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POST SCRIPT: after the USA EXHIBITION
RETURN OF ART TO AUSTRALIA
When
the exhibition at Echo finished my works had to return from the USA.
Fortunately for Australians they are protected by a vigilant customs
and quarantine department whose actions are governed by Australia's
self-belief in Australia's innate and central importance in world
affairs which they, the frontline troops, are to keep intact. Armed
with the knowledge that events of global significance are more likely
to happen on Australian soil than anywhere else on this planet their
job is to protect Australians. In protecting this country from a world
full of villains their vigilance is not tempered by their stupidity or
lack of imagination. So it was, that when my purpose-built art crate
reached its destination, Australia, the authorities of this country
acting with the impunity possessed by a body which can act with
complete immunity from the consequence of their actions decided that my
crate posed a risk. Somehow, in the nation central to world
civilisation, my crate with its paintings was, it seems, no more than a
Trojan Horse intended to get in underneath their radar. So in looking
for the means by which I was going to corrupt the Australian mind these
authorities decided that there must be something of value concealed in
the crate and this of course excluded the paintings. The interior of
this crate was slashed (below is one of the photos I have taken). Parts
of the polystyrene were gouged out ... looking for heroin? What? The
joins of this crate are glued and stapled together. These were pried
apart by customs looking for the pestilence I may have intended to
bring into the country. Alas, these vigilant defenders of the chastity
of a nation already f#=ç@*ked found nothing. So now, as a
monument to Australia's vigilance, I have a crate which I can not use
again. It is no longer dust/bug proof as anything can now get into it.
Its interior is in a condition that if I repaired it by taping up their
slashings to use it again to transport paintings it will appear that
the crate has been tampered with which will thus elicit investigation
again. It's not even good as fire-wood as its exterior is painted
yellow and the polystyrene lining will give off toxic vapours. Thanks
Australia!
above: circled, the superb craftmanship of Australian customs. This is only part of the damage by Australian customs.
(refer to notes)
exhibition in 2004
Two photomontages were exhibited in a group show at CCP before it closed down.
exhibition in 2009
HUMANIST TRANSHUMANIST 17 June - 5 July:
the fiasco of Guildford Lane Gallery of Melbourne
Guildford Lane Gallery is run by the toxic Robert Cripps. AVOID THIS GALLERY ASSIDUOUSLY!
This page had been disabled - censored - by iinet (on whose servers I came to host my site after it was pulled by Ilisys, the company which had previously hosted this site).
And, after I hosted vakras.com on my own server complete and uncensored, Telstra, Australia's primary Telco, disconnected me from the internet completely. To make certain that vakras.com remained off-line, someone using the cover of the disconnection by Telstra, hijacked my domain. These actions which have resulted in the disabling of my site completely, and/or in part, have been undertaken on behalf of Robert Raymond Cripps of Guildford Lane Gallery. The domain hijacking, which was reported to the police here is still (to my knowledge) under investigation. (On the conspiracy to commit fraud, go to cyberrefugee.com )
Cripps' assertion has it that what I have written on this page about the exhibition which describes his disgraceful conduct is false even though his own emails constitute most of the evidence against him. And, his claim has it, our pages should be removed because of his claim that their content is false. The corollary to this is that removal constitutes an acknowledgement of falsity by us. No such acknowledgment has been made, nor will it EVER. Our pages were hacked by our ISPs who had no right to do so, on the say-so of Cripps' lawyers. The absence of these pages, or sites, never implied in any way that we acceded to Cripps' vexatious claim.
The absence of our pages has caused us much embarrassment and made it difficult to mount our campaign against his claim; and to garner support in our fight against him.
There is no part of the contract that we signed with him that stated that the exhibition was for the promotion of Robert Cripps. The exhibition was to promote us and our art, putting it into public display for public discourse, and for it to be available for sale, etc. There is no part of the contract for our exhibition at Guildford Lane Gallery that states that the purpose of the exhibition is to limit any reference of our experience with Robert Cripps to be only positive (for him); or that we have a legal obligation to FALSIFY the account of our exhibition for the purpose of providing him with a positive account; or that he has, had, or ever will have, any say, or right of veto to what we write solely because he wants only positive accounts, irrespective of his behaviour.
Whereas the laws in other parts of the world include rights such as the right and freedom to receive or impart information, such as Article 10 of the European Convention of Human Rights, there are no such rights available here, at the arse end of the world, Australia.
Demetrios Vakras.
Much money was spent by myself and my co-exhibitor Lee-Anne Raymond to make this show a success. This has turned out to be a waste of money. The owner, Robert Cripps, had, at the time of writing this, still not paid us for work that sold during the show [payment was eventually made around 6 weeks later - after we sought legal advice].
During
the course of the exhibition he, by his actions, circumvented our
capacity to promote our work. His idea of a contract, we were to soon
discover, is that he believes he can unilaterally insert conditions
subsequent to any original agreement. The result of his actions was the sabotage of the exhibition. Cripps turned the exhibition into an expensive debacle for us, but he made a profit on it.
Below: a photograph of some of the works exhibited at the June-July exhibition in 2009. The exhibition was of never-before exhibited works by myself and Lee-Anne Raymond. A fully illustrated catalogue was published to accompany the exhibition. [the catalogue can be purchased here]. Essays which are featured in the catalogue were pinned alongside our artwork in the exhibition.
