421. Art is in the Eye of the Beholder

 

I took this great blog title from Leila Zamora Moreno who gave it as a name for her son’s Cesar first masterpiece which I am going to share here because it’s his first year alive on Earth today!

We got a Pollock coming, people!

 

So, I watched a documentary on Marina Abramovic’s work called Marina Abramović: The Artist is Present and noticed how through watching it, I was constantly seeking for some kind of ‘meaningful’ thing to come through, something that could match my idea of ‘art.’ Through writing the self forgiveness I’m about to share, I realize that I had become this constant judge toward anything I’ve defined as ‘art’ and within doing so measuring/gauging it and see if it does match my idea of art as something that can ‘change the world’ and if not, usually I would follow through to judge it as pointless, useless, a waste of time, etc. In fact I had written out a blog about the documentary, but obviously noticed it was filled with righteous comments so as to impose ‘my perspective’ which then of course was a cool thing to do or else I would have remained within the idea/belief that ‘I was right in my assessment’ lol.

I also reacted when seeing people organizing performances and/or artistic creations around an ongoing situation here in Mexico about students having been disappeared/most likely killed due to a political point of convenience for a governor in one state here and then judging this as ‘pointless’ and ‘meaningless’ and then rehashing the judgment of ‘how come I can despise this ‘art world’ so much now and I once was so eager to be a part of it, where was I?’ – so here I go straight to Self Forgiveness.

 

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to say to myself, how was I ever involved in this art/cultural realm and come to despise it so much at the same time? Which is only showing the usual love-hate relationship wherein of course any ‘negative’ experience is in fact denoting I still hold a relationship toward art, and as such, it’s all about ME in fact and not at all about art/artists or the art world at all – this is then the point of self-responsibility to expand upon here.

 

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to experience remorse and embarrassment for having ever aimed at achieving an artistic career as I followed my desire to experience something ‘special’ through art and aim at ‘changing the world’ with it, which simply means that I was entirely driven by my own emotional and feeling experience and that this clouded my ability to see reality for what it is and genuinely question whether a ‘work of art’ has in fact ever changed people’s lives to the extent that I thought it would.

In this, I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to judge art as something frivolous or useless, wherein by defining it in such way I am then creating a negative relationship to it, but still a relationship nonetheless, so this is about me taking responsibility to ensure I no longer impose any ideas, beliefs, perceptions and reactions toward ‘art’ itself.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to create yet again an experience of disdain toward people that are using art as a way to demonstrate the corruption and deaths of people here in Mexico, wherein now artists are gathering to create portraits of students that have been – most likely – sent to be killed by a high authority in one of the states here in Mexico, and so reacting with the experience of ‘this is utter bullshit’ and so having the desire to just curse at the people that believe that in any way doing a portrait or performance of and for the people that have disappeared will change their family’s grief or would in any way ‘solve the problem.’

I forgive myself that I haven’t accepted and allowed myself to realize that this ‘disdain’ is simply a tantrum like experience that comes after one had created certain ideals and expectations upon something, which is why one has such a ‘stance’ toward – in this case – art, instead of realizing that ‘art’ in itself in this case is not aiming at creating a tangible, physical solution, but simply a remembrance that some people might find supportive and that’s up to each person and how they react/interact with such artistic expressions – therefore

 

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to become hypercritical to anything that has to do with art and aiming at bashing it constantly or whenever I can, which only demonstrates my own judgments and ‘false expectations’ created and imposed toward art, wherein I was trying to make of art an actual ‘tool to change the world’ but I realize that ‘art’ in itself as a manifestation and expression cannot do that at all – self change is and will always be here as ourselves, it is about who we are in our mind and in our actions, which in turn will define our creations as well.

