The Rake’s progress: last week in gossip

Introducing Rakewell, Apollo’s wandering eye on the art world. Look out for regular posts taking a rakish perspective on art and museum stories.

Speaking at the Hay Festival this weekend, Tracey Emin lamented that some of her contemporaries have fallen back on repeating themselves. ‘I know artists who make the same f***ing work day in, day out,’ she said. ‘They make it, they sell it, they make it, they sell it, they make another version, they sell it. They get a bigger house, they sell it. They get another house, they make some more work, they make more of the same work – that is what their f***ing life is …’ ‘It tends to happen much more with male artists’, she added. Now who could she be thinking of?

Rakewell alerts your attention to a new cookbook by artist and photographer Julia Sherman. Entitled Salad for President, Sherman’s culinary tome sees her dropping in on fellow artists who provide their favourite salad recipes and candid conversation. According to ArtNet, highlights include William Wegman’s ‘sweet and nutty Passover-inspired’ offering, Laurie Anderson’s roasted aubergine dip and a ‘cruelty-free’ shredded Brussels sprouts salad recipe courtesy of Tauba Auerbach.

Pamela Anderson is back in London and has an arty agenda. Speaking to ES Magazine last week, the actress confessed that the first thing she does when arriving in the Great Wen is to visit the National Gallery. She also revealed that, if she could buy any building in London, it would be the Wallace Collection’s home in Manchester Square, but only on condition that she was ‘allowed to keep all the art’. Not that she’s lacking in a collection as it is: ‘I’ve collected art for the past 20 years. Most of my friends are some form of artist including Ed Ruscha, David LaChapelle, Richard Prince, Philip Treacy, Sante D’Orazio and Jeff Koons. Artists seem to kind of collect me. Ha!’

The Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band LP is 50 years old this summer, and the city of Liverpool is celebrating the anniversary with an arts festival. Speaking to the Guardian, Judy Chicago – the radical feminist artist best known for her expressive work in the 1970s – recounted a conversation between two curators she overheard when it was announced that she was to participate in the festivities. ‘What is Judy going to do?’, one of them asked, ‘paint a giant vagina?’. ‘I hope so’, replied the other.

Finally, the Rake offers his commiserations to art critic and Reading FC fan Waldemar Januszczak, who travelled all the way from Mexico City to Wembley only to see his side defeated 4-3 on penalties by Huddersfield Town. Prior to Town’s winning goal, however, Waldemar had the good grace to treat us to a clip of himself in the desert of Turkmenistan in 2006, singing Polish songs and looking somewhat the worse for wear. Arts broadcasting at its finest…

If you’re in Turkmenistan at the Gates of Hell you wear a Reading shirt! Keep watching. @TheTilehurstEnd @ReadingFC https://t.co/YblYjrkCj0

— WALDEMAR JANUSZCZAK (@JANUSZCZAK) January 21, 2016