BOBBIE WILSON

The Art of the Party: Escapism, Indulgence and Creating Intimacy

Emerging from two years of a global pandemic in which social interaction was limited, partying has taken on new meaning and importance for an entire generation of young people who, in the years allotted to be wild and free, were restricted and isolated. The pandemic has forced us to confront the holes that are left in the absence of partying. Searching for new experiences, intimacies and an opportunity to turn our heads from an increasingly hostile political landscape, these social gatherings appeal to our desire to feel free. After two years of exploring themes of excess and release in my own work on student culture, this essay will aim to delve into some of the different ways that artists interact with the theme of the party.

This essay is also a way of affording this theme the profundity it deserves, of which history and theory have often overlooked; at its worst it has been seen as a harbinger of sin, indulgence and immorality, and at its best as a trivial pastime of youth. Throughout this history, however, humans have only become more drawn to the party as an escape; the Nightclub industry in the UK, although in decline, is worth £683 million (IBIS World, 2022: online). From the Cult of Bacchus’ illegal festivals of debauchery and sex in Ancient Rome, right up to 2021’s illegal Downing Street Christmas Party, humans have flouted convention, rules and even laws they have made themselves in the name of the party. Putting aside any moral judgement, this shows how inherent partying and socialising is to our rituals of celebration, compensation of hard work and feeling of worth as social animals. So when the cogs of capitalism were expected to continue turning in the pandemic, many struggled without the same routes of escape. 

The art of the party is a phrase I will use throughout this essay which broadly refers to works of fine art which seeks to capture, highlight and honour the culture of nightlife. I will use my research to prove that partying is not a trivial theme, but an abundant source of artistic inspiration that has been used by artists to explore three main themes: escapism, indulgence and intimacy. The work of Dafydd Jones, Michael Andrews and Catherine Parsonage will formulate my argument on the different ways that people are attracted to indulgence and hedonism. To explore escapism and the roles that music and togetherness play in creating safe havens for marginalised groups, I will be looking at Denzil Forrester’s dynamic abstract paintings of the dub-Reggae scene in London and James Bartolacci’s nostalgic works on New York Queer clubs. Finally, I will look at Nicole Eisenman’s ‘Another Green World’ and R.B Kitaj’s ‘The Wedding’ to explore the way painting the party can be used to create intimacy and preserve memories. I will conclude my essay with a study of ‘Night Shift’, an exhibition by the student art collective that I co-run, examining the ways young, local artists respond to Manchester’s Nightlife, and highlighting the importance of the art of the party in a post-pandemic world. 

Through this discussion I will explore a wider view of the party as an essential social arena in which many different facets of life play out on a hyperbolic scale, creating lasting memories to be both captured and processed into artworks. Many of the works I will explore are about atmosphere, about the impression that the party or club night made on a particular day, the stamp of fleeting memories intercepted by substances, asking what was the feeling in that room and of the collective mass that created it. By showcasing the beauty of the night-time world, these works set about immortalising these memories, keeping the party alive.

Indulgence

In this section I will be discussing works that explore themes of indulgence and excess. The work of Dafydd Jones, Michael Andrews and Catherine Parsonage give us an insight into why we are drawn to indulgence, and why many turn to the night-time world as an arena in which one can explore these desires. Rosanna McLaughlin wrote of Catherine Parsonage’s 2017 exhibition ‘Convivium’ that central to the work is a “desire to express more, connect more and feel more”. Indulgence is the search for this “more”, to pursue pleasure free of guilt. I am not necessarily concerned with passing judgement on the morality of indulgence, but rather looking to what draws us to it and how the art of the party shows the beauty that can be found in the excessive.

