The Paintings of Marg Nicoll

Art for art’s sake, money for God’s sake

by Member, Geoff Todd AM

In a time when a digital artwork sells for a record $69 million at Christie’s first NFT (Non-Fungible Token) auction, and while I am still quite sure I cannot tell anyone what “Art” is, I could not resist illustrating Ari Lun’s essay, Art Hoax, on how the art world may have been duped by dealers and others from the early twentieth century onwards. Could it be happening again? Recently in Art Industry News, David Hockney, who as a living artist has achieved the world’s highest auction price for a painting, spoke about NFTs, calling them “silly little things” for “crooks and swindlers”.

As a former art lecturer and teacher, craft adviser in Arnhem Land, and an artist who has worked mostly outside the mainstream, I don’t feel so bad about my cynical view of the art market after reading Hockney’s comments. When art students in the late sixties and early seventies, Marcel Duchamp was presented as one of the great artists of the time - and off we students went in the pursuit of ‘Conceptual Art’. Late in the seventies, English translations of Duchamp’s many interviews were finally printed in books that did not find their way to art schools, but happily out-of-print copies can now be found on the Internet. Reading Duchamp’s cynical comments about his own art, about American society and, of course, recognising his self-portrait With My Tongue in My Cheek for what it really might be, reinforced my need to bring Ari Lun’s essay to public attention in an accessible way that I found stimulating and could share with others.

For me Art Hoax was fun and by using cut paper, glue, ink and pens, while avoiding the computer, I attempted to make my own statement through

this classic handworked medium, while hopefully not producing a hackneyed and conservative anachronism. The result is a very slim and colourful volume that hopefully will entertain almost as much as an ‘artwork’.

As I. P. Rossi states in the foreword to the book (reproduced here in full): “Art Hoax is written for anybody who might wonder why unlikely objects in today’s world are called art and sometimes valued at extraordinarily high worth. This is an honest argument claiming the world has been duped by dealers in art, art galleries, art museums and on occasions, even artists. Presented here from hand cut and pasted original collages by Geoff Todd, Art Hoax proposes that the evidence of the artist’s hand in art is not something to hide, nor something to cause embarrassment, but rather something of which to be proud. All quotations are from real people – living or dead, and attributions to any quotations are within the text for the sceptics and academics who might wish to verify them. The argument is very short, as is this foreword, so readers who are not interested in a large tome arguing points of aesthetics, art and concept, may find this book as an alternative half-hour read, which will equip them for an exciting dinner table debate.”

The title of this story is from the song, “Art for Art’s Sake” (1975) by 10cc. For our story on Geoff Todd published in the July 2019 Newsletter, see: https://bit.ly/31PzrnH. To purchase a copy of Art Hoax, see https:// amzn.to/3rVVjZ5.