artistic intention and artistic interpretation don’t always match up, especially as the passage of time alters our understanding of society. It’s important to note here that it was not commissioned. It was a piece of guerrilla art delivered under a giant Christmas tree in front of the Stock Exchange on Broad St in the middle of the night. Di Modica still owns the statue and it is on loan to the city. It’s an incredible act of generosity by an artist - and that needs to be acknowledged. And it was his symbol of love for his adopted country. At the time. In 1989. But regardless of whether an artist likes it or not, we always look at art through a prism of history and experience. And things have changed since 1989. For the sake of argument (in case you just CAN’T relate to the feminist angle) let’s create a specific, more universal example: let’s look at the Bull again, this time placed in the context of the GFC -  

At one point (to the artist), The Bull may have been a symbol of courage and virility, but its deliberate placement in a post GFC financial district places it in a defined environment, and our bull suddenly takes on a darker and more aggressive meaning. Instead of being “courageous and virile”, standing as separate entity to Wall Street, it now “represents” Wall Street. As representative, we see that our trusted bull invested in fragile pottery, built a china shop around all of us, had a large and public tanty, and destroyed everything. His virility also fucked us. Royally. In every way conceivable. He fucked us up and down, round and round and inside out, then walked out of the shop feeling satisfied with himself, because not only did he get away with it, he also ended up getting fed from the hand of the country that keeps telling him he’s a good boy. ‘Cos you know, “bulls will be bulls.”

I may have gotten off on a tangent there, but my point is that post GFC, this bull takes on a dangerous and entitled quality. And thus the original intention of the artists’ work is blown away by history, and blown away by the eyes through which the viewer looks at it - eyes that still have shards of china left in them that sting.

The place of women has also changed since 1989. You just can’t make a movie like 9 to 5 anymore because people would be like “why are all those women using typewriters?”. But back then Di Modica chose a Bull as his symbol, because I guess maybe to him, the bull represented “people”, and by “people” that meant men. After all, at that time, it was mostly only men who worked the paid jobs, and definitely only men who worked the WELL-paid ones. In fact, I’m sure Sigourney Weaver’s boss character in Working Girl was probably paid just marginally more than Melanie Griffith’s secretary character was.  It was only men who could apparently make positive change through their paid work. And only men who led. And he’d have been right to think that. Because most people would have thought that. At the time.

A male cow. A. Male. Cow. Whoooo boy! How on earth could Di Modica have known that in the future, placing a bull in the financial district could be interpreted as male dominance that stands in the way of women climbing financial ladders? He couldn’t. Because the world was different then and while MOST women were doing unpaid or underpaid work that allowed men to succeed in their careers – they simply weren’t acknowledged as being able to succeed themselves. What Di Modica didn’t address then, was that women WERE working very hard and HAD the determination. They just weren’t recognised for it. And so, the animal he chose to represent “the people” was male.

I guess my long and drawn out point is that depending on your life experience, the bull is likely no longer viewed in the way the artist originally intended and it is more than likely no longer a symbol of love for an adopted country, but a negative reminder of bullishness and dominance, and that the privilege of power will still win in the end. And thus, someone thought that perhaps it is time to change the reading of that art to something more positive. Enter State Street Global Advisors, Kristen Visbal, McCann and Fearless Girl. There has been a LOT said about Fearless Girl. Initially we loved her! I mean, yes, it took appropriation to a whole new level, making the world discuss the pluses and minuses of appropriation (which is a whole other post), but in general, suddenly a lot of women around the world got excited. Because they could see themselves in her, and they could see her in themselves. We’ve all faced that angry bull - not the 1989 interpretation, but the one we see in 2017: the dominant males who refuse to let us pass (notallmen guys notallmen). We empathise with her, we know she’ll grow into a woman with the same stance, I think most of us wish we were her. The bull snorts and she breathes it in like it feeds her. It is wonderful and empowering and celebrates mixed race. Certainly, I know women who bring their daughters to the statue and I already know young girls who adopt her stance. That alone is priceless. So we loved her. We loved her!

