Everyone keeps saying , "next ,you guys need to create a happy piece". I shrug and say "yeah..you know that's a good idea " or something equally bland and ingenuine.
But I've been thinking ..of this idea of a "happy" piece or even just a "light" one. And I find that every time I envision something that could go into a less morbid place than is usual for me and many of my fellow artists, it is not really a "happy" piece , in the sense of simply HAPPY . Instead ( if its not dark) , its ironic or funny or tongue-in-cheek. I can't envision something that is unashamedly light or upbeat or optimistic...at least something of this kind that can represent me or me ,it.
How very strange.
Makes me wonder about art, my relationship with it and indeed everyone else's . Happiness like we see it in the movies and songs of the 60 s and 70 s is naive, classic or frowned upon. Taken seriously only at times when nostalgia is appropriate. "Funny", "clever" or "intelligent" - this is closer to what young creators of art want to hear about their pieces or creations. What is an "honest" piece? what "touches " or "effects"?
Is the act of taking a private impetus from within oneself, dissecting and bisecting it and presenting it , in itself one that requires the dishonesty of verbal or explicit communication?There 's a book inside of some, waiting to be written, a song bursting to be composed or a dance finding its way into a choreography.Almost like the work of art already has its own life or existence inside of the creator or his or her consciousness before it even takes shape. The metaphoric conception of this baby is the idea and eventually the birth is its actual manifestation. But unlike our human physical offspring, the work of art , in some inexplicable kind if way seems to pre-exist.. architecturing itself or dictating the terms for its own formation and eventual release into the world of viewers, listeners ,readers and so on.So often one looks back and is aghast as to where "that came from" when revisiting something one has created. I can't describe it too well but it is as if the piece or book or installation chose its parent , form and temporal/ spatial parameters and then worked itself into a birthing. Much like the Buddhist explanation of how a human being works out his or her birth ,life and death along the path of karma .A work of art then, has a soul, has a purpose and manifests through some kind of body depending on the medium.
If a piece were a person....? If a work of art is thought of as a living being with a life defined by how long it is valid or engaged with then universal appeal across generations and cultures brings about immortality .
The creature that creates is the same as the creature that has been created. In a way we are our work. Very few receivers of art can actually separate the art from the artist and the more you get to know one the more that one defines what the other is to you. The actor and character merge as do the book and the writer. You then (as an artist ) are the world you seek to create. The question I am asking though is -Are you choosing and creating this world or is this world channeling itself into being through you ? Do you choose or have you been chosen? ...I sometimes think we artists like to massage our self esteems by this "art has chosen us" idea.
Of course this can go on and it would undermine my need to keep making work if I claimed to have any answers..
In a way, manifestation is the most important signifier of "choice". Art too in its strange and accommodating way indicates both choice and surrender.. and in some way by choosing life we are born and then by surrendering to it, we live.
But I've been thinking ..of this idea of a "happy" piece or even just a "light" one. And I find that every time I envision something that could go into a less morbid place than is usual for me and many of my fellow artists, it is not really a "happy" piece , in the sense of simply HAPPY . Instead ( if its not dark) , its ironic or funny or tongue-in-cheek. I can't envision something that is unashamedly light or upbeat or optimistic...at least something of this kind that can represent me or me ,it.
How very strange.
Makes me wonder about art, my relationship with it and indeed everyone else's . Happiness like we see it in the movies and songs of the 60 s and 70 s is naive, classic or frowned upon. Taken seriously only at times when nostalgia is appropriate. "Funny", "clever" or "intelligent" - this is closer to what young creators of art want to hear about their pieces or creations. What is an "honest" piece? what "touches " or "effects"?
Is the act of taking a private impetus from within oneself, dissecting and bisecting it and presenting it , in itself one that requires the dishonesty of verbal or explicit communication?There 's a book inside of some, waiting to be written, a song bursting to be composed or a dance finding its way into a choreography.Almost like the work of art already has its own life or existence inside of the creator or his or her consciousness before it even takes shape. The metaphoric conception of this baby is the idea and eventually the birth is its actual manifestation. But unlike our human physical offspring, the work of art , in some inexplicable kind if way seems to pre-exist.. architecturing itself or dictating the terms for its own formation and eventual release into the world of viewers, listeners ,readers and so on.So often one looks back and is aghast as to where "that came from" when revisiting something one has created. I can't describe it too well but it is as if the piece or book or installation chose its parent , form and temporal/ spatial parameters and then worked itself into a birthing. Much like the Buddhist explanation of how a human being works out his or her birth ,life and death along the path of karma .A work of art then, has a soul, has a purpose and manifests through some kind of body depending on the medium.
If a piece were a person....? If a work of art is thought of as a living being with a life defined by how long it is valid or engaged with then universal appeal across generations and cultures brings about immortality .
The creature that creates is the same as the creature that has been created. In a way we are our work. Very few receivers of art can actually separate the art from the artist and the more you get to know one the more that one defines what the other is to you. The actor and character merge as do the book and the writer. You then (as an artist ) are the world you seek to create. The question I am asking though is -Are you choosing and creating this world or is this world channeling itself into being through you ? Do you choose or have you been chosen? ...I sometimes think we artists like to massage our self esteems by this "art has chosen us" idea.
Of course this can go on and it would undermine my need to keep making work if I claimed to have any answers..
In a way, manifestation is the most important signifier of "choice". Art too in its strange and accommodating way indicates both choice and surrender.. and in some way by choosing life we are born and then by surrendering to it, we live.
