mickey mouse friend or mentally liable

what is disney and how does he compare to or fit in with our society. having recently visited disney land paris the identity of mickey mouse struck me has an object that must be worth billions of dollars. in fact that particular image could be thought of as priceless, but why? what is it about an image that makes it such a popular trademark. could we explain why it is more popular than another image when all we realise that we are looking at is a coloured drawing, an object that has secured in magnetising us more to it than another.

it dawned on me that what we may be seeing here is how our brain loves to focus on familiar objects, it must love the process of identification because the electrical signal that is coming from the light produced by this object gets transposed into the nerve sensory signals that cause a certain chemical release in the body; I suppose this is a sort of addiction for familiarity. the body can create all the chemicals we need to survive so our walking talking chemist shop must find its fix by looking for visuals, visually identifying with and producing the chemical excitement our body/brain craves for. did walt disney know this? if so then he was way ahead of his time because we can certainly judge our culture and its standards by how and what kind of ‘advertising’ is used and perhaps his perception of people seemingly mixes this advertising strategy together with its physical understanding for familiarity. again the case for ‘how’ his product is managed seems to work in partnership with ‘what’ is managed. the whole identity of disney portrays our failure as a society to gain any ground for utopia that we hunger after; for instance our society seems to be divided into many categories for who ever you are i.e. I am a working class man who has one child and will go on holiday once or twice a year. I belong to a 9 to 5 TV world, pint on weekend type style yet there are others who lead a more exciting life than this, they make money all day long and who’s christmas and summers are nothing more than dates and times for distributions. where disney land can be seen as an escapism for some to others it is a reality. our world is full of these realities, where ever you are on some other part of the planet a life-story is taking place and this is the importance of what I'm saying in the context of other lives.

disney land should be compared to any great painting or work of art and perhaps walt disney is more important than pablo picasso. each work of art carries its own embroidery or visual stimulus and in this context disney portrays an authority in this way. a body of work by any artist will help communicate more of what he wants to say yet at the same time actually makes new physical biological contacts in the brain that helps us to remember. the electrical pulse that sends and receives all messages that comes through our senses are now permanently imbedded, a fixed part of the human body. it can now be said that the experience of mickey mouse once would be fleeting but the succession of images of mickey’s on products, such as cups, bags, 35 mm film has the profound effect of actually physically changing our bodies. ‘you can not forget but just fail to retain the information’, you may think you have forgotten today but tomorrow you may remember. advertising knows the power of familiarising people with products and so did walt disney.

we may now all have a case to answer because being mentally damaged by products could have an everlasting effect on our conscious or unconscious. we may thus regard anybody saying anything as making an assault on our bodies which makes them perhaps liable in law. the world that is full of ‘product liability’ has often been one which has been used only towards violent films. the deaths of those people were perpetrated by a copycat murderer so the film is to blame. american film director oliver stone does not believe in ‘product liability’ but advertising does. humans have the ability to challenge their misconceptions but I see walt disney applying his art to those that are either to busy in real life or just lazy. either way he has been very successful at what he's done and no doubt go on and on until the day come when the brain craves no more....



cardiff city of culture 2008 dream or reality by neale howells

I moved back to wales in 1991 just after graduation. my motive was to give something back to a country that at the time had ample studio places in the form of abandoned and declining industries, yet apart from this I felt wales had lost more than it had gained so I felt that staying and working here could not only give me a base but I really could make a contribution. in the years since, I have witnessed -on the positive side- a labour victory and welsh assembly. ok, the great new order in wales hasn't materialised into a functioning assembly but that is only due to no party having overall control, and the fact that its orchestrator, ron evans mp, made himself humanly flawed. overall though, especially in the arts it has looked rough. from, say, swansea's architectural new literature centre of the 1980's that was turned down for its modern design, then cardiff (please stop me if I go on) anhard aidde's opera house, the farce with the welsh assembly, which building new or old, o.k new, but now the design, next the millennium centre. ok, there are concerns with new buildings, but unlike the west wales national glass house we are more inclined to find problems than answers. in fact, we in wales could win the world championship in problem causing. that would be something, I suppose. yet, the answer isn't even money. for instance, the recently abandoned C.V.A cardiff failed not because of money but because it was a good idea badly thought out. you see, if we look at our country there are more bad things to say about it than good. if wales is failing on the NHS front with all the priority it gets, you can bet your last euro that culture is miles behind. Culture - what does that mean to most of us? opera, art, people walking through streets on stilts even. well, welsh culture is drinking, sport, television, stealing cars, vandalism, swearing a lot, going to the park, cinema, eating in/out and apparently singing, in fact welsh culture is just life. hey, what does st.fagans depict other than how we lived? go and see for yourself. so, if cardiff/wales really wants to become the new capital of culture, and unless the world sees our existing culture like theirs, then we have got a huge amount of exciting work to do. I would like to put forward that the wales in six years time is as far from our culture as it is at this moment. in six years time we should have a new generation of people who not only contribute to the arts, but are genuinely interesting and well on their way to pushing forward art nationally/ internationally. the kids that are in junior/ comprehensive schools now will have left and it is they (optomiskakly) that should be our reward. in six years time, wales should have a thriving energetic culture that is gathering momentum. it will go on to change the way we think and do things, it will carry the city of culture into the new decade as a mantle appreciating the authority it carries. how can we do this? well, apart from a particular building such as the museum of contemporary art, and making redundant those people who are easily offended and currently making decisions regarding this project, we can start to manifest changing attitudes by setting in place an alternative to the annual turner prize and this can take whatever form. this , if given the right media attention, should create interest, business and so would follow finance. it will at least help propel art as a talking point early. this would be followed with the capital of culture project being considered as a whole-wales identity, (i believe this is the current thinking) and bring in the galleries from around wales and treat them as partners of the project. this may take the form of rotating exhibitions so that everybody gets a chance to view what's being seen, followed by its own satellite contributions. within the city of cardiff all galleries would participate with radical ideas only. this would be the year that says good bye to the local art show. but with all the good intentions in the world, and even if we had the most fantastic arts building in Europe, our biggest problem here in wales would be what Shiite would we put in it. with all our aspirations for this project, what on earth would fill this space and would it be any good? if it was today, then I'd have to say, apart from three or four, no. what I suggest is that the artists of tomorrow are not even aware that they will be involved in this whole project. in my opinion we will need artists that have new visionary ideas, a new way of thinking and expressing, can it be done? maybe. our recent culture am jane randerson has forged ahead with targeted money that may help this direction, making available the re-programming, if you like, of a new lot of people to be involved who may not have been as yet. with the recent announcement of the new millennium arts centre, let's hope the design inside is adequate or we'll have another C.V.A on our hands, that we are setting the correct foundations. all we need to do is have the right expertise to run them properly. with the national museum spending money on dead artists work we should validate potential artists by recruiting and purchasing new work. this would at least give the artist the impression his talents are not being ignored and would also start to build up an interesting affordable art collection by a small country whose contents may one day generate more than its cost. the investment is minimal compared to the millions they have used buying boring old pictures. although, we could always scrap VAT on the selling of art here in wales and bring all the art auction houses of london to cardiff. now that would change things forever.

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