In Wonderland
In celebration of the 150 year anniversary of Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland comes a freshly eccentric exhibition following the misadventures of Camille Joy. With large-scale watercolour, ink and gouache works evoking the fairytale format, Joy’s travels tell stories that are as philosophically poignant as they are comically kitsch. Much like Alice's Adventures, this exhibition is brimming with a fascination between reality, our perceptions of reality and what does and does not appear when one peers through the looking glass. Camille in Wonderland is a show for anyone looking for the excitement and beauty of chance encounters.
Joy uses personal stories which manage to convey a collective human memory. Instead of the Mad Hatter, there’s an ageing London Gangster turned property tycoon. Instead of Alice’s ‘unbirthday’, it’s Camille’s birthday, which involves two men resembling the walrus and carpenter ranting about governmental conspiracy theories. Unbeknownst to our heroine, the ‘drink me’ potion happens to be a psychedelic substance in a water bottle which synesthetically transports Camille into Manet's 'The Bar at the Folies Bergere.’
Drawing from both popular culture as well as contemporary art and philosophy, each series provides unique insight into humanity through the lens of the adult fairytale.
Camille Spends the Summer in the Basement of a Christian Scientist Church …until she discovers Michael, the transgender, has lice, again!
Every summer I have a tradition where I stay with one of my best friends, Dreyson, for my birthday in Middle of Nowhere USA.
He had a talent for picking obscure living quarters and one summer he was staying in the basement of a Christian Scientist Church with 8 brunette girls. The basement was converted into office-y type rooms, which were converted again into haphazard sleeping quarters. Dreyson only ever sleeps in basements or attics and when the former he likes to further the hovel effect by placing opaque curtains on the windows, sleeping in a pile of blankets on the floor and covering the walls in cloth buddhas, skeleton drawings, and pictures he finds in dumpsters. He completes the look with hand-crafted cardboard creations, dangling dried roses, rocks, crystals and Jesus pictures from his grandmother. I always look forward to my visits with Dreyson – despite or because of the way he arranges his abodes, they are so... comfortable.
This church is actually one of my favourite buildings in Small Town USA so when I found out he was staying there I was really really excited. It's a striking building compared to the more standard mid-west Americana structures neighbouring it. I found out it was built in the 'Greek Revival' style and the upstairs was a Christian Scientist church, with the basement starting out as offices, but then it was more lucrative to rent out the spaces as rooms and voila. The eight brunettes Dreyson lived with were almost all musically inclined and they used to sing and play hippie songs on their ukuleles whilst we all sat on the porch of the church drinking wine out of mason jars and smoking cigars on sticky summer nights.
It was pretty idyllic in a really cliche hipster sort of way. But one hot summer day, with the fan blowing on me, eyes fixed on Tripod- Dreyson’s three legged turtle- and mind elsewhere, I was startled by a girl coming in and laughing with her friend. "Hi I’m Camille." "Hi I’m Michael." "Hi Michelle." "No, I’m Michael." "Oh… Mikale… Hi." "You just don’t get it do you? My name is Michael. I’m transgender." "Oh. Sorry!" Michael and his friend proceed to laugh at my ignorance. I didn’t like Michael from the beginning, thinking he was being needlessly difficult. He looked like a girl and sounded like a girl, had massive boobs, and this fooled me, how was I to have known he wanted to be a he?
My instinct about Michael was right. Him and his friend were laughing about the fact that he got lice. Again.
I abruptly sat upright on the sofa and pulled my wild hair into a bun. I really could not handle even the thought of getting lice from a transgender named Michael in the basement of a Christian Scientist church.
Despite not really having much hair, Dreyson understood my plight so we needed to find a new place to sleep. We didn’t have much money, but I had a friend named Ian who was living in someone’s garage whilst studying for his law exams. Ian said the garage was a bit too small (he called it a shack) and he needed absolute quiet for his studies but we could park Dreyson’s car in the driveway and sleep there. So we did.
Unlike sleeping in a house, when you sleep in a car, you need to be outside right up until the point you are ready for bed. There is no room for a dinner table in a car. No bathroom. No standing. Thankfully it was the summer so this wasn't a big deal. For dinner Dreyson bought a bag of potato chips, a block of cheddar cheese and some salami and we went on the top of my favorite parking structure off Main Street and ate our haphazard sandwiches watching the purple sunset, punctuated by a few bats madly circling above our heads.
