Damien, Jaack and Verity…

It’s always nice when someone leaves a comment about the blog, nicer still when I get feedback from artists and performers that I’ve featured on it and nicest of all when I get to interact in some small way with those writers and creative types more successful than myself.
That vicarious thrill of knowing that, no matter how minor, my little corner of the internet has had an impact on the work of somebody whose work I admire, whether it’s plugging a local band I’ve seen or helping promote a world famous artist.

Ok, that second example might not be the sort of thing I get to do very often, (oh alright, “never” would be more accurate, if you want to be picky) until today, that is.

A couple of years ago I wrote this post on outdoor sculpture, which featured the spectacular Verity statue on Ilfracombe harbour, a commission by the original enfant terrible of the British modern art world, Damien Hirst.

Verity looks out to sea in North Devon.

Up close, Verity is incredibly imposing, towering over the small harbour like a watchful colossus protecting her homeland from invaders and, despite her half-flayed naked figure, she has a savage beauty that takes your breath away.

Well imagine my delight last week, when I received an e-mail from a very polite gentleman called Theo who works for a company called Artsy, (they showcase and promote the work of various artists on their very slick website) saying that he’d seen my sculpture post and asking if I would be prepared to provide a link to their Damien Hirst page.

Obviously I was very flattered that he would consider Diary of an Internet Nobody worthy of such a request and told him that I would be glad to be involved in whatever way I could.
After all many of you, my lovely readers, are from far flung parts of the globe and you may not have yet been exposed to Hirst’s often beautiful, sometimes controversial, but always intriguing catalogue of art works.

So please take the time to check out THIS LINK and discover for yourself what makes Damien Hirst one of the most talked about artists of recent years.

Which brings me to the second person that I’d like to draw your attention to today, someone who, if there’s any justice in the world of comedy, will soon be a big name, not just on YouTube, where his channel has over 150,000 subscribers, but on TV and the live comedy circuit.

Jack Dean is a self-styled “YouTube personality with little personality” whose channel is called JaackMaate and who tackles everything from the curse of terrible, formulaic pop music and teen magazines to racism and celebrity interviews.

Now, I’ve never really been a fan of what I suppose you could loosely describe as “lad humour”, although the way Jack does it, with his immensely likeable personality, (he’s too modest, he has charisma by the bucketload) snappy editing and liberal worldview, it makes even the most ranty of his posts very funny indeed.
Admittedly, you may need to brace yourselves for a fair bit of colourful language and adult humour, but even so, JaackMaate comes across as one of those rare people; somebody who everyone wants to be friends with (unless of course, you are one of the unfortunates who have incurred his comedy wrath) and I’d like to share with you one of my favourites of his recent YouTube videos.

This is “Dirty Questions With My Girlfriend”:

If you liked that and want to see more of Jack’s material, GO HERE TO CHECK OUT HIS YOUTUBE CHANNEL.

And that’s about it for this post.

Coming up: I’m lucky enough to have been nominated for another award, this time by the lovely Linda G Hill, so next time I shall be going back to (very nearly) the beginning of my blogging adventure.

Stay tuned…