The Luther Blissett Enigma
"By exploring every conceivable avenue down which it is possible to escape the shackles of a conventional identity, Luther Blissett infuses the world with a fresh vitality." - Luther Blissett (1998)
Luther Blissett is a black British footballer who was 'bought' for a record fee by the prestigious Italian club AC Milan in the early 1980s. He subsequently played a disastrous season and became a symbol of heroic failure in Italy. Somehow by the 90s Luther Blissett had become a 'multiple name' used by media-savvy, culture-jamming Italian activists. Articles, exhibitions, performances, best-selling books, CDs and numerous hoaxes were attributed to the increasingly ubiquitous Luther, until even the venerable writer and theorist, Umberto Eco was suspected of being Luther. Numerous Luther events and appearances led to media scandals, public outrage and violent confrontations with police. --> [1]
---
In early 1995 the Italian media was gripped by the disappearance of a British artist. harry Kipper had been cycling round the north of the country, his route tracing out the word 'ART'. Weekly TV show Chi l'ha visto? ("Has Anybody Seen Them?") departed from its usual diet of missing children, fugitive spouses and draft dodgers to follow Kipper's case. On the eve of broadcast, the programme-makers found they'd been duped - but not before newspapers had been alerted to the hoax. Kipper was the creation of anonymous, Bologna-based art-anarchists who explained their motivation thus: "Chi l'ha visto? is a Nazi-pop expression of the need for control". The statement was signed 'Luther Blissett'. --> [2]
---
The School of Swindle
Lies and deceit as methods of artistic media critique: A new handbook encourages "communication guerillas" to fake news. --> [3]
Related: Umberto Eco