It wasn't too bad sleeping in the car actually- we charged up Dreyson's laptop, bought some Ben and Jerry's ice-cream and watched the Wizard of Oz on mute to Pink Floyd's The Dark Side of the Moon. Dreyson heard from his homeless friend, Ron, that there were some conspiracy theories that would be revealed if you watch them together- I wasn't convinced but the song Money came on right when the film popped to color in the munchkin’s world and this change- and other little aptly fitting sequences made the experience worth it. And certainly better than risking getting Michael's lice!
Camille Frequents the Swing Behind the Church in Brixton Where Homeless People get Crack Cocaine
I like being in motion.
Kind of like some people enjoy yoga because their bodies become completely satisfied and they can focus on their minds, my body is satisfied on a swing set. It is in motion but it doesn’t have to worry like other times when it is in motion, you know, looking out for bus drivers, dog poo, or having to control the intensity of my dance moves inside my own flat to avoid the complaints of my downstairs neighbour fearing for the 'structural integrity' of our building.
This way, body aside, I can focus on my mind. I like to pretend I'm solving global issues but mostly I'm just thinking of situations where everyone I know is in a room together and somehow they see me compete in a dance off, which I win.
When I moved to Brixton there was a swing set behind a church where all the homeless people used to get their crack cocaine. It was ideal. No sane mother allowed their children to play in such close proximity to so many drugged homeless people, so I didn’t have to compete with those half my age for swing time. Usually none of those homeless people went to the backside of the church and if they did it was mostly just to pee on the building. Sometimes they’d shout 'Blondie! Wot choo doing here?’ One guy came up to me ‘Oh, sorry, I thought you were 12’ and abruptly left. I still don’t know what he meant by that.
Being on a swing set reminds me of being the pendant on a giant pendulum, going backwards and forwards, but the hypnosis happens to myself. I think of extremes, as soon as I go as extremely backwards as possible, the momentum hurtles me as extremely forwards as possible- and from the union of these two extremes in tandem of one another- a form of balance is created. When I go too far on one side- something usually brings me back- as far- to the other side. A start is also a finish. To create one needs to destroy. An end is a new start. Destruction is a form of creation. In between dance off daydreams, I think of how funny and tragic that I can adamantly argue both the interconnectedness as well as the isolation of the world. But this spirals me further and farther down my own rabbit hole -I like black and I like white but when they start to muddle into a grey I know it's time to get off the swing set. Or when my bum starts aching, or when- as the sun sets- a cluster of homeless people spread out on the sparse grass near my flying feet.
Camille in Wonderland
The next day I was still tripping (considering I accidentally ingested all of the brazilian cocktail waiters' MDMA the night before this was no surprise). I was also still wearing the same outfit- which I really liked because it sort of looked as though the older, fat Elvis Presley dressed up like a cupcake- I can't explain any better than that, you'll have to use your imagination.
In this elated, hungry-eyed state, I naturally went off to see art. Despite having been in London now for about five months, I still didn't get a chance to view one of my favourite paintings - Édouard Manet's A Bar at the Folies-Bergère. The Courtauld was especially crowded on this day and I looked rather out of place in my clubbing wear from the night before, with even greasier hair and more smudged makeup. I'm not really sure how I managed to buy my ticket and get through the crowds, but I instinctively went straight to Manet's work.
And then the transformation took place. Though my body was in front of it, slightly swaying, playing with the skirt of my cupcake Elvis garb- I knew I had actually hopped into the painting. The night prior my eyes were windows but this time I was in front of a canvas as an open window. And armed with enough MDMA to last a throng of Brazilian cocktail waiters for an evening in my belly, I climbed into that window. I was sliding along the clumps of paint, congregations of specks and flecks which magically swirled to look like 19th century pleasure mongers. It was great, (despite laughing a bit too loudly when I neared the trapeze artist's feet in the upper left corner of the work). And I really have no idea how long I was standing there, vigorously feeling my cupcake skirt whilst my mind was dancing inside a work of such personal significance to me. Utterly in awe at all the literal and symbolic mirrors and layers and ideas of the gaze. The barmaid was a spectacle, I was a spectator but not the intended male spectator, where did I fit in? The mirror behind her was perspectively off, but the canvas was a window, and my eyes were windows, and I couldn't think of something without thinking of something else. Of Jeff Wall's Picture for Women and Laura Mulvey's theories on the gaze, and my own eyes and their past, present and perspective journeys.
