The Last Bastion of Laziness

The Last Bastion of Laziness is comprised of a series of assemblages, each including a different 80s Garfield the Cat plush toy, fitted with infant Nike trainers of various design lines—Air Jordan, Air Max, Free Runner among others—that are staged in different poses atop cat scratcher ‘trees’. Playing on the infamous laziness of the cartoon icon as well as the athletic, aspirational pretences of megabrand Nike, the works see Garfield at an impasse; both lazing and competing, winding down and gearing up, seemingly lethargic and ever-ready. These assemblages reveal our ambivalent relationship to work and leisure by exploring the aesthetics of anti-work office culture, and the ‘rise and grind’ ethos of self-optimisation. Through these works Attwood contends that even the once iconically lazy must today negotiate the productivity imperative.