 

I realize that in this, of course I’m missing out the actual self-forgiveness that extends beyond ‘myself’ only but as a human being that has lived in a world where pictures, emotions, experiences are the actual ‘drivers’ and/or ‘fuel’ of our reality, wherein the society of spectacle also involves creating this kind of ‘motives’ and ‘remembrances’ using art as a way to ‘heal the wounds’ or else, without realizing that in essence, art only works at a mind level and as such, it creates no solution to real-reality problems and in this

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to judge art for not being what I expected it to be, instead of realizing that it’s only me that tried to make it’ more’ than what it in fact is – in this

 I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to constantly try and fit ‘art’ into the category of a human creation that will in some way ‘change the world’ or ‘change people’s consciousness’ wherein in my desire to ‘fit’ art into this ideal, I’ve actually created such an unnecessary conflict within me, because I see that it is just impossible to do so, because nothing, no object, no image can ‘change you’ but only oneself in actually understanding why changing is necessary and how one can practically do it – in this:

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to get so infatuated with the idea of ‘change’ being able to exist within art, which you know in terms of the large scope of what art is, this idea of ‘change’ is already a limitation, a definition that is coming strictly from who I am and what I am walking in my life, which is very much aligned with ‘changing myself ‘ – thus, I have to stop trying to fit the world, fit people’s idea of art into my own.

 

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to be gullible and somewhat stubborn in trying to fit ‘my idea’ of art into everyone else’s artistic creation, which then of course leads me to only criticize, judge it, see it as ‘not good enough’ or ‘pointless’ or plain ‘bullshit’ without realizing that I’m judging it from my own point of view that aimed to make of art ‘something life changing and revolutionary.’ Therefore, I realize that I have to STOP trying to impose my own ideas of what art was supposed to be as a catalyst or a way to change people’s minds/lives and instead of trying to measure ‘all art’ against my own idea/belief and perception of what ‘art should be, I have to rather use all judgments as a way to continue checking what exists within me as an expectative or assumption around art, as this is then how I can use art or anything else as a mirror to continue seeing where I am creating experiences and separation from what is here.

 

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to play out the love and hate relationship toward art, which only signifies one thing: there are still remnants of self-definition within me according to ‘being an artist’ or wanting to stick to that profession as ‘what I studied’ or ‘who I was,’ because in a way I still wanted to try and ‘save the profession’ as ‘my choice’ and having done so in absolute clarity and conviction within myself; and so this was my attempt of trying to justify my decision thinking that I wasn’t so ‘out there’ or detached from reality when I chose to study this – but, at the moment I can see that I was in fact not really ‘grounded’ on Earth 10 years ago when I made such decision and that somehow I am still beating myself for it, which is not necessary – therefore

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to judge myself for having chosen what I now judge as some self-conceited and self-importance and absolutely self-indulgent profession as ‘art’ which in this is in fact only judging and ‘dissing’ that which didn’t ‘turn out to be what I expected’ and so, I realize that I have gone back and forth within this experience in the past of the ‘love and hate relationship toward art,’ but the problem is that I still tried to ‘suit my idea’ of what art should be in everything that I continue to see/watch and consume as ‘art,’ instead of realizing that I have to absolutely let go of the idea that I once held about art, let go unconditionally of my past choices in life, of my past ‘mindset’ and as such, stop any judgments around this point within me.

I commit myself to see art for what it is: a series of visual or experiential-based objects or images or actions wherein one is challenged to see reality with another pair of eyes and get to see reality from each person’s mindframe and perspective – thus to take it ‘for what it is’ as an individual or collective expression, instead of continually trying to see ‘where or how is this in any way changing the world?’ which is My idea of what art should be and the reason why this conflict still would emerge within me.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to judge ‘the past me’ as vain and superfluous for having chosen such a career and now in one way or another wanting to throw shit at it, which is not really acceptable at all, because art as any other action and creation that we do in this world, is part of what we also have to take responsibility for. Thus my way to contribute to it, is not to ‘bash’ something because it did not ‘fulfill’ my expectations upon it, but rather take the words that I had once associated with art / being an artist and live them myself in the way that I see is supportive and best for all.

 

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to having said this morning ‘where the hell was I when I decided to study art?’ and say so with a sense of regret and disdain toward me and so toward everything and everyone involved in such practice, instead of realizing that if I did this same kind of reproachment for everything else that I see we have done ‘wrong’ in our lives, I would live in constant reproachment which is obviously not necessary at all as in that, we only trap ourselves in guilt and remorse, instead of focusing on what is required to be changed HERE.  