Perhaps somewhat later than I should have, I started to notice all the stares around me- I was really too elated to determine if they were stares of disapproval or incredulousness but I quickly realized the stares belonged to some students in caps and gowns and mainly their parents. It was graduation day at the Courtauld! These students surely learned a lot about Manet's work, but did any of them have a chance to climb into it? #education
Camille Doesn't Fit In at the Fancy Dinner
The first time I remember having a fancy meal I was 21, (fancy meal defined as consisting of three courses). I must have had other fancy meals prior to this, but I really can't remember any except one awful time that really put me off from the whole fine dining thing.
I was probably about ten and the restaurant had a white table cloth laid out which still designates 'fanciness' to me now. When the first course arrived- chocolate balls in pretty porcelain dishes- I was ecstatic and loving fancy meals already- ice-cream to start! Kinda weird they were serving the chocolate ice-cream with crackers and bread on the side but whatever. I dug in- anticipating nice cold chocolate ice-cream and…. and…. it was pate! I never had pate before but since I was expecting ice-cream and instead tasted room temperature meat fat, I was very upset. This unexpected cause of events, to a child with a very select palate (I indulged in an almost exclusive diet of ranch dressing, processed cheese, and Doritos; complemented by a salt lick I found in the woods during hunting season) put me off from the more expensive and weird fancy meals.
Even the restaurants that served bread before the main course kinda sucked because my great grandma always checked to make sure my purse was empty before we went out so we could pack it full of the free bread and jam from the table dispensers. Great grandma was in general very pleased with me for pilfering restaurant items- the larger the better- glasses, ramekins, ketchup bottles, salt shakers, etc and throughout my teenaged years I'd come home with these little practical goods to her immense, gleeful pleasure (and the embarrassed dismay of my teenaged dates). But, if I came home empty handed, she'd shake a bony knuckle at me 'you're shit outta luck' she'd scowl (sometimes even stealing parts of my school uniform as punishment - she had a penchant for my white knee-high socks in particular).
Anyway, when I moved to London I ended up dating a guy that always had fancy dinners. His parents were of English nobility and our backgrounds couldn't be more silver chalk and processed cheese. Let's call him Big Princess for convenience (you can even go look at the Big Princess portrait for more detailed etymology).
And let's call his mum Lady X. Lord and Lady X invited us to one of their country estates for the weekend. Big Princess ran inside and by the time I caught up he was with his mother, who was laughing how someone wrote them a thank you note for staying in their mansion, 'Har har har- How embarrassingly middle class! A thank you note!' she exclaimed. This put me on guard. Firstly, middle class was -erm- an aspirational thing for my family but to her it was a vulgar word. Secondly, she was insulting something I thought was quite a nice thing to do! As soon as I entered their home, I knew I'd have to play a game where I didn't know the rules, and where I was destined to inevitably lose each time.
So after an afternoon of little faux pas after little faux pas (and me not realising when something was or wasn't a faux pas) we all sat down to dinner. But when everyone was clearly finished Lady X stood up, with a drawn out pause, looking directly at me. Her expression was similar to earlier when I said things like "No, my mother didn't prepare a casserole on Sunday just in case unexpected guests arrived for dinner" or "I didn't have a nanny."
Big princess knew this stare better than I did obviously- "Mummmmy….." he exclaimed, foreseeing trouble. "Camille. Have you finished eating?" I was pretty confused by her question, my plate was clearly empty. "Mummy!" Interjected Big Princess. "No, no, I'm quite interested in this, darling. Now, Camille, is this an American custom of yours, this…" "Mummy please stop it." Big Princess protested yet again. "Let me continue, is this an American custom to just toss fork and knife willy nilly on the plate when one is finished eating? Is this what you did at home, with your own family? Is this how you were... raised!?"
"Um, yes?"
That evening Lady X pulled Big Princess aside, "She isn't right for you, darling." To which Big Princess said something quite rude to his mum in my defence. He then came into the playroom where I was hanging out with Nigel, the family Rottweiler (probably the most pleasant company in the entire house). "Let's go" "Where?" "Back to London" "Ok…? Let me just say goodbye to…" "There's no need."
Big Princess and I drove back to London in the night, without saying goodbye to Lord and Lady X. For the next 6 months, Big Princess didn't speak to either of his parents over this incident. So awkward. And as far as fancy meals were concerned, this was so much worse than the pate posing as ice-cream of my childhood! Just pass me the EZ Cheese, please.
Camille Meets the Vampire
Each time I asked his name, I'm sure he told me something different. Always of easily confusable Irish origin. Donnel. O’Connel. Oh- is he a conner?
