Catalogue Essay for No Sweat, Alex Kiers, Sydney Guild, 2013

It is difficult to critically analyze something that seemingly refuses to be taken seriously, or to attach meaning to something that feels like a joke. To do so would force a critical and cultural distance from the object or utterance, would risk the integrity of the object by patronizing or simplifying, and, perhaps worst of all: would kill the joke. Alternatively, and more humorously, our gaze at an art object (or any object) can also be strengthened by a good dose of critical irony, can enhance and layer the meaning of the work or utterance. But how many interchanging levels of authenticity can we divorce something from before it loses meaning and purpose altogether, even as a post–ironic construct?

Alex Kiers’ new show No Sweat poses such a problem. In this new work, the artist imagines a clothing brand that caters to fitness, activity, and motorsports enthusiasts, with the artist wholeheartedly incorporating the accoutrements of these subcultures in to the work. No Sweat is a continuation of Kiers’ personal journey into ideas of masculinity and cultural stereotypes, as well as an expansion of an artistic practice and dedication to subjects not generally considered as traditional, beautiful, sophisticated, tasteful, popular, or fashionable. 

Wild flames, harsh metal, and polished chrome finishes make up part of the designs. Graphics of chains, images of mass-produced “bogan” food, and aggressively bland motivational clichés adorn the pieces. Similarly, crude stock images are manipulated and arranged to produce an identity titled 'Speed Dealer'. The graphic signifiers are burlesque and caricatured; the stock imagery creates stock characters. And while much of the imagery in No Sweat is in the style of the macho subcultures it represents, it is no accident that some of the aesthetic concerns align with a post-internet cluster of visuals that have emerged in some of the more fashionable corners of the internet, as well as the art and (actual) fashion worlds. Transparent Photoshop effects evoke a nostalgic digital realm, one of naivety and simplicity, and the overproduced gradients, beveled and embossed edges, patterned overlays, chrome finishes, and drop shadows have been liberally applied. As well as participating in this aesthetic, No Sweat can be read as a kind of mocking of it, a defiance of digitalization for is own sake and a return to aesthetics that emerge from actual cultures rather than metastasized virtual ones. No Sweat is not entirely concerned with fashion or internet aesthetics, but visual comparisons are apparent. 

Graphic trends such as rave or seapunk or witch house can be seen as set of meta-subcultures; meta in the sense of borrowing from mostly nostalgic, pre-existing and (often) middle-class subcultures of recent decades. This distinct lack of cultural diversity is partly the reason for their easy assimilation into the mainstream fashion media machine. The other reason for their hasty dissemination is possibly just because of the nature of the internet itself. In a recent interview for culture hub i-D, author and journalist Will Self described the internet as “neutralizing the possibility of an avant-garde, as it creates a kind of permanent now,” and argued that the more mediatized something is then “perversely, the less influential it is; the manifest cultural content is so easily appropriated and used that it becomes null. In other words the very difficulty of the diffusion (before mediatization/the internet) made it more influential – because it could be avant-garde. It could exist in a non-accessible way.” 

The continuing talk of a New Aesthetic echoes through the pop-critical community, but for an aesthetic that apparently challenges and reflects the hyper-production of various colliding digital/actual realms, it is suspiciously bereft of “low-brow” culture or working class characters. However, here in No Sweat, they intentionally flourish. While digital trends and image zeitgeists come and go, mass production industries glean from them mostly benevolent and sentimental symbols for various aesthetic purposes, and the old-fashioned marginalization and taste-mongering continues to occur, often in the name of creating desirable art/fashion objects that can safely enter the cultural economy. It is a process that continues to brand some aesthetic cultures as beautiful, and banish others as ugly, undesirable, or unusable. No Sweat is a response to this process, and an attempt to destabilize it by forcing recognition of these supposedly ugly aesthetics and cultures that such signifiers conjure. 

No Sweat is almost devoid, on its surface, of an art-historical or political rhetoric. And yet this gaze is complicated when we consider what the work is intentionally overloaded with: culture, character, texture, physicality. It is smugly anti-intellectual. There is a colourful, physical world of characters alluded to in the articles in No Sweat. There is, most obviously and literally, the “Speed Dealer”, but allusions are made to the visual cultures and identities of the gym junkie, the rev-head and the boxer/MMA fighter. There is also, as referred to in the title of the show, another theme: one of literal sweat, of work. The idea of work—hard work—is heavily present in No Sweat. Work is a recurring theme in Kiers’ exhibitions, as in the embroidered “WORK SUX BUT I NEED THE BUX” in Old Chook Good Stock, and here again, in No Sweat, there is a big nod to a working class, and to labour—most obviously in the sweatpants made entirely of removalist carpeting. The presence of actual people is felt amidst all the graphic posturing and jokey objects; the presence of people who devote themselves blindly to sports and suburbs, to lifestyles and looks.

One example of a violent, hyper-masculine culture complicating expectations (especially media expectations) has been witnessed in the recent protests in Turkey. Since May 31st of this year, three separate soccer club’s fans and supporters with an extremely vicious rivalry (one that had, only a month earlier, resulted in a fatal stabbing) united under something called Istanbul United. These three staunchly rival teams, Besiktas, Galatasaray, and Fenerbahce, not only cooperated and united under a common cause, but were a highly active and influential force in the civil resistance. Their violence was politicized, and all the while the three teams still wearing their discrete colours and jerseys. So what does clothing (or sports/activewear) mean in these circumstances? How do logos and brand identifiers function here?  How can we dismiss this as “thuggish” tribalism when team/gang colours are being used to both empower and transcend the individual? And obviously No Sweat is a far cry from the streets of Istanbul, or from specific or localized ideas of civil resistance and power, but it would be too shallow a reading to ignore the interconnectedness of clothing, identity, culture, and class in No Sweat, and likewise, too easy to forget how these same issues can manifest and influence social dynamics.

It is not hard to imagine these pieces being worn by both the people it represents—removalists, gym junkies, drug dealers and rev-heads—as well as inner-city fashion devotees vying for the most advanced trends or aesthetically distinctive designs. So what is the difference between faux-brand No Sweat and an actual "lifestyle" apparel brand like No Fear, No Rules, or more recent designs from Perks and Mini, or the enflamed designs by Jeremy Scott for Adidas? What stops No Sweat from being a snide and shallow jab at fashion production? The answer is, ironically, very little.

But it is precisely this obsession with surface details and stereotypical representation that No Sweat is spotlighting. By imagining art/fashion objects that subvert fetishized notions of high taste and low culture, we are encouraged to reconsider the value of the subcultures and aesthetics being represented, their place in the art and fashion world, and the process by which they enter or are alienated by such economies. No Sweat is both a genuine celebration and a satirical provocation of the macho seriousness of the cultures, characters, and graphics the work evokes. Kiers goes beyond irony, by first going through it, in a perhaps vain attempt at that old, rather unfashionable thing: representation. Representation of people, of place, and of style. It is an earnest attempt to collect and present these visual languages and cultural signifiers, ones that can so easily be manipulated by the internet, by fashion, and by the media, and to deliver it back through the portals they have been disfigured by. Back to their somewhat authentic and purpose-built origins. Back to physicality and to the body, to speed and intensity. Back to sportswear.

Jim Vockler Whyte, 2013.

Catalogue/Exhibition Essay for Alex Kiers, “No Sweat”, Sydney Guild, 2013.