Fugue Chat

Matt talks about narcissism. Is this podcast narcissistic, he wonders? (Yes, is the answer.) Also, what is it to perform narcissism in an age when our sense of self is always already fractured and scattered across the technological platforms through which we construct it?

Matt walks to the library and talks about what it means to have conviction as an artist. What should you have conviction in? When is it useful to remain convinced by your work and ideas, and when is it important to give up? (n.b. At some point in the podcast Matt shouts ‘8:30’ and that’s because someone has just asked him the time in the street.)

Matt talks about his teenage anti-capitalism, seeing the back of things and how political disgust can turn into aesthetic interest.

Matt walks to work and talks about the desire to act out while teaching.

Matt walks to the library and talks about Object Oriented Ontology, Ed Atkins, and the NPC and POV trends on social media.

Matt walks around campus and talks about how being an artist trains you to make decisions, and how we find the edges of what can be talked about in art practice, and what has to be passed over in silence.

Matt tells the story of a forgotten artwork based on a denim tote bag made by the artist James Richards’ as part of ‘Music for the gift’, his Wales in Venice project from 2017. Warning: Matt sings a song at the end.

Matt walks to work and talks about memories he didn’t ask for.

Matt walks a slightly different route to work and talks about different kinds of boredom.

Matt walks from Lewisham to New Cross and talks about theme parks, art and the relationship between class, taste and the intensity of aesthetic experiences. Not quite a trigger warning: this episode opens with me referring to and deconstructing a dismissive and classist joke that I made to my wife.