POST-OPENING STRESS DISORDER
26 November 2018, Pepino
Why I feel so lousy after the exhibition openings nowadays? When I come back home nothing makes sense and I don’t want to be artist anymore. Late Night Capitalism looks good at Makasiini Contemporary, Turku, and some works were sold including the only big painting exhibited - a capitalist Pinocchio which is one of my best paintings ever. It was placed in a Danish private collection but I understood that a conservative minister wanted it too. My enemies buy my works. Very few intellectuals have enough purchase power and desire to own art.
Now I’ve lost the drive and the inspiration again. I’m afraid that the my art makes no difference and can’t change the world. I’m just thinking about how to sell and provide for my family. I don’t want to be a robot-like professional who just works without thinking. It’s hard to question everything all the time but it’s necessary to keep my practice sharp.
LATE NIGHT CAPITALISM
12 November 2018, Pepino
Winter arrives and my badly isolated studio is getting chilly. I've done some good paintings during the fall and now it's time to move to the drawing table in our library room close to the fireplace. Painting is physical work, drawing is thinking. Before the shift I travel to Turku, Finland, next week for my solo show Late Night Capitalism at Makasiini Contemporary. I wrote a text for the exhibition but I'm not sure whether the gallery is going to use it.
Late capitalism exercises an extremely high degree of control over public and private life. It is regarded as the most extreme and complete form of totalitarianism. Political power in late capitalist states involves a total rule by the market and an all-encompassing propaganda campaign, which is disseminated through the privately controlled social media marked by mass surveillance and widespread use of brain washing. Academic Roberto Colgate describes late capitalism recognizing no limits to its authority in any sphere of public or private life and extending that authority wherever feasible.