An example of excess and indulgence that has interested me for a number of years now is the life of the student, especially in the UK. A unique phase of life, the student runs on a cycle of excess in which intense work is balanced with intense play. The Situationist manifesto ‘On the Poverty of Student Life’ looks at the economic oppression of students, and how young people are forced into a cycle of pre-packaged capitalism. They argue that while we may be fed theoretical notions of independence, we are ultimately being educated by a system controlled by both the state and private profit. Seeking to assert their new found independence as young adults, there must be a way for the student to reconcile this terrifying transition into adulthood:

Faced with the prospect of such a dismal “reward” for his shameful current poverty, the student prefers to take refuge in an unreally lived present, which he decorated with an illusory glamour. (Situationist international, 1966: Strasbourg. p.8)

The student finds an “unreally lived present decorated with an illusory glamour”; a social underworld fuelled by alcohol, music and various substances that allows for the indulgence of spirit which adult life seems to often want to quash. The “illusory glamour” of partying in a small way helps young people through this period of early adulthood in which many are lost for prospects, forced into difficult and low paying jobs, and bombarded with a plethora of unspoken responsibilities.  As young people who are thrust into this world, many choose indulgence and hedonism as a way to bring a form of equilibrium to their lives. 

This is what Dafydd Jones beautifully captured in his book “The Last Hurrah” which documents the decadent social lives of Oxford University students in the 1980s. Without passing judgement on the privilege of these students, Jones looks to this notion of ‘work hard, play hard’: an explosive need for chaos to counter the solid rigidity of the ancient institution. Under the guise of glamour and sophistication, brought on by the return of a fascination with Evelyn Waugh’s era of ‘The Bright Young Things’, these students indulged in traditions of the past while preparing for a future ahead. Waugh writes in ‘Brideshead Revisited’, “Sometimes… I feel the past and the future pressing so hard on either side that there's no room for the present at all” (Waugh, 1945: London. p.144), what Jones highlights in ‘The Last Hurrah’ is this small space in which the individual may indulge themselves in the wonder of the present.

Richard Ovenden articulates that “the swagger of the young people in these images… was matched by the melancholy that Waugh’s novel also conjured up” (Ovenden, 2020: Belgium. p.1), suggesting a duality in the work that speaks to a quintessential feeling of youth. Within these parties and balls Jones records moments of high intensity next to moments of sombre reality, the images reading as a meandering journey of emotions typified by energy, drunkenness and the “languor of youth” (Waugh, 1945: London. p.44). Many of the photographs capture a range of these emotions within their compositions such as ‘Sliding Down the Marquee, New College ball’ (Figure 1). The composition leads us throughout the scene sequentially, each lavishly dressed figure leading into the next. Starting with the figure sliding down, feet facing the camera as if ready to fly into the foreground, the speed causing the image to blur. This evokes a momentum that simultaneously excites and forebodes the consequential crash into the outstretched arms of the anonymous figure before him. The energy in this interaction is then starkly contrasted as our eye is lead to the two stationary figures in the forefront. The figure on the right assumes the position similar to the photographer, a voyeur passively looking on as the figure rockets towards them, whereas the figure on the left is actively detached, looking away from the spectacle. Casually smoking a cigarette, with hunched shoulders adorned with a blazer, this figure is firmly within this scene but directs themselves away from the main focus. The action of looking outwards draws focus away from the spectacle, highlighting a significant contrast between this wild, carefree display and the melancholy aspects that come with indulgence. Although such contrasts exist within the book, the figures in Jones’ photographs appear significantly harmonious within this nuanced view of youthful partying. 

Images such as ‘Halloween Ball, 1987’ (Figure 2) seem almost contrived in their nostalgic signifiers of an indulgent youth, but when looking at my own photography from my time as a student I see many parallels to Jones’ work (Figure 3). Shots of parties filled with people, drinks, cigarettes, dancing, fancy outfits and physical touch; these images are laden with a shared nostalgia for the wildness of these formative years. ‘Halloween Ball, 1987’ has a composition saturated with figures almost uncomfortably packed into the shot, each offering a different experience of the ball, indulging in one thing or another. The central figures are two people looking to the camera caught in a compromising position, however they don’t look embarrassed at all, merely shocked by the camera’s flash. Directly behind them we see another couple embracing, the figures all around them face away, backs to the camera providing sheets of black which intimately frames both of the couples in this silly, youthful mass of bodies. The pile of empty beer cans and plastic cups discarded in the middle, in front of the figures, act as a reminder to the melancholy aspects again, passionate encounters meeting sticky floors, half-finished beer cans and a hand just reaching into frame offering a cigarette. A myriad of signifiers to this distinctly student experience of partying suggests that solace can be found for the student in the momentary “illusory glamour” of excess. 

