Masterpiece of Marketing

yoko-112 Just where is the tipping point when the avant garde loses credibility and becomes ridiculous? With the ”Imagine” exhibition in Montreal opening in conjunction with the 40 th anniversay of ”Bed-In” you do not have to be an art gumshoe to smell a whiff of hoax in the difference between real art and ”Imagine(ary)”.

By 1969 the peace industry was in turbo-charge and the scripting of ”Bed In” kept the peace genies firmly corked in the bottle from the comfort of a posturepedic mattress in their five star hotel suite. Although Yoko Ono is often viewed as a pioneer in the merger of pop and the avant-garde it would appear that marketing hubris had a firm hand on the tiller ( and the till) . The vintage footage of the Two Virgins show an absence of spontaneity and disregard for humour. Both John and Yoko took themselves very seriously and seem aggressively indifferent towards their stated causes.

Yoko Ono’s recent ”Odyssey of a Coackroach” (2007) is a presentation where visitors are asked to consider art and understand the world from the centipedes point of view. This exhibit has elements which are quite macabre such as trash hampers filled with severed limbs.

The Yoko culture reminds me of a twist on the Peter Barnes play ”The Ruling Class” where lowly rug bugs play the role of Bohemian Art Aristocracy. Just a few beams of spotlight would send these roaches scrambling to obscurity. It may be a case where money considerations prevent someone from actually stating ”the Emperess is Wearing No Clothes!”

Certain seminal works in her portfolio such as ”Cut Piece” 1964 seems like strip poker with scissors,”Painting to be Stepped On” is self explanatory, ”Grapefruit” is a PT Barnum anedote to ”There’s a Sucker Born every Minute” , ”Ladder Exhibit” climbs somewhere,Film no.4 is a lengthly study of buttocks…Yoko memorabilia and art is constantly recycling to an eco-friendly exhibition near you. There is an aesthetic and a vision to her work but its very remote and abstract.

The Yoko brand has been enhanced over the years with consistent doses of retrospectives such as ”Yes Yoko Ono”, monuments, endowments and dazzling public relations. This is bohemian gauchiste chic imbued with laziness and fed by greed. There is a pervasive banality in Yoko art thats beyond boredom.”All we are saying is give please and take no chance”.