While looking for more information on the baffling news that Richard Prince has launched a drink called Lemon Fizz with canned iced tea giant AriZona, we happened upon the photographer, painter, and appropriation artist’s blog and noticed that he’s been very active lately, and is writing some fairly provocative things. Thus this weekly feature was born, in which we will present to you Richard Prince’s best blogging moments from the past week every Friday.
Among the most noteworthy things on Richard Prince’s blog this week are his feelings about a memorial the Metropolitan Museum hosted for late Australian art critic Robert Hughes, his claim that an outdoor sculpture at FIAC is an appropriation of one of his own unexhibited works, and his thoughts on women’s grooming habits.
On Wednesday, Prince learned that the Met would be hosting a public memorial remembering the outspoken art critic Robert Hughes, prompting a heated exchange with his wife that he recounted later on his blog, despite his wife’s directive not to do so:
Last night I asked my wife how to spell the name Robert Hughes. [...] What I wanted to say was how I reacted to a text I had just read… about the fact that Robert Hughes was to be “remembered” at the Met tomorrow. That’s exactly what the text said. She said, “and what was your reaction?” I told her my reaction was, and what I wanted to say was… “Robert Hughes is to be “forgotten” tomorrow at the Met”. She kind of physically recoiled and said, “that’s pretty mean. Why are you even bothering to say anything? Don’t you always ignore these irrelevant people?” I said, “yea, but this reaction about being “forgotten” came pretty quickly. It rings true.” “Yea, but even so”, she said, “it’s still mean spirited and shallow”. She said, “didn’t he write for Time magazine? I mean Time magazine… come on. They wouldn’t know how to spell the word cat if you spotted them a “c” and an “a”.” “Yea, your right”, I said, “but it’s hard to put it out of my mind. And why the Met? The fucking Met? What the fuck is that about? I don’t see the Met remembering any of my dead friends.” “Don’t go there”, she said. I said, “Where”? “The Met”? “No” she shouted. She shouted “shit head” too. Now she was pissed at me. She started to walk away and leave the room. She was in no mood to listen my “bother”. One last turn before she went upstairs, “What you should do if you can and I’m sure you can’t is forget about yourself”.
Also on Wednesday, in a post cryptically entitled “There’s Something About Mary,” though apparently not in reference to the 1998 Farrelly Brothers gross-out comedy starring Cameron Diaz, Prince candidly offered his thoughts on women’s public hair, or lack thereof. As he put it:
I wish women would stop shaving their pubic hair. Let it grow. I hate it when the pussy is shaved. It’s awful looking and it looks painful. It so much better when it’s covered by lots of hair. It’s suppose to be that way. The more hair the better. A big nest of hair. Crimson flames. High and mighty traps. And while your at it, why don’t you let the hair under your arms grow back too. Black bra… terrorist or friend?
And then yesterday, Prince’s thoughts turned back to art after he apparently perused ARTINFO’s slideshow of the outdoor sculpture installations at this year’s FIAC art fair in Paris. In his post “Birdtalk” he claims that Dominique Ghesquière’s “bateau” — a rowboat installed underwater so that only its rim is visible — is a better version of a similar work he made but never showed to anyone. He explains:
The edges were the only thing above the surface and the continuous line they made turned the shape into an erotic opening. Maybe “opening” is the wrong description. The outline was more of a negative and the harmony of the object and its surroundings made perfect sense. It was actually better than what I had done in one of my upstate ponds. A couple of years ago I was making a video where part of the story called for the sinking of a ship. I didn’t have a ship but I had a rowboat and I basically scuttled the tiny vessel until the only thing showing were it’s edges which formed a perfect cunt like shape. (I wanted to sink one of those large cruise ships and have everybody jump overboard but Shelley Wintered it so I made due with what I had). The sunken row boat stayed like that until the cold set in and the pond froze and when the Spring came and everything thawed it had disappeared into the depths and the only way you could view it was to scuba your way down to its graveyard. I was glad to see the piece in the Tuileries today. It was simply called “Boat”. As I said a better boat.
While the submerged boat’s vaginal shape hadn’t occurred to us until just now, it certainly makes sense given the frequent use of water as a symbol of femininity. As for Prince’s cruise ship-sinking aspirations, we heartily recommend that he visit Thomas Hirschhorn’s “Concordia, Concordia” installation at Gladstone Gallery, which closes tomorrow. We’ll look forward to reading his blog post about its murky sexual metaphors next week.
— Benjamin Sutton