Everyday Creativity and Little Pep Talks
The lovely literary magazine Bracken has just published a collection of sidewalk faces! A ray of light penetrating our pandemic fog.
https://www.brackenmagazine.com/corona-hopelings/mccaleb-sidewalk-face
As an editor, I am always arranging other people’s footage. Such a pleasure to have mine arranged. Thank you Bracken.
When is a good time to make art? Right now. What is an acceptable outcome of making art? Fun. What if it’s not fun? Then it’s not your art. You are trying to make it be some way and not letting it reveal itself. And it’s self is you. Art is a fingerprint. Yours can not be like anyone else’s. The reason to do it is to know what you would make if only you let yourself make it.
I used to want to be “in” the art world so I did things like turn a bunch of art into photographic slides which necessitated formatting small Avery labels in Microsoft word with the appropriate art info. Do you think that got me in the art world? Mostly it got me shelves of non joy sparking detritus that have lived in an Ikea cupboard for decades.
I could say, okay, forget art, eat more chips, call more friends. Go camping! I don’t know. Finding things to pass the time isn’t difficult. But I don’t want to forget art. Is it okay to do art and not tell the art world? Yes!
For me the art world was a legitimate seeming way to justify a lot of present day activity. Like an imaginary rubber band that held all the art together.
Art is not a ticket to the art world. Art is not like a dollar where if there is one why not have a hundred. Art is not for hoarding. Art is not for spending. Art is not a product. Art is not a thing. Art is not for the future.
Art is for right now. Art is the most authentic way to be in a friendship with oneself. Art is an activity. Art is a date with the self. Art is a revelation.
Can’t believe you missed part 1, the essay everyone is talking about even though it was written 5 years ago. Link at the bottom. Catch up!
While looking through old posts, this title made me smile. Yep! That still sounds right. I think I will elaborate.
Let’s start with the point of it all, as in is there one? Is there ever a good or necessary reason to organize cooked spaghetti? I can’t think of one. Just put it on the plate and eat, right? I’ve never thought of my belly as an organizational device before but sure, that’s a good if temporary place to store cooked noodles while we strip them of nutrients. Otherwise, if there is too much, put it in Tupperware. It’s organized in the sense that it’s not co-mingling with other leftovers and I can find it again. But if I had to organize it strand by strand, it would be really hard and seem pointless. Just like art!
I think you know I don’t really find art pointless but surely you have had the experience of looking hard for this particular point and having a hard time locating it. Art is so messy and irrational. Art is mysterious and defiant. Art is useless and compelling. Art is strange and upsetting. Art is for eating, not for organizing. Art is for contemplation not for transaction.
It may be more accurate to say that justifying art making is like organizing limp noodles. It’s so easy to cook spaghetti and it’s pretty to listen to music and draw in a little book or make a face out of an evaporating water splotch on the sidewalk. The harder job to say explain to one’s self why this is a reasonable acitivity. To formulate a coherent, satisfying and convincing argument for why this process should be repeated over and over. To give one’s self a satisfactory explanation for why the resources of time and money are being used to fund so much unnecessary visual detritus.
Let’s say you did organize the heck out of those gelatinous strands of cooked Italian dough. Then what?! Would you be excited if someone very close to you, such as your very own self, informed you it would now become a regular part of the work week. Maybe.
Making the art is easy, understanding the art is hard. Justifying the art is impossible.
I make art because I don’t know how else to deal with reality.
Link to Part 1
Making Art is Like Organizing Cooked Spaghetti
Sidewalk Face 