There is certainly, however, an otherness to the party culture that Jones depicts. Featuring future politicians and celebrities such as Boris Johnson (Figure 4), David Cameron, Nigella Lawson and Hugh Grant, these people represent the upper echelons of society, at a time when the rich were getting richer. Margaret Thatcher’s tax cuts for the wealthy resulted in a distinct shift in the performative indulgence that trickled down from parents to their children, creating a culture of the party as a chance to display wealth, power and infallibility, Jones himself saying “they weren't trying to hide their wealth…The rich were celebrating"(Jones quoted in Seymour, 2020: online).

The idea of the party as an indulgence of wealth is mirrored in the work of Michael Andrews which explores “decadent, transgressive, and nihilistic forms of party-going” (Hallett, 2019: p.111) within an otherworldly collage of wealth and hedonism. Andrew’s piece ‘The Deer Park’ (Figure 5) took inspiration from a novel of the same title by Norman Mailer which explores the social and individual evil which lurks in an affluent imaginary town based on Palm Springs, California. The painting depicts a party scene of glamorous figures collaged together to observe, touch, talk and lounge within this strange mid-century architecture. Andrews’ sketchy and rushed style gives this piece both movement and a hazy, dream-like quality; figures are faceless or their bodies fade into the furniture, mirroring this feeling of drunken confusion and the act of building together half-remembered images to create the essence of a party. 

In Mark Hallett’s in-depth search into the significance of Andrew’s party paintings, he notes that the background of ‘The Deer Park’ takes inspiration from Diego Velasquez’s ‘Philip IV Hunting Wild Boar’ (Figure 6). A particularly extravagant ritual of the Spanish court, Andrews uses historical references to “gesture to continuities between decadent courtly cultures both old and new” (Hallett, 2019: p.119).

Figure 5: Michael Andrews, ‘The Deer Park’ (1962)

Figure 6: Diego Velasquez, ‘Philip IV hunting Wild Boar’ (1632-7)

Partying and indulgence have danced hand in hand for thousands of years. In Ancient Rome, Emperor Nero held lavish parties of excessive wine, food and sex in his Domus Aurea (golden house); In 1664, Louis XIV held the ‘The Party of the Delights of the Enchanted Island’, held in Versailles, it lasted four days and featured music, plays, feasts and fireworks; in 18th century China Qing Dynasty Emperor Kangxi hosted a 3 day banquet of Manchu Han cuisine; and in New York 1977, the lavish, celebrity-studded Studio 54 saw Bianca Jagger ride into the club on a white horse. Andrew’s work highlights this historical mode of indulgence, while he pastiches Velasquez’s piece, he adds nods to contemporary culture which evokes a “transhistorical mundane society” (Crippa, 2018: London). Images of Marilyn Monroe embracing Jose Bolano and a 1962 newspaper clipping of an exotic dancer (Hallett, 2019: p.119) provide layers of meaning which speak to the modern spectacle of partying. Andrews balances this with contemplative characters, some who seem firmly within the party scene, and others who seem to be observing, mirroring the stillness of the melancholy figure in ‘Sliding down the Marquee, New College Ball’. These hints of melancholy within vibrant scenes serve to juxtapose these extremes of emotions, revealing the balancing act which comes with indulgence.

Painter, Catherine Parsonage does not play up to this balancing act, in her 2017 exhibition ‘Convivium’ she celebrates and indulges in the excessive. The show’s title derives from the Greek Symposium, which was defined by wine, poetry and “a hedonistic pursuit of pleasure” (Bosse and Baum, 2017: online). What Parsonage beautifully displays in her work is the body’s attraction to pleasure and the “feverish and bestial” (Bosse and Baum, 2017: online) interactions with indulgence. Although displaying works with a broad selection of subject matter, Parsonage describes in an interview with Rosanna McLaughlin that the concept of the Roman Convivium weaves together the threads of her work combining themes of monstrousness, excess, consumption and socialisation. Parsonage’s piece “Suddenly Every Wednesday” (Figure 7) was inspired by a weekly poetry evening in Rome which often turned into “raucous, gluttonous, orgiastic affairs” (Frieze, 2017: online). The pink forms in the piece appear like abstracted flamingos sipping from long, luxurious wine glasses, conjuring the image of an animal at the watering hole. Instead of sustenance, however, Parsonage is feeding on wine, conversation and debauchery, displaying a need for these moments of decadence. There is something so effortless in this piece, an ease with which Parsonage takes to indulgence; the flat abstract forms of elegant faces and hands, the sophisticated shape of the glasses, the delicate hues of pink and white and the softly placed brushstrokes combine to give the piece a dreamy, pleasing quality, which speaks to the distinct joy of partying. Parsonage’s work makes us want to indulge, to “feel more”.

