Whatshisname (b. 1982, Poland)
POPek Chrome Blue Dog, 2020

Let’s finish this season on a subversive note. I just realised that adjective “subversive” could be applied to some of my works. Although those who say so tend to go silent when I ask “in what way?” And I kept purposefully looking for some good subversive intervention artist that was not yet on my list, but somehow nothing interesting was popping up.

So Whatshisname will do. I like his name. Reminds me of some of my artist names – and my preference not to mix in my legal name into my arting. And I like the puppy. I’ve done puppy, too – in “Stray in Concertina” and “Stray Jam”. I also like his subversive attitude to some of the art world’s “big names” – including the very idea of “big names” (as my own attempts to avoid establishing a brand name for myself may confirm). “My Name Printed Larger than Baldessari’s – Twice – by an Art World Institution” was my brooch made of the library loan slip (for a book by Baldessari about Baldessari) and a safety pin. In “How to Explain Colour to Anti-plagiarism System” I kept uploading same text to Turnitin in different colours until it stopped complaining. I wonder if Whatshisname had a similar experience with Jeff Koons – making various naughty versions of the Puppy until he did not care any more?…