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Why did we want to stage an event that could well have set sparks flying? Well, the arts and the media debate was prompted by a number of events in the arts sector over the past year, including very public disagreements between artists and various critics/reviewers.
aaa thought a debate would be a good chance for both the sides to discuss issues in a fun and friendly environment. To enable both sides to better understand the issues and pressures put on each other, we decided to have the arts team argue the affirmative of the moot and the media team the negative. This did present a challenge for panellists, but they commented that it really had made them think about the issues. In the end the nastiest the debate got was Tom Scott's introduction. In keeping with the moot Tom gave a cruel and self-deprecating review of himself. "I was asked to come from Wellington to chair this debate tonight," he announced, "as there is a shortage of fat, red-faced, bald men in Auckland."
From that moment the audience seldom stopped laughing. Mike Chunn, leading the affirmative side, read the audience one of the "best" reviews Split Enz ever received. The American review reported that the legendary band "monkeyed around the stage like a collection of idiot robots".
NBR News Editor Deborah Hill-Cone convinced the audience reviewers simply didn't have the talent or understanding required to be a more important part of the creative process than artists. Look at the Trust Waikato Contemporary Art Award made of beer crates, she encouraged. Look at the dew-covered rose of Walter's Prize winner Yvonne Todd. Deborah could make sense of neither. She could never have come up with them, she assured the audience, so how could she be more important than the clever, award-winning artists who did?
Douglas lloyd Jenkins agreed. "My special admiration goes to Martin Creed whose award for 2001 for "The Lights Going On and Off," consisted famously, and rightly so, of an empty room in which a light switch almost beyond comprehension to us mere mortals turned wait for it the lights on and off."
But it was actor Geraldine Brophy's performance that had the audience wowed. Her speech was written and performed in Shakespearian-style. Taking lines from each of the bard's famous plays, she used them to argue her case. Her performance caused Tom Scott to joke as she sat down, "The negative team just admitted defeat."
It's fair to say that both teams, however, had problems arguing the "wrong" side of the moot. As Chris Saines commented "I can hear those unconfined squeals of delight that must have filled their [aaa's] gin-soaked and airless committee room the "a ha!" moment when some bright spark suggested that the conventional arts and media postures might be reversed." (We wish it was gin-soaked or even better Bolly-soaked Chris, and that airless-committee room is in your gallery!)
Heath Lees, however, did a marvellous job of diminishing his own importance and that of other reviewers. How, he wondered, could reviewers be the most important person in the creative process when they depended on the creative process for their job? "It is like saying a bun taster is more important than the baker when quite obviously the bun taster is just a parasite."
But he went further, describing the rigorous job interviews reviewer's must pass in order to nab their gigs: "Can ya type?" and, "are you available after hours?"
Steven Gray added that reviewers importance was reflected in their pay next to nothing. And then he became still more forthcoming, giving the audience a tip: a good or bad review is entirely linked to when the critic last had sex.
But Mika was on the reviewer's side (or at least attempting to be). He decided to demonstrate their accuracy using a review from a 1997 Edinburgh performance in which he was deemed a "glamour puss with buns of steel". He assured the audience both descriptors were correct with a quick pose and a flash of his behind (fully-clothed, of course). But for reviewers struggling, Mika had advice: make sure your review has quality and usefulness. He couldn't however help but finish with a serve to the other side. "Long live reviewers, tribe of the acid tongue," he cried.
But it was the arts panel that the audience voted the winners their arguments for the importance of reviewers were obviously flawed but as is to be expected from seasoned performers they won the audience over anyway. |
