Illegal Art (How to Rob a Bank)
This newspaper article was originally published in August 2001 in The Lakeville Journal
To rob the Robarts branch of Coutts & Co., a bank in London, you’ll need to be cautious. But more importantly, you’ll need to be able to follow directions well.
You see, Janice Kerbel has already done all of the time-consuming research and planning for you. She’s meticulously timed the twice-daily arrival of the armored trucks. She’s drawn a detailed blueprint of the bank’s floor plan and surroundings, noted the small area that isn’t under surveillance, and conveniently taken black-and-white photos of it. She has described every turn of a 2,000+-mile escape route for you, through the Channel Tunnel and into France. All that remains to be done is the robbery itself.
Kerbel’s work, entitled Bank Job, is part of the Aldrich Museum’s exhibit, entitled “Art at the Edge of the Law,” which will run through September 9. Kerbel effectively blurs the line between crime and art, even to the point where she chose a date for the robbery to take place. (Instead of a robbery, however, Kerbel released a “do-it-yourself” handbook on that day containing the aforementioned plans.)
But if you think Kerbel’s exhibit is “on the edge” of legality, some of the other artists’ works will downright stun you. For example, Barton Lidice Beneš, an HIV-positive artist, created a work of art called Flying Missile. It’s very simple, really. He took a syringe and drew some of his blood. Then he attached a syringe, needle facing forward, to a plastic toy airplane. Voila! He could effectively infect someone with HIV from many feet away. Another of his works was called Molotov Cocktail, and you can probably guess what that involved. But Beneš isn’t just a nihilist. In his work, he wants to show that having HIV makes him feel like he’s a living weapon.
Other works at the exhibition have been widely publicized in the mass media. For example, during the 2000 presidential election, the Vienna-based “ubermorgen” hosted a web site called [V]ote-auction, originally started by American student James Baumgartner. The idea was that any registered American voter could go to the site and sell their vote. After signing up, their name was added to the database of people from their state that had registered. Any company, individual or organization could bid on that block of votes and, when the auction was over, the money would be equally split up among the members of the group. ([V]ote-auction reports that Connecticut voters got $24.83 each, Massachusetts voters got $13.43, and New Yorkers got $18.96.) The reasoning behind the site boils down to: since corporations and organizations already use large amounts of money on political advertising, why not give the money directly to the public? (Their tagline: “Bringing Capitalism and Democracy Closer Together.”) They weren’t ignored. CNN ran 7 stories on the project, and 13 lawsuits were brought against the company. The Aldrich displays a CNN broadcast and some of the legal papers from a lawsuit. Incidentally, vote-auction.net is still up and running, and receives over 150,000 hits a day. They soon plan on expanding their services internationally. […]
Nearly everything at this exhibit is startling and makes you reconsider beliefs that you take for granted—a trademark of great contemporary art. This is important to note, because these works get under your skin. They twitch. But the point of the exhibit is not to glorify breaking the law. Rather, they are a safe way of exploring the law. After all, the London bank was never robbed, no one was infected with HIV from a model airplane; and [V]ote-auction didn’t actually send out checks. These artists want to show you what might have been, and let you draw your own conclusions.
Of course, the Aldrich isn’t just another museum. In fact, it was the first contemporary art museum to open in the US. One reason for their excellent reputation, associate curator Jessica Hough told me, is that they exhibit art that almost anyone can relate to. They choose broad topics like family or faith as themes in order to draw people into the art. And there’s hardly anything broader than law, which surrounds us at all times. This universality, combined with the high quality of the exhibition, makes the Aldrich museum a worthwhile destination for a weekend trip.
One last thing. After you’ve successfully fled to France and are sipping a Cabernet Sauvignon at your chateau in the Loire valley, don’t forget where you saw Janice Kerbel’s name first, ok? Checks payable to [Michael Garner].
The Aldrich Museum is located at 258 Main Street (Route 35) in Ridgefield, CT. Museum hours are Tuesday-Sunday noon to 5 p.m. and Friday noon to 8 p.m. Call (203) 438-4519 for more information.