'I'm just as controversial as Tracey Emin,' protested the slightly peevish tones of what turned out to be Grayson Perry, on BBC Radio 4's Midweek. Presenter Libby Purves bravely represented the horsy charms of the middle England bourgeoisie, which Perry pretends to satirise with varying degrees of success, and the outre wing of decorative ceramics got a bite of the cherry which is mainstream broadcasting. Purves obligingly pretended to be shocked, while Perry wittered on about the particular charge of his gold encrusted, fancy front parlour vases, with rude pictures scratched on, displaying the hypocrisies of the petit bourgeoisie, now so beloved of the haute bourgeoisie. It has always been the conundrum of satire that the author so often is of, or aspires to, the target of his or her wrath. Success balances on a knife edge. That inside knowledge can give the work the power to cut mercilessly, or it can be hopelessly compromised by the affection or esteem in which the subject is ultimately held. Perry is no exception to this rule. Within the gin and Jag estates of the Essex nouveaux riches, his attack runs amok, lifting every lace-edged bed spread and twitching every tart's knicker curtain, revealing whatever seamy mass of abuse or mendacity lies beyond. According to Garth Clark, owner of the Garth Clark Gallery in New York, and who has shown Perry's work since the 1990s, Perry has 'absolutely no inhibitions with what he says or does.' Certainly the onslaught is unrestrained in Strangely Familiar, the one where the characters depicted cavort with all manner of ludicrous and painful looking perversions, while the child's cry, 'daddy don't hit me' emerges in typed text through the background imagery. There is a palpable anger in this work. However, once outside that milieu, which is arguably the easiest target in the world, he is on much shakier ground. His critique of the art world, of which he longed to be part, plainly expressed in the opening sentence of this article, is the area where he pulls every punch he ever seeks to deliver. 'I make rude pots for rich people.' The unmet longing is the curse and the driving force of every artist, and particularly of the satirist. The wish to be a part of something from which you believe yourself to be excluded both fuels the anger with which the critique is formulated, and simultaneously undermines the way it is delivered. Potentially there is too much to lose. Even when an artist like Perry throws caution to the wind, the British establishment can be viciously skilled in co-opting and taming any potential attack.
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