Indulgence occupies a precarious space in our moral framework, some arguing for the Pleasure Principle of seeking only joy in life, and others claiming that from a lack of self-restraint comes corruption. These works display this precarity and in many of the pieces these polar opinions exist within the same frame. The art of the party is not concerned with moral deciphering, but rather acknowledging the fact that for many people indulgence offers a significant release from the perils of modern of life.

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Escapism

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For many artists, creating provides a chance to escape; it is unsurprising then that many artists have been drawn to nightlife’s transformative quality, which allows people to enter worlds very different from that of the day. Denzil Forrester and James Bartolacci create work which are about existing just in this moment, escaping life outside of these spaces and capturing a moment of elusive freedom. Dave Haslam argues that the setting of these spaces aids this escapism, “subdued lighting schemes, light effects, music and alcohol make night owls in the bar forget their daily routine and immerse themselves in other worlds” (Haslam, 2015: London. p.16). These “artificial underworlds” (ibid. p.17) are created as an arena of otherness, manmade to counter an increasingly terrifying world above ground.

Denzil Forrester’s lively abstract works are an interesting example of nightlife spaces becoming a safe haven within communities. Since moving to London from Grenada in 1967 (Stephen Friedman: online), Forrester has had a preoccupation with the dub-reggae clubs of London, his practice was built upon drawing within the spaces to the beat of the music, allowing himself to fully be immersed within the club experience. Pieces such as ‘Dubscratchers’ (Figure 8) shows intertwining abstracted bodies combined with strong beams of light to create a transcendental moment which looks to the “power of music to transport” (Amoaka, 2021: online). The bright and colourful hues of his paintings create a world quite separate from our own, with minimal variations in colour which seeks to unify the abstract figures, alluding to a pulse which moves throughout the piece, and throughout the physical space which it depicts. Such as in his 2019 work, ‘Itchin and Scratchin’ (Figure 9) in which Forrester forgoes figurative recognition and treats the crowd as an interwoven mass reminiscent of early Cubist works in the geometric merging of multiple perspectives. This gives the work an unreality which fights against a hostile reality, and shows the power that music and partying has to unify a mass of people.

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Forrester highlights the importance of music venues to the Black British community, Haslam arguing that the club is “as much an exercise in enjoying life as reclaiming it” (Haslam, 2015: London. p.x). These works are a vibrant celebration of ‘black joy’. Forrester conjures the fabric of this community to create this underground, vividly coloured world. Interspersed throughout his body of work, Forrester also explores the darker interaction between clubbing and the racist police presence which poses constant threat to these communities. Kaddish Morris in Frieze describes these pieces as “sombre yet pulsating” (Morris, 2019: online), the spirit within the works remains the same while the carefree movement evolves into something less joyful, Forrester saying “I painted them like I drew the nightclub scenes, with speed and gesture”. Forrester’s police paintings were created as a response to the death of his childhood friend, Winston Rose, who died in police custody in 1981 (Bonsu, 2019: online). The horrific nature of the death propelled him to create these darker versions of the night club scenes. Where the use of lights in ‘Dubscratchers’ evokes the transformative quality of dancing and moving, in pieces such as ‘Blue Jay’ (Figure 10) “bright beams throughout the work could be interpreted as either club strobes or flashing emergency light” (Morris, 2019: online). Forrester maintains a continuity of style which transforms these safe spaces into an arena of fear, in Figure 11 we can see a detail of ‘Blue Jay’ showing the animalistic rendering of the police officers grabbing the central figure. Forrester’s lines and brushstrokes are both violent and sensitive, the face of the police officers are geometric and eye-less to create something starkly impersonal and aggressive, yet the hand reaching towards the figure is rendered quite delicately against the light, which seems to radiate powerfully from the face of the central figure.

