Grayson Perry Crybully and Lolcow 2020
Glazed ceramic
50.5 x 50.5 x 4 cm
19 7/8 x 19 7/8 x 1 5/8 in
‘This work is again based on an early English press moulded plate showing two gents smoking and drinking in a coffee house. Crybully and Lolcow perhaps sound like characters in a Restoration comedy but they are two very modern terms I gleaned from a rather brilliant YouTube channel called ContraPoints. Crybully is an elegant way of putting the psychotherapeutic phenomenon of “persecuting from a victim standpoint” someone who thinks because they have had something unfortunate happen to them it gives them a free pass to be awful to other people. A Lolcow is someone on social media who is unwittingly hilarious and other users will provoke and tease the Lolcow into reacting in an unconsciously stupid, angry and unintentionally funny way: they milk them for laughs, hence Lolcow.’ – Grayson Perry