Until it was revealed that SHE was an advertising campaign. Let me get this straight…. we LOVED HER… and then we found out an artist actually got paid in dollars instead of “exposure” and suddenly it’s not ok. Is it because we felt duped? Or because the company has a NASDAQ ticker of SHE? Now, SSGA are not entirely clean – they allegedly invest in mining, petrol, and fracking amongst other frightening things, and some of those companies have associated human rights violations. So, when I write this next paragraph, I am in no way defending those investments (which do absolutely need to be considered in the context of feminism) but for now I will separate it for just a moment. Because… Advertising or not, you cannot deny that SSGA and McCann got it right. Someone there should deservedly be guzzling multiple cases of Moët, because this work was a great success until we decided that a corporation shouldn’t be paying for art. So, it’s an ad. But it’s an ad that works, unlike the failed Pepsi ad, and the “come drink a beer with me and I’ll change my deep-seated hatred of transexuals” Heineken ad. Those ads don’t work and will never work, because they don’t speak our truth. Let’s face it: Margaret Court ain’t never gonna change her mind on same sex marriage just by sharing a Heineken with a gay couple deeply saddened by their inability to get married in Australia. But finally, finally, here is an ad that actually harnesses the zeitgeist, and does it in a fierce sculpture that we, as the world, can enjoy as a work of art after they’re done advertising it. Or, another way to think about it is as a commissioned sponsored work (and god damn it, art SHOULD be sponsored).   And women are fiercely protective of it. We so rarely see ourselves presented in art in powerful poses that when a dude bro is photographed humping it, to shame and diminish her power, we immediately react. I mean seriously, who WAS that guy? Because…. Fearless Girl is more than just a statue. She IS us. I mean sure, not everyone agrees: The Washington Post published a piece saying it “portrays the empowered woman as a child, reinforcing the idea of femaleness as cute and inoffensive.” But I’m a proud femmo, and I vehemently disagree with that statement. “Cute and inoffensive”? Tell that to all the MRAs losing their shit over it. Which is another sign that it works. OK. We need to get to some nitty gritty. I am a left-leaning lefty leftist, and yet here I am defending an investment management firm with potentially dirty ties. But here’s the thing, my left-ism is based on what I think is just and true in the world, but I pepper it with a healthy dose of realism and logic: We’ve been busting the balls of financial industries for not doing the right thing for a long time (cos let’s face it, they’ve been assholes), and finally a firm decides to do something about their gender equity and we’re all like, “yeah nah, this is bullshit - you’re only addressing gender equity because you think that’s what people want.” Ummm…. Yeah!? Of course! They’re responding to what we’re asking for! Get with the program! We demanded, and they are finally delivering. And yet we rail against them for finally doing what we’ve been asking for all these years and we slam them for paying an artist to advertise their inclusive hiring practices.

And here is why that is wrong. They nailed their advertising. We’ve been talking about Fearless Girl since she was installed because the issue divided people, which in and of itself means it was successful: now the world knows that SSGA hire women. We shouldn’t be bawling them out for using corporate feminism, or art as advertising or presenting it as guerrilla art, we should be nailing them to the wall for alleged dirty investments. We should be holding them accountable and saying, “hey, well done on Fearless Girl and congrats for actively encouraging gender equity in your firm. Good one. Five stars. Go you. Shame it took you so long but never mind we got there in the end and now we can all move forward. Speaking about moving forward, let’s have a wee chat about Rio Tinto…”.

‘Cos at the moment, my guess is that they are thinking that whatever they do, they can’t win: Keep up bad employment practices? The public hate us. Try to address gender equity? The public hate us. So, given that we are loudly castigating them for publicly announcing their gender equity, why on earth would they bother cleaning up something a hell of a lot bigger: their investment portfolio?

Look. All your corporate feminism arguments are valid: Yes, they shouldn’t use feminism for corporate gain – but if the net result is that it puts more women in high positions, then use it. I don’t care. Just give women better jobs and better pay. Whatever gets us there in the end. They will always only put their profits first instead of the “right thing to do”, BUT if aligning with a feminist fight means they get more money, then it’s incentive for them to promote more women and you know who wins? Women. (And them… they also win, but the main point is that women might have a fighting chance of paying a mortgage before we die. Plus, if we finally get gender parity in finance, then we also have equal rights to be assholes if we wish.) Basically, as pure advertising though, McCann, SSGA, and Kristen Visbal totally nailed it. Good on them. You know who didn’t nail it though? Gardega, with his ugly pissing pug.

