Author: Mark Hannam

Last weekend, I visited several commercial galleries in London, enjoying the opportunity to look at art works, which is possible once again after several months of enforced closures.  However good the quality of online images and virtual tours of exhibitions, the intermediating presence of a digital screen changes the nature of the perceptual experience: there is no substitute for being in the physical presence of the art object.  (Compare, watching a cookery programme online and eating a meal in a restaurant.)

One drawing in a room of recent work by Luc Tuymans attracted my attention.  It showed a view across a square or courtyard towards the façade of a large three-story building opposite, with two other buildings, one to the side of the square and another slightly behind the first, also visible.  All the buildings were shaded grey as was the paving of the courtyard and the road that led out of the square.  The scene was drab: a deserted space on a cold, sunless day in winter, with no people, no colour, no objects of interest.  In the centre of the drawing, as if superimposed on this dismal vista, was a white equilateral triangle, with one side rising vertically and the two other sides leading to a point to the right.  It is a familiar sign in the contemporary world, visible on every phone, laptop screen or video monitor: it is the sign that means “click here to proceed” or “start”.  It is the sign that means the opposite of two parallel white vertical lines, which means “click here to pause” or “stop”.

Continue reading “Pause”

Just over a week ago, twelve of Europe’s leading football clubs announced the formation of a new European Super League (ESL).  Their aim was to create an annual tournament, that would run alongside the various national league competitions and would rival the existing pan-European tournaments, namely the Champions League and the Europa League.  The two main differences between the new ESL and the existing competitions, were that the ESL would be smaller, with twenty clubs rather than thirty-two or forty-eight, and that fifteen teams would be guaranteed participation in the ESL each year with only five places to be secured through competitive qualification.  The twelve clubs’ goal was to create a competition with greater quality and focus, to showcase the “biggest” teams playing against each other regularly, the “best” players competing against each other all season. 

Three days later the plan appeared to be dead and buried as all six English teams that had signed up as founder members of the ESL withdrew from the initiative, in the face of a storm of protest from other clubs, former players, and groups claiming to representing the “real fans”.  But, if the proposal for a new tournament is off the table for now, it has not gone away for ever.  Just like at Easter, a form of resurrection is possible.  There are two sorts of people who really like the idea, the owners of the top European Clubs – many of whom are from America, the Middle East, and Asia – and the millions of football fans who do not live in Europe.  This alliance – between the super-rich and the mass consumer – is likely to triumph in the long run against the protectionist instincts of those in the middle, predominantly Western European commentators and fans, who care about the preservation of the traditions of the game for their own sake.

Continue reading “Own Goal”

In my late teens, I had a pointless argument with one of my friends, while sitting in a school minibus on a daytrip to learn about the geomorphology of the Surrey Hills.  Who, we debated, was the more important American singer-songwriter: Bob Dylan or Billy Joel?   Dylan, said I, because his lyrics are more meaningful.  Joel, said my friend, because he has sold more records.  That only goes to show, I said, that Joel appeals to a more popular audience, not that his songs are more important.  It goes to show, my friend said, that his songs are important to a greater number of people.  No, I insisted, for those people his songs are enjoyed along with many other songs by other artists, whereas for Dylan’s fans his songs matter more than anyone else’s ever will.  No, he replied … 

Continue reading “Special”

This week, I have been thinking about Dante Alighieri, who died seven hundred years ago in September 1321, after contracting malaria while travelling from Venice back to Ravenna, where he lived in exile.  In 1300, he had been caught up in one of those violent Florentine factional conflicts that erupted periodically, a fate that was to befall Niccolò Machiavelli two hundred years later.  In Dante’s case the White Guelph party, of which he was a member, were thrown out of power by the Black Guelph party, working in collusion with the King of France’s brother.  Dante was travelling back from Rome, after an unsuccessful diplomatic mission to the Pope, when he heard the news of his banishment, and he never again set foot in the city of his birth.  In Canto XVII of Paradiso, written fifteen years later, he makes this prophesy to his younger self:  Thou shalt by sharp experience be aware / how salt the bread of strangers is, how hard / the up and down of someone else’s stair.

Continue reading “Stasis”

As a child, I was encouraged to cultivate good habits and discouraged from acquiring bad ones.   An example of a good habit might have been brushing my teeth each night before I went to bed; an example of a bad habit might have been eating too much sugary food.   Another good habit was taking regular exercise; another bad habit was smoking cigarettes.  From a child’s perspective, good habits always needed to be cultivated – that is, they needed regular work and attention – because they were not things that one would have done instinctively.  Given the choice, plenty of sugar and no toothpaste would seem far more enjoyable.  Likewise, the appeal of bad habits called for an effort of resistance, since they held out the promise of immediate gratification, whatever worries one might have about long-term harms.  I learned that nurturing the right habits is hard work, requiring us to swim against the flow of pure contentment, against our natural predilection for easy pleasures.

As an adult, I have come to regard this approach as too simplistic.  For sure, it matters that we make good choices about daily health and hygiene, but it matters more that our habits – both of behaviour and thought – are truly ours, that is, that they are chosen by us rather than adopted unreflectively.   Habitual ways of thinking and acting are bad for us not just when they lead us into foolish or unhealthy actions, but also when they are acquired without thoughtful consent.  Just as the smoke from someone else’s cigarette can damage our lungs, so too the passive acquisition of habits can damage our character. 

Continue reading “Habitual”