By including fear and prejudice into his work, Forrester displays that there is room for nuance in the art of the party. While these spaces are geared towards joy, there is a darker underbelly which is always present: escapism cannot exist without the place from which you want to escape. Forrester imbeds this nuance into the world he creates in his paintings, aiming to both honour and eternalise the heightened emotions which swirl round the club, using abstraction, bright colour and vague forms to emulate its intensity.

New York based artist James Bartolacci also looks to the club as inspiration for his large-scale abstract works. Exploring queer nightlife, Bartolacci creates nostalgic

memories of safety, community and connection which immerse the viewer into this space. Escapism is woven into the fabric of these abstracted paintings, recreating

hazy and saturated memories which are recognisable to many queer people who seek solace in these clubs. Such as their piece ‘3 A.M’ (Figure 12) which depicts the faintly recognisable shape of a body through a blurred, inebriated viewpoint. The abstracted swathes of bright blue, red and green light powerfully illuminate the forms. Bartolacci’s use of light is interesting, in many of his pieces he steers away from the tonal continuity that we see in Forrester’s work, evoking what could be excitement or alarm in stark contrasting neon beams of light. At first glance, the work ‘444 club’ (Figure 13) signals alarm, the bright red and blue reminiscent of an emergency vehicle darting inwards at the partygoers; however, Kevin Brazil in Frieze writes that “for a second, you are back in the crowd, wrapped in blinding light and welcoming darkness”, the dark, otherworldly quality is central to the escapism of the club or party, you can be who you aren’t able to be in the light of day. The figure on the far right is bathed in red light, looking into the beam like a religious messiah, or a child basking in the warm sun. The light directing in on them is both illuminating and protecting, creating subtle hues of purple which dance on their skin. Despite the excitement generated in the bold, saturated colour and proximity of people there is a stillness to this piece which feels incongruous with the idea of the party. It is in this stillness that we feel Bartolacci’s subjectivity, the act of processing his experience of a night into this snapshot of a beautiful moment. Bartolacci’s paintings exist “in an unfolding present” (Rugoff, 2007: London. p.14) in which layers of time are built upon each other, and the lack of clarity that exists in the hindsight of a night out offers a viewpoint based on nostalgia, feeling and half remembered images.  Escaping into this world that Bartolacci has created is about honouring the capacity for the art of the party to create safety and happiness, a happiness that many queer people experience when entering into one of these spaces for the first time.

Physical proximity is very significant in Bartolacci’s work, with many of the pieces for his 2021 exhibition ‘Life without Night’ created while nightclubs were shut due to Covid-19 lockdowns. The stance of the figures in this piece, tightly packed into the centre of the composition, transforms them into an infallible unit, a joined force. There is such comfort in this physical proximity and further highlights what we missed during the pandemic; the art of the party helps to remind us of that fun. Historically, the ability to be physically intimate was one of the defining features of a safe queer space, Matt Houlbrook in “Queer London” writing that in urban bars such at The Criterion in the 1930s the ability to be in physical distance from the world above, and physical proximity to other queer men “generated a tangible sense of release” (Houlbrook, 2005: London. p.72). This legacy from the earliest queer spaces trickles down to the distinctly 21st century clubs of Bartolacci’s work: these spaces are about safety.

Similar to Forrester’s depiction of the importance of these community spaces, Bartolacci’s works display the unifying escapism that occurs in the physical safety of a queer space, and how the art of the party can be a “visceral reminder of the magic and transformative possibilities of nighttime” (Dinsdale, 2021: online). Despite how crucial these safe spaces are, in the wake of the pandemic countless music venues and queer clubs are being closed down due to economic strain. Under a conservative government which viciously defunds the arts, we must wonder how long these spaces will be able to keep running, and what will happen to the marginalised people who need somewhere to escape.

