The Scum Gentry Alternative Arts & Media E-Zine Issue 2: April 2014 Read online

  Peter himself has said that “The Elm Tree” as a book is designed like a bar – the cover is the door and, as you step into the first section, poems from “The Dark Pool” (which to me not only connotes Dublin but also that dark and murky liquid, the plain stuff, which is, as O’Neill says elsewhere, “95% dark (as dark as your soul)”), you meet the “Bar Man” in the form of the introductory poem of the same name. Indeed, much of the poetry in this section is set against a backdrop of barrooms, perhaps more quintessentially Irish then than some of the later stuff and certainly more grounded in the physical world. But like any dalliance with intoxicants, the longer you press forward in their presence the further out there you go...

  The rest of the collection is peppered with moments of ethereal surrealism and a knowing intertextuality that I myself am nowhere near well-read enough to fully decode, reaching a kind of centre-piece in the “Sweeney Amok – The Trees of Ephesus” section, where the title-poem appears, along with a number of others that get to the heart of Peter’s biggest influences and obsessions in his poetic career. If this book is a bar then it is also a tree, one that nobody else but Peter himself could have planted and grown, and its gnarled and magical roots are often showing, ancient and immovable beneath the slender majesty above. It is a wonderful thing to behold.

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  “The Elm Tree” by Peter O’Neill is available to buy now from Lapwing Publications:

  https://sites.google.com/a/lapwingpublications.com/lapwing-store/peter-o-neill

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  SCUM GENTRY: Even though you studied art in university, you say you didn’t initially intend to follow up on it as a career. Can you describe your early days out of college and the gradual slide that led you into a career in the arts?

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  ROB: I’d sort of left art school not really knowing what I was doing, I'd always intended to draw as my main “thing” but I had no clue how or why I was going to do that. Illustration as a profession was over populated, hugely under paid and basically there was no direct road into it, you just had to get into it through guile, so I kind of never took it seriously as a goal. The early days out of college were awful, I moved to London on my own and swiftly had a small mental breakdown. I was drawing to keep sane and as a way to keep me out of the bars. I made some prints and gave them to my friends and sold them here and there. Living in East London a lot of people work in publishing, media and fashion and having friends in these places got me my first jobs. I ended up doing illustration by accident really, doing favours for friends. I keep it as a part time thing.

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  During that time, what were your motivations in creating the work – whether personal, social, or financial – and how, if at all, have they evolved since then?

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  I’ve always had a need to draw, but on top of that there was the need to keep sane and also living in ultra-creative East London it’s hard to shout above all the other talent, there is that constant question every weekend in London, “what do you do?”, meaning justify your existence. The financial side isn’t a constant, but it’s nice to get some money, I just never count on it. These days my motivations are more to do with getting my thoughts across in my work, it’s more for clarity of mind for me than keeping up with my peers or staying sane.

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  Originally from Donegal, you’ve been based in London now for several years. How important is it for an artist to re-locate themselves in search of wider opportunities? Is it an absolute necessity?

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  I wouldn’t say it’s a necessity. I had to leave, I told my parents when I was young I wasn’t sticking around, I'm not sure why, but I did have to do it. I missed the tail end of the Celtic Tiger but who cares. I’ve always admired people who’ve stayed and made something happen where they’re from. Leaving is definitely the easy option now. I think it’s vital to experience as much as possible from cultures outside your own, but you can remain in your own culture and do that. Seeing someone else’s ways gives you good perspective on you own. I feel weird when I can’t hear Turkish and smell the smoke from the ocakbasi grill. London is the place for me.

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  Your work was recently featured in a solo-exhibition in the city, titled “Oyster Flesh”. Can you describe the process that went into organizing and hosting such an event? Where did the name come from?

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  That was my first solo show and came together very quickly with the help of Jameson, they got me a gallery and obviously provided booze. I wasn’t hugely prepared but I had to get it out and done otherwise the work I’d done would whither on the vine. Any show is stressful but at the end you feel high as fuck. It was just a start, I’ll do it differently next. The name reflects how our flesh is weak and soft, we swell and bruise so easily but we’ve survived thousands of years and can take a kicking. It was a series of portraits of swollen disfigured faces. I’ll probably go back to that work.

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  Speaking of Jameson, you work with the whiskey company from time to time as a brand ambassador – a position that has many of the Scum Gentry salivating at the chops at the mere thought – what’s that like?

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  Good, they’re fun and easy going and it’s been mutually beneficial so far. Having a shot of whiskey at hand for the end of a horrible argument with my missus is just fine

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  As a more personal endeavour, you’ve been working on a collection of drawings that you say “deals with the bits of detritus that surround us” – can you tell us something about that?

