Corporations and knuckle-brained philistinism have been so closely intertwined for so long that only the most naive spirit can claim to be shocked when some new Orwellian horror is presented as a good idea by the faceless men in grey suits.
We are amused, yes, indignant, certainly, but the recent ham-handed financial chicanery of corporate America somehow fits snugly into a picture that shows no signs of being rearranged as long as creative people create and nice-but-dim schoolchildren trudge dutifully into the moral and intellectual oblivion of modern business.
It should come as no surprise, then, to hear that Tiger Woods (or whichever throng of yes-men and handlers now comprise that distinctive young man) is suing an American artist named Rick Rush. The crime? Rush, trying to sustain his expensive predilection for Messrs Windsor and Newton, has painted a montage of Woods winning the Masters at Augusta in 1997. Anyone who has been subjected to this monument to kitsch might consider a lawsuit an entirely appropriate reaction: indeed, a restraining order ensuring that Rush never comes within a hundred yards of a canvas again would not be a bad first step. But naturally aesthetic appreciation in the corporate world extends as far as stainless steel bar-fridges and iMacs. No, Rush is being sued for trying to make a buck off the iconic image of Tiger.
Woods couldn’t be more corporate. His Colgate grin is a dental facsimile of Nike’s swoosh and his gosh-darned modesty comes in bite-sized chunks Taylor-Made for Oprah teasers. But his decision to go after Rush comes as a sobering reminder of the astonishing ignorance, the barbarous heart of business in sport.
It is safe to assume that Woods does not understand what a painting is, nor that he understands even a minimum of art theory. One cannot blame him for this: he was nailing miniature nine irons when most of us were chewing the corners off our first inflatable bath-books. But that he has not acquired the humility along the way to accept that there are things in the world that are beyond his understandably limited ken is sad. That his absolute philistinism should have been imposed on the art world by Tiger Inc, however tenuous the link between Rush and Rembrandt may be, is obscene.
Corporate sport busts a gut trying to convince the world of the magnetism of our sporting heroes. Misquoted lines from Tennyson and Kipling superimposed over bloodied or impassioned faces, serenaded by Brian May’s howling axe, tell us that they are enigmas, warriors against evil, saviours, lovers, fathers, gods.
What they cannot tell us, because they themselves do not entirely understand it, is that our heroes are desperately ignorant about very, very many things in the world. Magnetic is all that they are.
For a year it was my job to interview some of South Africa’s finest cricketers for a website. All were astonishingly friendly, consummately polite and spine-implodingly dull. Deep-sea sponges have more interesting conversations. Ask any veteran of any Springbok press conference or United Cricket Board-monitored interview, and he or she will tell you that they write the story first and then fill in the gaps after the event: the only variable will be whether the guys gave 120% or 150%.
But until a Formula One champion looks like Brad Pitt and runs a cosy little neurosurgery practice on the side between humanitarian trips to the Amazon rain forest, the suits must protect their earnest, malleable little charges by appealing to the lowest common denominators, those of image and sex. Brill Becks beds Hot Posh, scores for England. Thanks to very clever feet, David Beckham, the epitome of middle-class ordinariness, makes James Bond look like a buck-toothed plumber from Bradford.
Corporate sport insists that Beckham’s sheepish grin is cool smirk and not a shy evasion tactic, that his taciturn demeanour is a stylish up-yours to the establishment and not a desperate fear that he will be asked by teacher to spell Mississippi.
Luckily for the corporations that run sport, life and its complications can be kept at a safe distance. Press conferences can be stage-managed, stars are allowed to become surly at the slightest hint of a polysyllabic question.
The one and only interview I did with a cricket star in which he ranted about a number of grievances and slung some magnificent dirt at international rivals was passed on to his corporate handler. Back it came: the guys gave 120% and we’re really looking forward to the next match.
So when Rush paints a picture of Tiger, translating an abstract projection of light on to a retina into a painting and then into money, they panic, sensing anti-corporate alchemy at work. And when they panic, they sue.
Is Woods arrogant? I cannot say, not having met him, and those who have say that he is not. Has he revealed himself to be ignorant and unsophisticated? Without a doubt. Will sports fans care? Of course not. As long as Rampant Tiger Stalks New Record, real life is an unwelcome interloper.