As I write in the publication Humanist Transhumanist which accompanied the exhibition, I oscillate from incongruous juxtapositions to symbolism with my art.[a sufficient explanation can be read here] Political commentary is de riguer in art; from Delacroix's celebratory Liberty Leading the People, to condemnatory works such as Goya's The Third of May 1808.
My art is a continuum of such political commentary which is also part of the repertoire of historical surrealism. For example, Max Ernst's Europe After the Rain and Dalí's Soft Construction with Boiled Beans (Premonition of Civil War). (My commentary on the latter work appears on p. 19 of Humanist Transhumanist.)
And, consitent with surrealism's early roots, I am critical of religion, ALL religion without exception. In a country like Australia that boasts of its secularity such criticism you might imagine would be welcome. However, this has turned out to NOT be the case.
Our exhibition was condemend by Cripps not because I was critical of Christianity, or Judaism or of Zoroastrianism, but because I criticised Islam at all. It turns out to be, as I wrote in my essay of 1980, a case of The Instance of Grievance when confronted with the Falsehood of Truth, the title to a drawing of mine from 1978 when I was aged 15. [This essay can be found here]. Cripps' reaction is about shooting the messenger because what he held to be true turns out to be a lie. With his lie exposed he simply shoots the messenger. To explain.
[THIS PAGE IS EXPANDED HERE]
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Cripps took exception to my explanatory essays.
Some of my essays juxtapose quotes from both the Old and New Testaments alongside Hitler's Mein Kampf, to show that Hitler's racial exterminations were Biblical (religious). [An assessment of Hitler's Christianity]
Hitler wrote:
"...I believe that I am acting in accordance with the will of the Almighty Creator: by defending myself against the Jew, I am fighting for the work of the Lord." Mein Kampf p.60, Manheim translation.
Hitler's enmity of Jews is based on 1 Thessalonians 2.13-16 from the New Testament. [quoted here]
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above: one of Cripps' many disclaimers (circled) |
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Yet it was not the exposure of the Biblical basis of Hitler's racism that Cripps took exception to. His actual objection was to my quoting from the Koran, particularly 9.38-52, in which the god of Islam, "Allah", guarantees automatic "martyrdom" to those who are killed while in the act of killing non-Muslims.
According to Cripps, quoting the Koran is insensitive to "Palestine", because he is opposed to, as he said, "the Jew's state in Palestine." He then accused me of "racism"! (Neither "Israel" or "Palestine", or the conflict there are mentioned in the exhibition)
Cripps, who does not know the difference between opinion and fact, placed disclaimers everywhere in the exhibition.
The "Disclaimer" reads:
"The management would like to state clearly that the views and opinions expressed in this exhibition are those of the artists, and not in any way representative of the views or opinions of the management, staff or volunteers of Guildford Lane Gallery."
The quotes from the Koran though are NOT an opinion. What quoting from the Koran achieved was the exposure of Cripps for what he is: a racist.
Unfortunately, some of the photographs are not in focus (limited depth of field). When Lee-Anne and I visited to photograph our exhibition, he followed us, harried us, ranting, ordering us out of our exhibition, even though we had a legal right to be there, and he had no legal means of executing his demand. He is a bellicose bully limited in erudition and of limited intellect.
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below: detail of Cripps' disclaimer |
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Cripps is a self-confessed racist [this page is expanded here]
He is a manifestation of the new-left who have adopted the sentiments Hitler expressed in his Mein Kampf, but who believe that, though theirs and Hitler's sentiments are the same, their racism is a 'justifiable' one [expanded here].
The above brief summary of this exhibition is expanded in greater detail here.
Australian arts journalists (which included those who write for the Age and the Australian newspapers) were contacted by email. Some journalists did respond with sympathetic emails, but did NOTHING. No response of any sort was forthcoming from any journalist from Murdoch's the Australian and Herald Sun.
Australia's arts intelligentsia, a parody of the British arts intelligentsia, ignored the show.
The premise behind many of my works in this exhibition was the condemnation of religion-incited violence, and religion-incited racism. My works specifically condemn the 4 'montheisms': Zoroastrianism, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, whose religious doctrines demand that their followers commit murder as an act of piety on behalf of their respective faiths. The exhibition also featured two works from my current series of "Mytheic Works" [preview here].
The exhibition was arranged as a counter-point to an exhibition of the powder-puff surrealism of Salvador Dalí whose works were being exhibited at the time at Melbourne's state art museum (the NGV).
It became evident that Cripps was utterly ignorant of surrealism, ignorant of its counter-cultural, counter-religious, and therefore its original revolutionary intent.
(For example, refer: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Révolution_surréaliste :
"the initial issue announced the revolutionary agenda of the La Révolution surréaliste with, "It is necessary to start work on a new declaration of the rights of man."…the third issue announced, "End of the Christian Era."…Writer and actor Antonin Artaud wrote an open letter to the Pope, "Address to the Pope," and expresses the revolt against what Surrealists saw as oppressive religious values…anticlerical remarks are found throughout La Révolution surréaliste and reflect the group's relentless campaign against oppression and bourgeois morality.") ]
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[the old version of this page is archived]
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