Creating Intimacy

In my own practice I find that my primary reason for depicting social activity is to record and recreate intimacy. The heightened feelings of elation in a club or an emotional conversation in the early hours of the morning, depicting these memories freezes them in time and allows me to romanticise and valorise the meandering journey of young adulthood, looking to the club and the party as an arena in which life unfolds. Elena Crippa writes of Michael Andrews’ keen interest in the theme of the party, stating that “he enjoyed and was fascinated by social gatherings; occasions on which he could observe people’s different behaviours, as he believed people at parties are not doing anything other than being themselves” (Crippa, 2018: London. p. 177). It is interesting to think that Andrews viewed the people in these settings as “being themselves”, a momentary release from everyday life, allowing the floodgates to open to our real desires. A beautiful idea, and one that is explored extensively in the work of Nicole Eisenman in which authenticity and essentialism play a massive role.

Nicole Eisenman’s paintings pay close attention to the intimate spaces created by friendships and uses painting as a way to explore her subjective view of the people in her life. After sitting for Eisenman, Frieze writer Eileen Myles wrote that “The time we spent looking and being looked at deepened our friendship” (Myles, 2016: online). Intimacy is created in this act of observing. What Eisenman does so beautifully is paint her sitters in the way that she, and only she sees them. ‘Another Green World’ (Figure 14) is a painting which seems to pulse with life, “each figure is painted with not just an identifiable body but a personality with a colour temperature and ambient light.” (Ward, 2021: online). The party scene shows an ensemble of figures, tightly packed, not claustrophobically but rather intimately woven together; people in the scene lean on each other or embrace, they recline comfortably in the company, becoming a homogenous mass despite the incongruous style. All the figures are distinct, being rendered on a varying scale from semi-realistic to cartoonish or abstract, giving each its own personality. The earnest figures who sit looking at the records are depicted on the more realistic end, while they are starkly contrasted to the intwined cartoon-like figures who blow solid white smoke rings into the air. The delicacy and subjectivity with which Eisenman treats her figures feels extremely personal, it feels like a peak into her life and community. This painting is an invitation handed to its viewer to enter this intimate world of music, charcuterie, embraces, half naked bodies and a romantic view of New York. Shakespeare’s ‘Green world’ was a place of nature in which “characters can escape society’s trappings” (Steelman, 2009: 3). A place where rights were put to wrong, Eisenman embeds this piece with the comfort that all will end up well, contextualising the uninhibited relaxation that echoes throughout the figures in the piece.

Composition plays a significant role in the creation of intimacy in ‘Another Green world’, by warping the perspective to reveal layer upon layer of partygoers, Eisenman creates a mass of bodies which harmoniously interact. This close proximity is so central to the party, dozens of people piled into a New York apartment, you can’t help but feel this emotional closeness between the figures, and thus in Eisenman’s relationship to the work. Similarly, in Kitaj’s ‘The Wedding’, the figures are built into a tight mass, intertwining and merging together in a painterly act of intimacy. The scene is chaotic but the composition moves as one, the piece flowing from the bottom right slanting figure of Frank Auerbach to the top left where the depiction of Lucian Freud looks off into the distance.

As stated in the introduction, the Art of the Party is distinctly broad, as what constitutes a party is inherently subjective. Arguably the grandest party of a person’s life, Kitaj’s ‘The Wedding’ (Figure 15) celebrates his marriage in this tightly packed abstracted group portrait. This piece is not only an ode to his lifelong partner, Sandra Fisher, but to the artist friends who surround him. With David Hockney as best man and Frank Auerbach, Leon Kossoff and Lucian Freud making up the minyan of ten Jewish men.

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Ralph Rugoff in ‘The Painting of Modern Life’ looks at the significance born from processing life through paint, arguing that artists aimed to depict ‘the immediacy of contemporary experience within the history of an ancient medium’ (Rugoff, 2007: London. p.11). And to this end were able to inject an “unexpected gravity” (ibid.) into somewhat trivial aspects of modern life. To paint someone, to me, feels like an act of intimacy, wanting to give gravity to the personal significance of memory making. Kitaj speaks of his difficulty with finishing ‘The Wedding’, saying “It was in my studio for five years. I like to keep a painting alive as long as I can” (Sinclair, 1994: online. p.390). The notion of keeping the painting “alive” speaks to the psychological connection that we feel as we paint the people among us, utilising this medium to preserve. It is no surprise then that Kitaj wanted to preserve the memory of his wedding, and also no surprise that it took him so long to part with it.

