I saw the Turner Prize Winning Sleeper over the weekend while in Liverpool, along with the other Prize nominees. It consists of a two-and-a-half hour film of Mark Wallinger wandering about an empty German gallery in a bear costume. They gave the prize to the wrong person, though. I think it should go to whoever writes the blurb that goes on the wall by the exhibits. It helps if you mentally insert 'man dressed as a bear' at the end of each sentence, just to remind yourself. For Sleeper, we are told:

Mark Wallinger’s work is noted for its succinct social commentary and political resonance. [Man dressed as bear...] His early work explored the values of contemporary British society, in particular national identity. His focus subsequently expanded to address themes of death and religion. Despite dealing with such expansive themes, his work is often characterised by a lightness of touch that belies the serious and multifaceted nature of the subject matter.

Sleeper records a live performance in which the artist, alone and dressed in a bear suit, occupied Berlin’s Neue Nationalgalerie for ten consecutive nights. The museum’s location enables a diversity of themes to converge, creating a uniquely complex and unsettling work. [Man dressed as bear...] The bears in the nearby historic Zoo are doomed never to reproduce, the possibility of their procreation in captivity preordained and controlled by man. Fortified by a culture of surveillance and paranoia, Berlin during the Cold War was physically, politically and socially divided. The ‘sleepers’, or double agents, blended into their surroundings by sporting plausible disguises. Wallinger, a Briton in a foreign city, disguises himself as a bear - the heraldic emblem of Berlin - an appropriation in which he becomes both ‘bear’ and simultaneously not ‘bear’.

Wallinger has described how the idea of a divided realm exists within his subconscious, shaped by a German fairy tale in which a prince is transformed into a bear. In Sleeper the Marxist dictum in which history returns first as tragedy then as farce is wryly expressed. [Man dressed as bear...] Allegory, the repression of memory, and the mutability of national identity combine to offer a meditative exploration of the language of representation, as well as an examination of the nature of perception itself. [Er... Man dressed as bear.]

He actually won the £25,000 for State Britain - reproducing Brian Haw's Parliament protest in a gallery. Mark says:

It's been taken away from the public by the police because of the nonsense of the new act that prohibits unauthorised protest within the exclusion zone, the perimeter of which runs right through Tate Britain. I have recreated the display as it was in May because it is an important document and people should see it.

He's not wrong there. And there's no point in getting into an argument about 'is it art or not?' Fine: it's art. But it's stolen art - nabbed wholesale from someone who gave a huge chunk of their lives to protest about the Iraq war. So I really, really hope Mark will be giving that money either to Brian Haw or to an anti-war / anti-arms trade group. If he really wants to get Brian's message across, 25 grand could really do something about it.

It's also bought home to me the gap between interpretation and the artist's intentions. Artists do have them. People may interpret them in their own way, and that's fine: it doesn't stop them from having them. Can't find it now, but I read a piece by Mark about his bear thing; there was some mention of the bears in the zoo, but mainly he talked about the weirdness of wearing a bear suit. Is the Marxist dictum about tragedy and farce wryly expressed? It is fuck. It's a man in a bear suit. Is it an examination of the nature of perception itself? Again, noooo, it's a man in a bear suit.

There was a great project connected with the Prize - the first time it's been outside London - that got Liverpool Taxi drivers to a) have guided tours of the show and b) talk to their customers about modern art. They showed the recordings in a taxi at the exhibition. There was also a TV show, talking to the drivers and listening in as they were shown the different exhibits. (The show itself was called 'taken for a ride'...) You had to feel sorry for the guide. Though one of them was quite affected by the bear: it reminded them of their time in an office, sealed inside a space they couldn't escape. Which just goes to show, eh?

Another exhibit by Nathan Coley, apparently, does the following, according to the translator:

Nathan Coley explores how power can be inferred through architecture and public space. Underpinned by research, his aim is to facilitate an increased physical and mental engagement with our environment. To enter and exit the installation we step over sculptures, bounding the space and designating a threshold, a transformative state of being. Made from oak, rich with moral associations, the works also register minimalist sculpture.

The works in question are two planks of wood about four inches in depth, requiring a permanent member of staff for each to make sure you don't trip over them. As with much of the exhibition, I'm glad there was some utter shite available to read, otherwise I'd have been quite at sea in my own little pleb world. Much like one of the taxi drivers, who when told the exhibits aimed to challenge, said:

If I go and hit that bloke over there in the head with a hammer, that'll be challenging, won't it? Will it be art, then?

Errrr... no. I think you miss the point; you have to be open to how these pieces can broaden your mind.

Maybe for some people they can - could, even, left alone. But these exhibits and their interpretations together clamp down on each other like a vice, squeeze every last drop of possible meaning out of them. You're left with a choice: laugh your ass off or lap up what you're told by the curators like good little boys and girls. Occasionally - as with the taxi driver above - someone's touched. Great! But that's despite, not because of, either the art or the bollocks that's written about it.

The parallels with some of the worst kinds of critical writing is striking - and ironic, because they demand silence in place of critique. "Both 'bear' and simultaneously not 'bear' " is such a perfect example of this I worry that the writer must be just plain taking the piss. The writing itself matches a common style in all galleries now: as with Sleeper, be sure to list at least two of 'allegory, the repression of memory, the mutability of national identity, a meditative exploration of the language of representation, an examination of the nature of perception itself' or some version of these. If you're going for the Turner, namecheck the lot. Twats.