Tomorrow’s papers

Now this is a bit of a gift for me. As part of Manchester’s ‘Future Everything Festival, Jeremy Hutchinson is putting people’s social media status updates onto newspaper headline billboards. Here’s the FaceBook page you go to to do it. Regular viewers will know I have a bit of a collection of these – a selection of CCTV themed ones feature in my current exhibition, the bizarre food fight ones may feature in a future one. Now what’s interesting to me about this project is that on one level it satirises the form, but it’s a form that (thanks to the anonymous sub editor at the Manchester Evening News who writes the real thing), is already satiric. The originals are therefore more subversive than the artwork, so the artwork becomes funded-festival-flim-flam.  I think the only way to save it is to subvert the art piece by posting real Manchester Evening News headlines onto the FaceBook page. I’ve started the ball rolling with “Man’s Legs Stolen – Wedding Dream Shattered”, but there’s so many – “Pie Yob Facing Ban From United”,  “Diner’s Vendetta – Over a Sausage”, “Window Cleaner Drowns In Own Bucket” – all real. Contact me if you want photos or further suggestions.