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Thomas Heatherwick's Olympic Cauldron: it's flaming well not art Thomas Heatherwick's Olympic Cauldron: it's flaming well not art
(7 months later)
Thomas Heatherwick's Olympic Cauldron has won the South Bank Sky Arts award for the best Britsh work of visual art in 2012. Yet the Cauldron is not a work of art, and Heatherwick is not an artist.Thomas Heatherwick's Olympic Cauldron has won the South Bank Sky Arts award for the best Britsh work of visual art in 2012. Yet the Cauldron is not a work of art, and Heatherwick is not an artist.
If he were an artist, he would be a really bad one. I once stood, on an icy January morning in Manchester, looking up at his B of the Bang sculpture, which has since been demolished because it kept shedding spiky metal prongs. But my instant dislike did not have anything to do with health and safety. I found B of the Bang empty and banal, a monstrous and clunking expression of a slight idea. Sculpture must be poetic, mysterious, nuanced and personal – this was just a design concept.If he were an artist, he would be a really bad one. I once stood, on an icy January morning in Manchester, looking up at his B of the Bang sculpture, which has since been demolished because it kept shedding spiky metal prongs. But my instant dislike did not have anything to do with health and safety. I found B of the Bang empty and banal, a monstrous and clunking expression of a slight idea. Sculpture must be poetic, mysterious, nuanced and personal – this was just a design concept.
Looked at as art, the Olympic Cauldron is equally empty. It obviously had its merits. As a piece of stagecraft, and as an architectural decoration, it played a magnificent part in the Games. I cooed and wowed as much as anyone when it was revealed at the climax of the opening ceremony. But just as the ceremony and the Olympics themselves had no deep meaning – they were bread and circuses – so the Olympic Cauldron was no more than a glorious candelabra. Amazing, but not art.Looked at as art, the Olympic Cauldron is equally empty. It obviously had its merits. As a piece of stagecraft, and as an architectural decoration, it played a magnificent part in the Games. I cooed and wowed as much as anyone when it was revealed at the climax of the opening ceremony. But just as the ceremony and the Olympics themselves had no deep meaning – they were bread and circuses – so the Olympic Cauldron was no more than a glorious candelabra. Amazing, but not art.
Is this to be the Olympic legacy in culture – a shallow populist celebration of spectacle over subtlety?Is this to be the Olympic legacy in culture – a shallow populist celebration of spectacle over subtlety?
OK. So what do I mean by saying the Cauldron is not art and Heatherwick no artist? If there is one thing that defines art across the ages, from an Ice Age sculpture of a bison to the work of Rachel Whiteread, it is an attempt to communicate meanings beyond the obvious. Art is something that initially makes no sense (or that has a much richer meaning than strikes you at first). It is distanced from practical problems and wanders off into realms of inner vision. "All art is quite useless," said Oscar Wilde. This is not the flip statement it appears. If something is a practical object, it rarely harbours the same turbulent storm of potential meaning that distinguishes any worthwhile work of art.OK. So what do I mean by saying the Cauldron is not art and Heatherwick no artist? If there is one thing that defines art across the ages, from an Ice Age sculpture of a bison to the work of Rachel Whiteread, it is an attempt to communicate meanings beyond the obvious. Art is something that initially makes no sense (or that has a much richer meaning than strikes you at first). It is distanced from practical problems and wanders off into realms of inner vision. "All art is quite useless," said Oscar Wilde. This is not the flip statement it appears. If something is a practical object, it rarely harbours the same turbulent storm of potential meaning that distinguishes any worthwhile work of art.
The Olympic Cauldron was made for a purpose, with a predefined and simple meaning: to symbolise the beginning of the London Olympiad. It brilliantly fulfilled this design function. But it did not have any deep poetic secret – to carry the dangerous charge of real art, it would need to have questioned its own context, carried hints that either resisted or had nothing to do with the Olympics.The Olympic Cauldron was made for a purpose, with a predefined and simple meaning: to symbolise the beginning of the London Olympiad. It brilliantly fulfilled this design function. But it did not have any deep poetic secret – to carry the dangerous charge of real art, it would need to have questioned its own context, carried hints that either resisted or had nothing to do with the Olympics.
Heatherwick is a designer who carries out projects with style. That does not make him, on this occasion at least, a sculptor with an inner vision to communicate. And yes, I think artists are better than designers; art is more rewarding and profound. The Olympic Cauldron has no depth of meaning and is not art – at least according to any definition I care about.Heatherwick is a designer who carries out projects with style. That does not make him, on this occasion at least, a sculptor with an inner vision to communicate. And yes, I think artists are better than designers; art is more rewarding and profound. The Olympic Cauldron has no depth of meaning and is not art – at least according to any definition I care about.
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