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  That began with drawing objects that had no real connection between each other. Digging deeper I was thinking how certain things are called rubbish or detritus when shortly they’ll become valuable and vice versa with things of value. My mother always told me that a weed is just a flower in the wrong place. It goes a lot deeper and there’s more than one idea in there but the finished pieces should be able to give the feeling of it better than me describing it.

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  Besides the commissioned work and the stuff you do to fulfil your own artistic drives, you also work a day job – an unfortunate necessity for many professional artists. Do you see yourself eventually becoming financially independent exclusively through your art? When do you expect to reach that goal?

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  It was something that drove me mad for years, I would see friends living hand to mouth and not really caring. I could never do it, as much as I constantly wanted to, I’ve been poor and I don’t want to go back to that. Over the last two years I set my goals to get work done and forget about everything else. I work from morning to night most days so it doesn’t bother me much anymore, I’m making my progress.

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  Finally, do you think it’s going to become any easier in the future for an artist to make a living through their art alone? Do you have any advice for someone setting out along that road?

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  I hope it does, I see a lot of talented people doing well and making money, I also see a lot who don’t. I always think about what I want. Right now I want to have clear vision and make work that accurately expresses my delusions. That can make me money potentially, but I’m not thinking too much about that outcome, it’s a by-product for now. My advice to anyone is think about what you actually want and cheat/work hard to get it.

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  For more information on Rob and his work, or to contact the man himself, check out his personal website: https://robwhoriskey.com

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  Steak and Eggs for breakfast again¶

  Each morning¶

  He ate steak and eggs for breakfast¶

  And again¶

  Each morning¶

  When he rose from slumber and flexed¶

  Those massive iron legs¶

  He would scour the cupboards for vitamin juice.¶

  Th
ey called him¶

  On the telephone, with offers of fame and fortune¶

  And talk-show interviews¶

  “Tell us, Juan, tell us about your crunching thighs”¶

  And Juan, aloof, would laugh.¶

  There is no secret to this, he would say,¶

  Just a step by step approach that you all already know¶

  All about inside you anyhow;¶

  One¶

  Get Out of Bed¶

  Two¶

  Find your Vitamin Juice¶

  Three¶

  Steak and Eggs¶

  Four¶

  Crunch your Legs.¶

  And then he would laugh again¶

  And shake his head¶

  How could they be so confused?¶

  They wanted any answer but this banal truth¶

  Any answer but this simple boring one¶

  That was true,¶

  They didn’t want his legs¶

  They didn’t want his secret that was not secret¶

  They didn’t want anything except¶

  What they wanted, which was:¶

  They wanted to be told no.¶

  They wanted to hear no.¶

  They wanted to tell themselves no.¶

  They wanted to be at peace with no.¶

  So he told them it¶

  And then he lumbered into the machine¶

  And crunched his great legs, again.¶

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  Insane synthesis of aural pyrotechnics and putrid content needed;¶

  Yet sadly, and strangely, lacking here... Rather, sweetened, all¶

  Too sweetened scent of mild corruption caused by cow dung –¶

  Though a bucolic aroma, mind. No maggot infested carcass, rich¶

  With the fat, thumb shape of pupae rotting in the midday sun,¶

  The bloated Havana’s to be found above Lough Corrib, filled¶

  Like puss injected éclairs, all ghoulishly swimming about¶

  In the liquid, fetid matter, which, for Christ sake, don’t step in!¶

  There, that oozing mass of Dijon, whose caustic odour tears¶

  At your very lungs, infecting them with their all consuming¶

  Squalor, causing the scarab to dance, the centipede to multiply¶

  In many legged, convulsive, and undulating shapes.¶

  There now, a rich and poisonous metaphor for the last 20 or so years,¶

  One to cause a stain like an excruciating and painfully delivered stool.¶

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  She held a seed, in a¶

  cupped fist like a¶

  womb,¶

  And as she slowly decreased¶

  her grip, the sun¶

  hit,¶

  and the seed began to sprout¶

  and blossom,¶

  in bloom.¶

  ¶

  I said, “it reminds me of you,”¶

  and that “once you let the dark¶

  out,¶

  the light in,¶

  you could flourish.”¶

  ¶

  But then she crushed it,¶

  in her grip,¶

  She let it¶

  fall to the dirt and¶

  asked,¶

  if that was reminiscent of her too.¶

  She cracked a smile and¶

  we laughed,¶

  knowing,¶

  that all of God’s beauty¶

  could be destroyed,¶

  by just a few.¶

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  I don’t know why I always act like such a crusader¶

