Okay, some things we encounter in life are just plain weird – Mike Gibson’s hair style; that Puerto Rican guy who swears he is Jesus – but then there’s even weirder: enter the new Michael Jackson statue at Fulham’s football ground, Craven Cottage.
It’s the brain child and tribute to Jackson by wealthy Fulham FC owner Mohammed Al Fayed, who once entertained the pop star at a Fulham game.
Fair enough, I’m a sucker for human emotion, connection and remembering the dead.
There’s also a phenomena called a time and place. My mind swirls in a stunned confused daze: a football ground; Fulham; Michael Jackson ? I don’t get it.
The problem begins in the fact Craven Cottage is a charming ground, with a heritage feel about it, and this statue is crass and the opposite.
Sitting by the River Thames, you can almost pass by this quaint and simple football ground and not even notice it, so at peace it is with the surrounds. You can approach the iron bar gate, press your face through and see the perfect green pasture.
The stands are simple and square with straight broad long roofs above, like the great early Australian veranda, all is simple and aesthetically effective.
You can smell yesteryear without trying, no need to work yourself into a lather and speak in tongue in order to get in touch with some imaginary spirit; it’s real and obvious.
You can see the sepia image; football players in long trousers, heavy cloth shirts and a large heavy ball; the mustached blurred faces of the crowd full and tightly gathered amongst a conglomeration of peaked caps and checkered woolen coats; smell the accompanying symbiotic odor of mold and mothballs.
Its a museum of early 20th century football; a time machine, and though no colosseum, beautiful.
And here, on this modest ground of sporting authenticity, now sits a statue of mans personification of plastic and pop gone wrong; a man who had nothing to do with the beauty, art and culture of football. The contrast is overwhelming.
This statue is not what we call a work of art, but looks like a store manikin with several nose, cheek and skin jobs. This is no Leonardo. It has the art skill of a garden gnome.
Predictably the statue attracted criticism from the sane amongst the Fulham football fans; to which Al Fayed replied, “go to hell”.
But here lies the big problem and this is my big theory: much man-built beauty – buildings, fine art, etc – was born under feudalism and its insanely wealthy patrons.
Fortunately these people worked very little and had a lot of time to appreciate and understand art. And understand it they did, very well indeed, and the wealthy commissioned amazing art. Today we gape in awe at them.
And this is the important part: today we still have the wealthy – who now own sport, and religion – but somewhere along the road, art abandoned them.
Now the wealthy create only the grotesque; bold, big, but artless. The wealthy recognise art only by means of a price tag. People know the price of everything, but the value of nothing – as the aesthete Oscar Wilde once wrote.
Where as we are now blessed with and adore the art of the old feudalism eras, I somehow doubt the Jackson statue born from the modern condition, will be valued by the future football supporters or art lovers. Laughed at yes; celebrated, no.
One day the US will invade England when they run out of other people to invade, and football fans will rebel and pull the damned irrelevant ugly thing down, Saddam-like.
Some will be shot for it under pillage and looting martial law, but through their sacrifice, the greater good will be achieved.
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