Scott’s work is about showing the viewer the ugly reality of consumerism hidden in the backgrounds of our society. I personally relish in the act of cutting the Socialist Throat, and enjoy watching people speak out against the injustices our nation usually enacts. While my work doesn’t necessarily focus on corporate or political belief structures, I respond to it well. I enjoy hunting and finding the fraud behind what people say and what they actually mean or convey. I even use to create and collect ‘puns’ because I think they are exciting and misleading and intelligible. I think this work has got a greater theme of brainwashing than anything. Global warming is just a theory and Buddhism, like any religion, has a set list of rules that one must conform to in order to reach Satori. And obviously the American army and Third Reich require you give up all of your civil liberties.
2) Do I agree with the message he is trying proclaim?
Yes. As artists it is our job to notice when ‘the man’ is bending us over and raping us. I would even be as bold as to recommend he attack the corporate executives more than he is. He says the “executives seem to slough it off as a social problem, not their moral problem,” but in the same way he isn’t really contributing to making the situation better. It’s like when I hear a shitty rap song blaring from some ignorant assholes ride… They rap about the problems in our modern society, but offer no remedy to these problems. Yeah, I know there is crack being made and bitches getting smacked in the streets, but how can we fix it? I’m not saying I know the answers, but art should address how we can also create better living conditions for ourselves and for others. Or maybe not. Maybe that’s the job of the guy with the microphone?
3) What do I like/dislike about the work?
I like the fact that he brought all of the different ideas together in one piece and how he showed them relating to one another. 54 zafu cushions (like good little soldiers) lined up in front of the swooshtika (Hitler/Nike corporation), yielding their attention. The colors and shapes are all well balanced. I think he could have given the cushions different patterns though. Some of them are the same, and it shows less various than there would really be if these cushions came to represent real people.
4) What other famous artists can I relate to this work?
As far as conceptual pieces go, I would have to say Andy Warhol. One of his main themes in all his work was how we tend to become so desensitized to acts of violence, racism, political propaganda, and pop culture icons by simply viewing them on our TV’s every day. We grow numb to them because they are common. And one of the main themes Scott Greiger uses in his work is how corporate logos and political symbols, typically everyday images, get lost in the background but continue to influence our perceptions on class, wealth, health, beauty, or anything else we use to help construct our residual self image.
5) Does this work have a positive or negative impact on you?
I would say it has a positive impact on me because I can steal his ideas and use them in my own work. I think most people would say it was negative and would thus ignore it. No one wants to face the truth. No ordinary consumer wants to condemn the products or ideas that make life easy, even if a child in Malaysia is making it for them in poor working conditions, or if the products are being tested on animals, or if people are being sent to the slaughter in other countries because of one man’s influence.
6) Has this work changed me?
I would like to say so. I should explore what meanings in my work could represent in other contexts. My compositions or color choices could closely correlate to other culture’s ideas and that would give my work more depth. I’m just too ignorant right now. You can only be so worldly at age 23. But writing about this work has influenced me to do some more research and brainstorming when I am creating a piece!
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