Once again, artists does not get to dictate how their art is interpreted by the viewer, no matter their intention. Sure. Alex Gardega may have been TRYING to make a statement about corporate interference in existing artworks, but what the world ACTUALLY saw was him pissing on fearless girls who to be frank have enough to contend with in the world thank you very much. Here’s the thing - and again I stress that contexualising art in the year that it is viewed is key - in 2017, women are still fighting the bull and trying to stand our ground even while dude bros are photographed rape-humping our fearlessness (suuuuuuuuch a duuuude), and yet Gardega chooses to completely ignore the social context in which he creates his ugly pissing pug, and decides to take over an important discussion with his man voice by literally pissing on the conversation. If there was an art equivalent to being mansplained, this is it. I mean, it’s not like Gardega made the work years ago, like in Di Modica’s case where the context has changed around the artwork making it read differently. No. In fact it’s worse. Gardega has completely and utterly ignored and misread the CURRENT situation, blatantly disregarding women’s daily struggle to not be debased, and he deliberately chose to piss on an image that many women see as either a mirror or an aspiration of ourselves. What a douche-canoe. If it had been a fearless BOY, would this have all happened? Would we be having this discussion at all? Would a pug be pissing on the boy’s ankles? Well no, because the artwork wouldn’t have needed to be commissioned at all if it was a fearless boy. And hence we see why she is necessary. Pissing Pug was removed a mere 3 hours later. I wonder how he feels. Is he proud? Is he indignant? Is he at ALL embarrassed that people think his art is shit? His ill-thought through, base-reaction work had zero layers to it, with complexity and depth so badly lacking that its feet are sticking out of its shallow grave. I wonder if he cares. Quite frankly, all I care about is that he has not completely derailed the conversation, yet is a mere blip - the short interjection of a self-important man who thinks he knows about “stuff” and tries to storm into a situation like a bull. But he’s not a bull. He will never be a bull. He’s a pug. A short, badly-made pug, who, try as he might, simply can’t see the whole lay of the land, because of his own stature and perspective. Ironically, if only he’d stopped pissing on fearless girl, perhaps she may have picked the pug up lovingly, so that he could see more of what’s around him. Clearly the artist has felt strongly enough that he had to interject with his statement, but he also clearly knows nothing about the conversation between the bull and the girl, because he just wasn’t listening properly. And thanks to this guy, the girl, who was otherwise busy with the bull, now has to multitask and find the time to shake the annoying piss-y pug off her leg.

Pissing Pug means nothing to Fearless Girl except for an extra bit of laundry and a wash. Of course he means nothing. Because she has a Bull to contend with. 

PS. I am fighting the urge to not post this. In fact it took me a good week and a half to post it after writing it, and now it’s no longer current. I took so long, because posting a shhhhh-thought is scary stuff: the minute this goes online is the minute I open myself up to online abuse. But I am trying to take my cues from Fearless Girl and face the bullies anyway.

PPS. I have deliberately avoided discussing the issue of appropriation and Di Modica’s reaction to Fearless Girl in this post. I hint at it, but figured it has been debated in plenty of other forums and I simply had something else to say. Also, this post is long enough as it is.

“I feel like to remove this work at this point would be to diminish everything that she stands for,” Visbal says of the brewing controversy. “Really and truly when Mr. Di Modica placed his work in 1989 it became a public work just like Fearless Girl—it belongs to the public, and the placement of Fearless Girl is simply an expression of the right to freedom of speech. There’s been some allegation that this is a corporate work but it really doesn’t matter how we came up with the piece,” she continues. “It was modeled from start to the completion of the piece by me and I utilized the same methods I use in creating any work. I’m sorry that Mr. Di Modica is not happy with the work—I asked him to join me at our sculptures twice. I think if he had taken the time to listen to how we view Fearless Girl and his work, maybe he would be embracing the women that the Fearless Girl represents.”