There is a tangible sense of chaos and theatre in this piece. Bright swathes of colour create an excitement and joy: blues outlining the rabbi, greens sweeping from the ceiling, the saturated yellow illuminating his bride, Sandra. Similar to Eisenman, there is a subjectivity in this piece, the figures each have an energy formed from specific colour, varied brushstrokes and textural changes. Hockney’s distinct bright yellow hair, pale, flat face and loosely rendered glasses are boldly set against the severe and densely depicted face of Auerbach. Sandra Fisher is very small yet the bright white of her dress and warm toned skin, along with the slanted composition leaning over her, makes her the centre-piece of the work. The subjectivity and love with which Kitaj painted this piece is evident, warmth radiates from his brush strokes creating a celebration of love and marriage, but also of the friendships that defined him.

Eisenman and Kitaj use an ensemble cast of people in their life to create something wholly theirs. It is an inherently intimate act to think about a person, look at them intently, process how you feel about them and finally physically render them in paint. A closeness permeates both of these pieces, bringing together tightly packed compositions, vivid and careful colour choices, and a celebration of the party as the physical space in which intimacy can blossom.

Night Shift

While looking at works by a broad range of artists pre-pandemic, I also wanted to focus in on work created by young, local artists immersing themselves in post-pandemic Manchester nightlife. ‘Night Shift’ is an exhibition curated by Dilemma MCR, a collective co-run by myself and two other art students. This exhibition was in collaboration with XLR Manchester, a garage and techno club in Manchester’s student area. An ode to the profundity of ‘going-out’ culture, this exhibition immersed the viewer in the setting of the club; as they viewed the work, they were able to have a drink from the bar, listen to the DJ, go to the smoking area and be confronted with the distinct smell of the basement club. One of our exhibiting artists installed an interactive sculpture (Figure 16) which invited people to draw and write on the disused door as they would a toilet door and as it filled up with writing it glowed under the colourful club lighting as a celebration of the chaotic beauty created in these environments.

Manchester has a rich history of nightlife: in 1845 Engels spoke of Manchester’s poorest workers drinking and socialising through their weekends, observing that they had “an unbridled thirst for pleasure, to want of providence, and of flexibility in fitting into the social order” (Engels, 1845: Cambridge); innovative clubs such as The Hacienda pioneered the 90s acid house and rave scene throughout the country (Haslam, 2015: London. p.xi); and Gay Village, once used by queer people for clandestine sexual encounters, is now an iconic district of queer nightlife internationally. When Joel Goodman took a photograph of Manchester in the early hours of New Year’s Day 2016 (Figure 17), it was shared throughout social media and “likened in its composition to a Renaissance masterpiece” (Safi, 2016: online). The photograph shows two policemen wrestling a man to the ground, a woman screaming from the side-lines, various people bustling about and the amazing form of a drunk man sprawled across the floor, touching his bottle of beer like Michaelango’s Adam. The image seemed to resonate as a quintessentially British, specifically Mancunion night out.

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Manchester has one of the biggest student communities in the country, with around 96,200 people studying across the five universities (New economy, 2016: online). Fallowfield, Manchester’s student area, has consequentially become a significant community with its own shared rhythms and rituals. Many of the artists in this exhibition sought to explore these rituals and how they come to shape our relationship to partying and clubbing. Cara Cottam explores the ritual of pre-drinks in her series of tender black and white film photography (Figure 18); the shared experience of a club smoking area is depicted in Ned Perry-Warnes’ ‘Splitting head ache’ (Figure 22); and the ultimate conclusion to a Fallowfield night out, going to the take-away, is beautifully displayed through abstracted illustration in Gem Poole’s ‘ The Big Night Out- phase 3’ (Figure 20).

Lily Hodgkinson plays on these tropes of student club culture in her large textile work, ‘Text Me’ (Figure 21). Hodgkinson layers mixed fabrics, screen-printed with hazy patterns and images of a club smoking area to create a naïvely rendered face, fruitlessly saying into the abyss “I can’t hear you it's too loud in here. Text me” (Figure 21). This simple line sends the viewer back into that moment in the club, not remembering the dancing or the drinks, but remembering the noise and the anxiety. Hodgkinson uses this ancient medium of textile to bring forward a small, nostalgic moment, distinctly Gen-Z in its language, to preserve a snapshot of what it feels like to be young.

