Alcoholism is such a glamourised thing. I remember being younger and more naive and listening keenly to the older and more experienced's stories of drunkenness. I remember thinking it was cool. I remember wanting to retell such stories except with me as the starring role. The truth is, England glamorises alcoholism. It's runs in the veins of this country's society. I don't really know why. It may be something to do with this countries general unhappiness. Their want to escape. Or maybe it's the economic climate? Like the prohibitions of the 20s the people flock to fluorescent nightclubs and dingy pubs for flowing booze and cheap laughs.
With one parent a recovering alcoholic, this is a subject that is highly close to home. But I want to dig deeper and see what it is about our society that loves the sauce so much. I also want to reveal more of my identity in my work, and I feel as though this is an aspect of it. I feel the pressures of drinking. I feel the escape of it.
RICHARD BILLINGHAM
Richard Billingham’s “Ray’s a Laugh”, published in 2000 by Scalo, is a bone jarring chronicle of the parts of life that shouldn’t… the life lived that isn’t, the dreams that wouldn’t be.
“A long time ago, far, far away, in a rainy-king and queen-filled land, in a colorful little-knick-knack, jigsaw-puzzle, cat-hair-filled, grease-streaked, filthy tiny fishbowl, baby Richie was born. Little Richie came into this lovely rainy little world born to proud parents, drunk-unemployed-Ray and devoted-enormous-”big”-Liz Billingham. Soon, little baby brother Jason would come along to join in the fun! Oh what wonderful places they will go! So starts the tale of Ray, Liz, Jason and lil’ Richard Billingham and their little journey through life in a little bitty box, in a tiny-poor corner of the world, called, Cradley Heath… unfortunately, things won’t quite turn out as planned."
“My father Raymond is a chronic alcoholic.He doesn’t like going outside, my mother Elizabeth hardly drinks,but she does smoke a lot.She likes pets and things that are decorative.They married in 1970 and I was born soon after.My younger brother Jason was taken into care when he was 11,but now he is back with Ray and Liz again.Recently he became a father.Dad was some kind of mechanic, but he’s always been analcoholic. It has just got worse over the years.He gets drunk on cheap cider at the off license.He drinks a lot at nights now and gets up late.Originally, our family lived in a terraced house,but they blew all the redundancy money and, in desperation,sold the house. Then we moved to the council tower block,where Ray just sits in and drinks.That’s the thing about my dad, there’s no subject he’s interestedin, except drink.”
“It’s not my intention to shock, to offend, sensationalise,be political or whatever, only to make work that is as spirituallymeaningful as I can make it -in all these photographs I never bothered with things likethe negatives. Some of them got marked and scratched.I just used the cheapest film and took them to be processedat the cheapest place. I was just trying to make order out of chaos.”
“Sometimes Jason is there, sometimes he isn’t. He lives at a lot of different addresses. Now he’s got a kid. When I used to come home from college, he was in care. He ended coming back to Mum and Dad to do his A-levels, but after about a month he didn’t bother getting up in the mornings and just jacked it in. He said he had no freedom when he was in care. Now he has loads. He just didn’t have any motivation.”
- Taken from "Ray's A Laugh" by Richard Billingham
ME
"Norwich Nights
I'm the Edie Sedgwick of EastThe princess holding the silver keys
Us all feeling sorry for ourselvesa motley crew of us, on the neon lit cobbles
dancing to our destination,a flurry of inebriated colour.
This is what we do,our crew, you too
Jigged up and melted down,we are here, the metropolis pulsates audible yet stagnant.
My heads all twisty and my eyes feel numbwhen the waves reverberate through,
Lost in life, down on luckand spinning, spinning
the matinee performance long gone
and here I sway"
21/05/13
"My Puke", photographs, 2013. A documentation of a particularly poisonous night in Norwich, celebrating the hand in of our work. I drank far too much and found my body rejecting my own insides, the colours displayed interested me, they were bright and vivid. Like they were trying to make something aesthetically disgusting look aesthetically pleasing.
I find it funny how if someone was bleeding they would immediately go to A&E at a hospital. But when it is self-inflicted alcohol abuse the case is different. I have known of people to puke deliberately just so they can carry on drinking, a feat I find ironic.
I find it funny how if someone was bleeding they would immediately go to A&E at a hospital. But when it is self-inflicted alcohol abuse the case is different. I have known of people to puke deliberately just so they can carry on drinking, a feat I find ironic.
28/05/13
28/05/13
The stark idylls of yesterdays outstretching North Norfolk beach that smelt like warm pine thudded back down to earth this morning when I had to meet my tutor to discuss my grade for this semester. I explained my desire to create more personal and gritty work based around alcoholism and she then explained her desire to be cynical about my “sustainment” of this. I have already made work on this subject I argued, I had actually already started. Then I expressed my concern for the lack of real issues that seem to be portrayed in contemporary art and she asking if I was really “informed” enough. And the truth is, I am probably not. I have no interest in contemporary art. I need to become more engaged.
I read this on Tumblr recently, an interview with Nick Frost and Simon Pegg on their latest film "The World's End" which is set around a pub and the world collapsing apocalyptically around it. Here Frost and Pegg vocalise their concerns for self-medicating within families and society in Britain, and even how alcoholism can be so close to young children as an influence.
Teetering on rocky blocks
Now the show is over
07/07/13
"Well, [the pub is] central to British society," says Pegg. “It’s so important. But when you strip away the social aspect, then it’s just somewhere that you drink alcohol. A lot of our society is based around emotionally anaesthetising ourselves. You can call it a social lubricant, but there is so much alcohol consumed in this country, and I wonder if that’s related to how emotionally repressed we are as people? Do we drink because it helps us let go, or not face that level of repression, or whatever?"
"It’s because it’s the only control we have over our lives," says Frost.
Frost still enjoys a drink: he’s an amazing cook, proper chef standard, and good food and wine is important to him. Still, now he’s a parent, he says he has a different take.
"I am kind of amazed just how much parents drink to null the pain of being a parent," he says. “You often go somewhere with a bunch of other parents and they’re hammering the wine. Also, in that two-hour period between baby’s bed and your bed: let’s get as much wine in as we can because it’s ‘our time’ now. As a worrier, I have an issue with that."
Pegg: “What if the baby wakes up and drinks bleach?"
Frost: “Yes! What if I drink four Stellas now, and I have to drive to the hospital? How do I do it? Do I have to wait for a cab? Or, if I phone an ambulance, and they see I’m pissed, maybe they will take him away from me."
Pegg: “That’s why it’s easier just to not drink, I think."
Frost: “Or not have kids."
- Simon Pegg and Nick Frost: the triumph of the nerds, Miranda Sawyer, The Observer, Sunday 7 July 2013
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