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TALK OF THE TOWN: vile buddies - Paint the town pink!
Independent on Sunday, The, Jan 30, 2005 by Hermione Eyre
On the same night this week, three major arts parties. Which meant even more distracted buzzing from London's social bluebottles than usual. At the Saatchi party, they wanted to know how the Tate was ("Bet it's full of stiffs"). At the Tate party, they were speculating about the Saatchi ("Might head down there for the champagne later"). And over at the Whitbread Book Award, well, they had to be quiet for the speeches, though you can imagine the text messaging. But the Good Lord did not design us to be physically present at three parties at once. Moreover, some of us only had one invite.
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Saatchi's party it was, then. Up the steps to County Hall, past heavies in high-visibility jackets (who were positioned there to keep out angry Stuckists, the pro-painting lobby demonstrating against Saatchi for the rather limp reason that they liked painting years before he did, OK?). Onwards, round the long bureaucratic corridor loops, following close on the heels of A C Grayling, a vaguely reassuring presence when one is looking for the coat-check. Then, the plunge into the gallery, where salmon-and- cucumber Garrick club ties are kissing fur stoles and purple Chanel suits embracing punk tweeds with oohs and aahs and Hiyas!
Yet something is not quite right about this party. What is it, I wonder, as I sidestep a man in an eyepatch staring intently at a Doig canvass. The art! That's it. People are looking at the art far more intently than is considered good form, especially at a Saatchi party, where the centre of attention is normally a nude plebeian dancing the fandango. But tonight, there is a commendable regard for the paintings. "Lovely," murmurs Nicola Formby, striding up to a vast Immendorf canvas depicting battery chickens. "That shadow..." says AA Gill, with a gesture of awe. People are giggling nervously in front of Marlene Dumas' unearthly Die Baba. And this is before they have touched a drop. Drinks are reserved for those who have finished touring the exhibition.
Flashblubs are still going, though. Padma Lakshmi expertly turns her head to give the press a glimpse of her face, set in a rictus of absolute delight. Nigella Lawson, snug in a black suede papoose- inspired outfit, is also beaming as if she has never been this happy. But then, she is hostess-by-proxy in the absence of her husband, who she says is "babysitting". You would have thought they could have splashed out on a nanny for one evening, but hey. Perhaps that bearded gallery attendant is Mr Saatchi in disguise.
On to the collection of Immendorfs. I peer closely at a grainy grey canvas, trying to work out what it is of. A heavily-set man steps up and peers at it too. Then at exactly the same moment we both see that it's a gapingly explicit pornographic image. As we both recoil, I realise the man is Salman Rushdie. I figure it's time to visit the room with the free bar.
The bouncers on the door there are tittering. "'E won the Turner prize, happarently," says one, mockingly. I follow their gaze. It's Grayson Perry, pidgeon-toed and vulnerable in his little girl get- up. Around him, the hungry crowd dives for high-held canape trays like scrum-halves after a rugby ball. True to the Saatchi branding ethic, the waiters are wearing natty T-shirts printed with one of the exhibition's key pieces, Hermann Nitsch's splatter painting. What Herr Nitsch, the old man bearded like Father Time, thinks of this commodification of his work is not clear. He stands silently while the vile artistic bodies throng and chatter gladly about him. But the lasting impression was of an evening stage-managed by a new, mature Saatchi intent that this time, the party was not going to upstage the paintings.
`The Triumph of Painting' is reviewed by Charles Darwent on page 18
Copyright 2005 Independent Newspapers UK Limited
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