  when I can’t¶

  liberate¶

  the air-oasis stitched in lace.¶

  ¶

  There’s an octave of warp weft¶

  and I’m left bereft¶

  Yet again.¶

  How can you be so divorced from cognition?¶

  ¶

  There’s ore over there,¶

  and me with my new awl!¶

  I know bayonets would give me what I want to get.¶

  ¶

  Now I know the endeavour is hate incarnate so instead I’m meditating on my¶

  baccalaureate¶

  chewing the days away.¶

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  WITCHING

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  My bad soul stayed back¶

  clinging to your clothes like smoke¶

  catching in your throat¶

  moving in peripheral vision¶

  sometimes a demon grinning¶

  in your vitreous humor.¶

  ¶

  In its absence I developed¶

  a fondness for charity shopping¶

  rummaging through piles¶

  of soiled sweaters with balling,¶

  picking them up with stiff fingers¶

  sniffing from a distance¶

  never buying anything.¶

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  THE TRUTH

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  They burnt out a wheelie bin¶

  at the end of our road.¶

  By the time I saw it¶

  it was completely cold.¶

  A solid foam of plastic¶

  the axle exposed.¶

  A charcoaled muffin¶

  juts out of its hold. ¶

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  GETTING HOME

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  After this party ends¶

  I have no place left.¶

  Dawn spikes across the floor¶

  until it reaches me¶

  I will glow in¶

  the light of your voice¶

  ¶

  after, I will be lost.¶

  For year upon year¶

  wandering,¶

  till I stop.¶

  Homed, finally¶

  in my own defeat.¶

  ¶

  Once there I hear¶

  your words again¶

  this time though¶

  they will only be¶

  withering in poetry.¶

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  To many observers, international politics can be explained principally by competition between rival powers. Nation states compete with each other in the pursuit of their national interests and where one state makes a gain, another makes a loss. It is a simplified and somewhat crude way of looking at complex interactions where many factors are in play. That being said, there are times when the framework of outright competition between states is central to an understanding of events. The current situation in Ukraine is one of those occasions.

  We are witnessing one of those rare junctures in international politics where rival great powers are engaged in a stand-off with each other. The current crisis in Ukraine sees the West (i.e. the United States and her European allies) at odds with Russia. Ukraine is a country divided between a European oriented population in the west and a Russian oriented population in the east. Since the Soviet Union fell and Ukraine and Russia went their separate ways, the country has been at the centre of a tug of war between our two antagonists. Last month, the pro-Russian president Viktor Yanukovych was ousted by protestors who were angered by his decision to backtrack on a deal with Europe which would have moved Ukraine economically closer to the EU and weakened ties with Russia. Instead, Yanukovych decided to align Ukraine more closely to Russia and after weeks of protest was overthrown. Already we had a state of affairs where Europe’s gain was Russia’s loss.

   To compound the situation, the protestors, though mostly liberal leaning, had at their vanguard far-right nationalist elements. The new administration in Ukraine reflects this. The Deputy Secretary of National Security, for example, is a member of The Right Sector, a neo-Nazi organisation and the Deputy Prime Minister is a member of Svoboda, a party which is, if not outright fascistic, at least radically nationalist. Unlike in other European countries, the far-right in Ukraine supports integration with the EU. They are also virulently anti-Russian.

  With western backed U
krainian nationalist protestors bringing down the government in Kiev, pro-Russian armed men seized government buildings in Crimea, a majority Russian speaking autonomous region in the east of Ukraine that used to be part of the Soviet Union and before that, the Russian Empire. These militiamen appeared to be highly organised and are likely to have been trained and directed by Moscow. Crimea is important to Russia for strategic military reasons. Prior to the crisis Russia had a longstanding agreement with Ukraine that allowed it to station a naval base there, providing Russia with its only warm water port. In 2008, the Ukrainian government had planned to end this agreement but backed down after Russia threatened to raise the price of gas it supplies to Ukraine. Members of Crimea’s local parliament now plan to hold a referendum on the 16th March, which if passed will see Crimea break away from Ukraine and rejoin the Russian Federation.

  With Russia already having a large military presence in Crimea, there appears to be nothing that the new government in Kiev can do about this. Furthermore, Russia’s parliament has authorised an invasion of the rest of Ukraine in the event that the Russian speaking population come under threat, although a general war seems unlikely. As things currently stand, we have an intense diplomatic showdown between Russia and the West. The EU and the US have described Russian actions as illegal and aggressive and the US has imposed limited sanctions on Russian officials (the EU, with closer economic links with Russia, have not). Russia has accused the West of hypocrisy (with regards to their own occupations of other countries) and has described the new government in Kiev as illegitimate. Relations between Russia and the US are at their lowest point since the Cold War ended and in terms of international politics it can be argued they are once again outright enemies.

  Of course, animosity between the two has long been a feature of international relations. When in 1917 communists seized power in Russia, Western nations gave military aid to those opposed to communism and even sent troops to fight in Russia. The threat of Nazi Germany meant that animosity between the capitalist West and Communist Russia subsided for a few years but once World War Two ended the two reverted to the position of being bitter enemies. There they stayed, each seeking to overthrow foreign governments friendly to the other side and fighting proxy wars against each other in Vietnam, the Congo, and Afghanistan, amongst others.