“How do you see things? With your eyes or with your beliefs?
And have you seen what you’re wearing?

In my mind’s eye, this is a record about ways of seeing. Though this may not be obvious. It probably, >chuckle< just looks like an electro-pop spy caper. ..Or a grown man dressing up and mucking about.
“new ways of seeing” is a phrase that ’s often associated with
the evolution of twentieth century art, during times when old
establ ishments were questioned to their core and great edifices of
assumption and understand ing came crashing down in some terrible
hours and terrific cafes and truly camp telly shows.

Those old edifices were rapidly replaced with new ones made of whizzy
new building mate rials that looked grubby in a few minutes and fell
to bits in a few years And behind such crumbling brand new facades
skulked all manner of dark ideas and covert lurking with telephoto
lenses and codenames. While most people were so quickly hacked off
with this brave new world they decided to just go shopping.

it was artists who tried to make sense of all that new mate rial thinking.
even the shopping. They Tried to hold a mirror to it all, to articulate
it, to test it, to see if they could get some money off it because they
were artists and rapidly couldn’t afford the gentrified prices. and for
better or for worse, depending on who caught them, they often did it by
looking a lot like they were simply mucking about.

Thing is, then as now, while the true artistic soul is instinctively
exploring life by clawing at the clay of their work – putting on daft
outfits, or scribbling stories in verse, or splashing abstract shapes,
or scratc hing irreverent jokes, or pressing unqualified basement
records or shouting sudden baby language into bistros or moving
their bedroom into an art gallery – the accidental fallout effect of
that work should be that your eyes get changed.

You’ll know it was ult imatel y art work not esoteric tosspottery
because You’ll realise you see the world just a little differently
having swanned around it with a glass of free prosecco on a swanky
private view. whether That artist pulled a whole wall down for you, or
just twitched a blind, there’ll be some new light break into what you
believe from their blood sweat and play.

But I would say that . I half think I AM an artist. Here, let me top up your
glass. Olive?

Of course, with All that showing off – for ‘artist’ read ‘narcissist’,
right? Do Any of us really want to see the world afresh after all, or
just want to see ourselves in new ways? well, the question i half ask
with this record is Why do we even want to be seen? Or want to hide
behind more carefully rehearsed versions of ourselves, like action
heroes on a big screen? So many digital children don’t want to go
undercover, it seems, they want to be recognised. But is this not a very
old need? A need to connect, as much as a need to explore by trying
things on. Like a great pair of trousers. Or a tea cosy.

Perhaps, though, the real trick to achieving this isn’t about making a
lot more white noise to att ract attent ion. And so I wonder if It isn’t
really about how we get seen, but how we see. My identity may be mine to play with however I like, but I suppose if I don’t ever look squarely in the eye the parping chump in the ta ilor’s fulllength
mirror that I’m really dealing with, it’s all ONLY an act and will
shed more heat than light. even the best bits of theat re grow tiresome
in the end. The truth will out, not shout.

What we see every day influences our beliefs – And so too the work
we choose, in the daylight or the shadows. The artist is more akin to
secret agent than big brother housemate because, even when hiding
in plain sight, they are really there to observe and interpret. I think
the real mission is to find the confidence to make work, make a life,
that isn’t really about you in the end, even when you’ve thrown your
own body into it. because doing that might demonstrate a world much
bigger than your own little ideas. Fearful But Inspiring. WHen you’re
finally confident enough to champion someone else’s identity sooner
than your own, to champion non-conformity, you may finally have
some perspective on who you are. Or at least know that saying so
sounds quite good.

All I know is, even if this daft bit of work doesn’t save the world,
At least I can now stop sta ring at pictures of myself all day.

Ciao for now – Momo x “