He'd come visit me during my brief stint working at a cocktail bar in Sloane Square. He was always dressed like a rock star, but one that on various occasions collided with the Notorious BIG, or a sheep, or Morticia Adams, or someone from That 70’s Show. But it completely suited him. He would even 'bahhhh' when wrapped in his long white YSL sheepskin coat, glint of a silver vulture skull necklace shining through. I had it in my head for some reason he was a scientist, but I have a tendency to confuse ‘science’ with ‘supernatural’ (like when I was nine and won a McDonald's competition for wanting to be an 'organic chemist' when I grew up- I meant I wanted to be a witch. Both of these professionals mix random things to make explosions and record their doings in books with funny graphs). Anyway, in retrospect I'm sure this guy was a vampire – or at least a gangster.
We became friends and he told me how his mum was married to an alcoholic Irish guy and they had five kids, she wanted to get out of her relationship and fled to London- she was 35 and this 17 year old from her town followed her. "I love you." He said. "You're 17, and I'm married with five kids," she responded. "I love you." He replied. She loved him too. So she gave her kids to her own mum to take care of and moved to Brixton with this 17 year old- still married to her alcoholic husband but ended up having another five kids with her young love. The youngest of all ten in her brood was the Vampire. They didn't have much money and he dropped out of school at 16 to sell clothes on the streets in Brixton during the race riots- saved up, bought a store, and now owns 20 or so properties throughout central London.
He painted the walls deep purple and black in his own property, littered with animal skulls, huge candelabras, zebra skin rugs etc. This, the fairy-tale like story of his upbringing and the fact he always slept with his eyes open- all contributed to me really thinking he is a vampire.
Camille’s Upside Down Birthday
It was the first time I ever saw rain on my birthday.
The midwest heat in early August is sweltering- so this hot rain was an unwelcome surprise. "Camille pull your skirt down, Jibble is coming with his friend and I don’t want them to make you feel uncomfortable." Jibble was Dreyson’s homeless friend. I could never remember his name as Dreyson seemed to always say it in a mix of a mumble and a jibber jabber.
Dreyson had recently come back from a hitchhiking adventure where he got rid of his possessions, bank account etc, and went down to work on organic farms in California. The goal was to earn his keep and work his way to South America. He prepared for years of this existence.
He lasted ten days. Sunday was kill chicken day on the farm and he couldn't bear to make it to the next Sunday and had too much pride to tell his parents his plan failed so quickly so he hitchhiked back to the midwest. It took 21 days and 20 rides to make it to Chicago; sleeping in dumpsters, on the side of the highway, and in the bed of a 'bear' trucker in between.
After Dreyson’s hitchhiking adventure he had suffered understandable trauma and started only hanging out with homeless people. This sometimes proved dangerous, like when they’d have drug related knife fights outside his door at 4 am and the weaker one would demand protection and shelter. Anyway, Jibble was Dreyson’s favourite homeless friend. He was old and thin with long curly white blonde hair and a tanned, lined face. He dressed like it was the 1970’s and covered his body in rock and crystal amulets. He had a friend with him who was fat with a big plump moustache and together they looked like the Walrus and the Carpenter from Alice in Wonderland. I think in retrospect, Jibble actually looked like Jesus, but because Jesus was a carpenter and Jibble was with a Walrus, I associated him more with the Lewis Carroll characters. Dreyson and I stood as far as possible against a wall with a small awning from the rain but also away from the Walrus’ stench of body odor and alcohol (Dreyson couldn’t invite Jibble into his basement alcove, lest he stay for weeks). Here, we celebrated my birthday.
Jibble did most of the talking, the Walrus did most of the drinking. I couldn't really tell you what Jibble said. He mentioned a lot of conspiracies and told them in a riddle like format but one he assumed I would understand. He also told me about rocks and crystals and their various healing powers- why he wore certain colored ones. What happened when they were combined with other stones, etc.
Right when they were about to go, Jibble pulled a dollar out of his pocket as a birthday gift. "Oh but I cant accept this!" "No please take it." "But your'e erm…" Jibble interrupted, "I want you to have this dollar to see the little owl near the triangle with the eye in the centre and remember that the government …" I didn't really hear what he said after because of all the etiquette questions running around my head- do I tell a homeless person they are homeless? Is it impolite to decline money from a homeless person? Is it impolite to accept money from a homeless person? I decided in the end it was best to accept and quite liked how upside-down my birthday was: with rain when there is usually sun, and with a homeless person giving me a dollar.
*His name was Ron. How I got Jibble in my head- no idea. But I found Ron on Facebook to better paint him and discovered he married a professor from the University- so he did quite well! No idea what happened to the Walrus though.