Can everyone be an artist? I believe that everyone has within them a spark of the very creativity that gives rise to all of creation. When we nurture this within ourselves it becomes very easy to see in others. It is preferred in my experience. We currently have a culture that commodifies youth and the all too human experience of not being enough. Not being good enough, unless I get, have or do ___________ . Artists of all kinds spend time and devotion learning their craft and skill to a point of proficiency, authority and/or mastery. Enter capitalism which removed from any negative connotations is an economic system that is attuned to the aspect within ourselves for constant expansion. When this aspect of our being meets the indomitable nature of the human spirit, self-expression whether filtered through a positive or negative lens is inevitable and natural. When anyone tells someone else that they arent this, cant do this or this, there is an reactive Ill show you. These artists/performers sing to that part of the psyche, that which still carries the trauma of the obstruction of our creative essence and innocence from view. When someone who serious artists dont consider to be an artist expresses something that is supressed in a majority of folks that artist or non-artist (depending on who you ask) becomes popular. There is an experience of immediacy, a resonance that matches the trauma and the desire to avoid or transcend it. This is an ongoing trend in the last thirty to forty years. And it appears things in pop-culture get worse. We seem to be at the heights or bowels of a cultural Monsanto. And in my own local universe and I see artisans those who have engaged their craft as well have created their own unique gift and place. I believe that artists who have cultivated deep skill have to reclaim their own value and authority as far as what it gives to life. As art and artists have become academic and shut in this need for permission from an authority to express oneself matched with a cultural valuing/institutional dismissal of celebrity has stripped a perspective of relevance. I personally dont think academics are irrelevant but I feel that other means of self-empowerment, self - authority and engagement with the life around it are required to bring relevance back to the people. Art and artists give value to the life around it through creating work, spaces to connect, experience possibility.
Posted on: Sun, 04 Jan 2015 23:32:26 +0000
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