‘MUCKY’ by ‘Pervy' Reg

Art Review by Peter le Musk

“I’VE ALWAYS BEEN MUCKY” states local wanker ‘Pervy’ Reg – a description not intended to be pejorative - Reg self-identifies as a ‘wanker’ and is clearly attempting to pleasure himself through his trousers as he crosses the floor to greet me. We shake hands and I’m immediately grateful to the kind assistant on the ticket desk for the surgical gloves she insisted I wear as the jizz streaked across Reg’s hand slides straight off them – though I do make a point of scrubbing my hands mercilessly following our meeting which is mercifully brief.

“I got into it early” Reg expounds. “I saw me first mucky book in the school playground but until I could cum properly I used to just piss in me own mouth.”

The show takes place at Box Room, Toy Town’s brand spanking new arts venue – purposefully built next door to the fire station in case the locals get angry at the very presence of culture again and try to burn it down – a fate which befell the town library so often it is now housed in a bomb and fireproof building.

Box Room’s space has faithfully recreated the signature room in Reg’s Toy Town home – bare save an armchair and plasma TV on the wall, screening all sorts of filth the artist has recorded on his video camera over the years. The volume of material is staggering – with 1,408 videos of Reg masturbating alone and another 3 of him doing it in company. The walls are similarly plastered, with 1,700 photographs of Toy Town nightlife taken by Reg in a single calendar year – an exhibition titled ‘1989.’ The photographic talent on display is not in doubt but one wishes he would choose more interesting subjects than overflowing urinals and numerous men and women snapped on toilets mid number two.

Reg is renowned locally as the sort of bloke “wot uses his own bog paper twice” and the sexual activities he appears to have filmed and continually attempted to participate in would make a 70’s rock band blush. Many worthwhile anecdotes are voiced in the audio commentary I listen to as I walk around - during which 48 minute monologue I hear Reg climax loudly. Three times.

The humbly stated wish for the show to share Reg’s unique insight and spread joy by which I presume he means sexual joy should fool no one and its difficult not to see the show for what it is – an exhibition by a lonely old man who sees sex in everything – a point proved by a piece entitled FISH FINGER - comprised of a plate of fish fingers slathered in tartare sauce. The tartare is spread artfully enough but there’s no mistaking Reg’s meaning, which is altogether too nudge, nudge, wink, wink for my taste.

The audio ‘Reg’ then invites me to sit in the armchair, close my eyes and ‘knock one out’ while the real Reg films it. Following straight on from the piles of stained underwear and discarded tissue mountain, this is the final straw for me and I tell Reg his show is brave and astonishing and that I shall be reviewing it favourably. Back on the train I’m struggling to escape constant replays of the Reg’s final video – a scene from a local dogging meet and Reg’s breathless exhortation to “look at that bloke’s arse. E’s goin’ like the clappers” concluding with the altogether too familiar camera lens smear, when the one word summary of the show demanded by my editor finally surfaces. ‘Haunting.’

© the glistening tortoise 2023