This quintessential nostalgia for the party is combined with classicism in Ned Perry- Warnes’ ‘Spitting Headache’ (Figure 22). Using a cast of a classical Roman bust, Perry-Warnes alludes to the timelessness of indulgence and partying. This piece looks at a moment of intensity in which discomfort is set against joy and fun. The bust is split in two to reveal pink feathers spilling out of the figure, Perry-Warnes articulating that “they are broken and beautiful but the party goes on”. Queerness plays a significant role in this depiction of the party, combining the bright, colourful aesthetic of the gay club with the drug-culture which lies beneath the queer community. The neon orange tip of a cigarette, drug spoon necklace and green glitter dripping down the bust creates a psychedelic reimagining of the heightened sensations of partying.

Hyperbole was a thread which ran through many of the pieces in the exhibition including Matilde Roque’s ‘Untitled’ (Figure 23) which depicts a vibrant club scene. Using careful yet fast brushstrokes, Roque creates a hazy movement which emulates moving through this space and observing the transience of the night. The eye is immediately drawn to the figures in the background who passionately embrace above the dance floor, illuminated by club lighting and being watched by lonely onlookers. Beneath them there is a hazy mass of people, moving and dancing to the pulse with which this piece was painted. The atmosphere in Roque’s painting is nostalgic for the moment in the club in which everyone seems to be moving as one.

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Conclusion

While I have separated my discussion into the themes of indulgence, escapism and intimacy, these concepts are inextricably linked in the melting pot of the party. The preview for Catherine Parsonage’s exhibition ‘Convivium’ was specifically designed to become its own party or symposium, forging a space in which intimacy can be created through looking at art. The warmth with which Denzil Forrester explores the dub-reggae scene is incredibly intimate, with a thread of careful celebration and love throughout his works spanning over 30 years. Intimacy lies at the heart of the art of the party. The word party comes from the Latin ‘partiri’, which means ‘to divide into parts’, it’s interesting to think how the word has evolved to have perhaps the opposite meaning; we can see in this essay that partying offers a space in which people can physically come together, to create memories that can be shared and collectively remembered in the future. The work I have discussed preserves those specific memories through mediated images, whether it is Dafydd Jones capturing indulgence and nostalgia of Oxford students, R.B Kitaj remembering his wedding day, or Matilde Roque harnessing the atmosphere of a Manchester club.

When first researching this essay, I did not expect to find the volume and variety of work which explores the theme of the party: I could instantly see that this is a theme which many artists are drawn to. Equally surprising, however, was the lack of theory and criticism about partying, especially in relation to art. Artists throughout history have wanted to capture the theme of the party for a variety of reasons, from displays of courtly decadence to capturing the feeling in the local club on a Friday night- but academia has not reflected this. Therefore, I believe there needs to be a shift in the boundaries of serious analysis, there is so much cultural significance that can be found in themes which are deemed silly or unacademic. Lying beneath much of the work in this essay are darker themes, made exciting and dynamic by processing through the theme of the party: mental illness, racism, homophobia and political unrest are concepts which emerge as we analyse and interrogate. The works I have explored in this essay have encouraged me to go forward with an analytical eye, searching for the social, political and personal significance in the mundane and the trivial: a magnifying glass which I may hold up to my life.

Despite the trajectory of modern progress towards a virtual reality, combined with a pandemic which isolated us from our peers, partying has prevailed. Kitchen discos, online raves and Zoom quizzes were no match to the reality of dancing, chatting, drinking and moving in the same physical space as others. With this newfound significance, the art of the party becomes a valuable cultural resource. It offers us a glimpse at the undercurrent that forever lurks beneath polite, adult society: where sordid freedoms, indulgent wealth, safe havens and intimate connection interweave to create a dynamic atmosphere, in which emotions can swing on a pendulum from fear to euphoria. As long as artists keep exploring these emotions, preserving these memories and analysing their significances, we can immortalise these important social rituals and keep the party alive.