 

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to not see and realize that what’s hiding behind this is me not wanting to admit that it was my own starting point toward art that defined my now judgment toward ‘art’ which is not about ‘art’ but about me and how I was in fact living and acting in a self-absorbed manner and was seeking for the kind of things like fame, fortune, all the money and the ‘good life’ as well as bashing the system while earning good money, lol – so I realize that I have to simply admit to myself the kind of decisions that I made in the past, the reasons behind it and that there is no way that I can ‘turn back time and change my decisions and career choice’ because I do realize that the decisions I made in my past were absolutely ‘congruent’ to my mind-frame, my interests, my aspirations in the past and within this, I have to absolutely let go of me trying to ‘make sense’ of my initial ambitions and desires in life so as to justify them, and try and see them with a ‘good light’ so to speak, which is not really necessary to now super impose some ‘goodness’ to it, because that would simply imply that I am still judging my past life and decisions as something ‘bad’ or ‘wrong’ or ‘self-interested,’ which is not really necessary once that I realize I have simply moved on from that phase in my life and my interests and aim in life have veered substantially from how I used to think 10 years ago, which I am of course grateful to myself for as well and for all the past moments that led to this realization.

 

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to project my dissatisfaction with my past choices upon every other artwork or artist I see and get to know of by judging their work and activity in all possible ways wherein I diminish it to being ‘pointless’ and ‘useless’ and taking this as a ‘fact,’ without realizing that all of these were only self-judgments that I have created around ‘art’ based on my own judgments toward myself and my past.

Therefore I commit myself to stop wanting to impose my idea of what ‘art should be’ upon others’ creations and simply redefine the word for myself to live as the actual creator of my life within the principles that I have established for myself of self-responsibility, self-introspection, self-forgiveness and self-correction as I see that this is what I have realized is the genuine way to do what I always aimed doing through art, which is changing myself and so with that, changing the world – therefore I hereby let go of the desire to ‘change the world’ through art  or attempt to make of art that ‘one point that changes the world’ which is also not ‘the point’ here.

 

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to as a human being desire to do something ‘more than myself’ through objects, experiences, artifacts outside of myself and now judging art for what I believe or assume ‘artists’ are aiming to do, which is another judgment coming from what I used to do with art itself, instead of realizing that art can be used as a bridge for self-investigation, yet it is not ‘the change’ in itself at a massive level that I wished it to be at some point, as I realize that self-change and self-realization cannot in any way be something done through only one action, one object, one image and have an effect ‘en masse’ – there are no magic tricks on this.

 

I commit myself to stop judging art, artists, art collectors, art supporters and everyone that enjoys art and instead see ‘art’ within the realm of any other human activity that we do at the moment which means that everything we are and do is yet to be walked through a process of self-realization and self-correction, which means there cannot be something that is genuinely ‘supportive’ if there is no foundation to understand such support or what would be supportive to ‘change oneself’ or ‘change the world’  – thus I am the one that has to stop seeing art through the eyes of ‘practical change’ and/or ‘practical relevance for self-change’ wherein I then create a righteousness to create ‘negative’ judgments toward it, which is once again falling in the judgmental trap that leads nowhere and in fact then I would support the continuation of separation, reactions, judgments and division in the world.

 

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to think, believe and perceive that because I studied art, I have ‘an authority’ to bash it which is really only playing the same critique conundrum that I have also criticized in the past, instead of seeing art or anything else as just expressions that each one of us will have to take self-responsibility for, for the intent, the purpose and the experience within which it was created – thus, I am no one to judge anyone or anything for what it is, I can only reflect myself upon the world and thus take responsibility for my judgments, my experiences, my expressions ‘toward others’ and always realize it has nothing to do with art per se, with artists or with the artworks themselves, but with myself.

 

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to still have wanted to control ‘my vision’ about art and so be able to ‘measure all other art’ according to what I had defined as ‘art,’ not realizing that this definition of ‘art’ is not even certain for people in art creation themselves. So, this is once again a point to show how when trying to ‘fit in’ one’s definition upon something/someone, because  each definition is created in one’s mind, it will always be a source of conflict to try and define something that in its nature is not meant to even be ‘defined’ as such, thus I see that my point of control was coming also from self-interest and still wanting to somehow remain with the dignity of having studied something ‘meaningful’ or ‘more than’ any other career, which would then lead me to play a value game that is once again of the mind and of consciousness definitions.

 

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to still go and see art in the hope that I will find something that is ‘life changing’ which is why every time I obviously come out without ‘anything’ or ‘nothing learned’ because I am seeing it all through the eyes of ‘come on, art exhibit, change me, change my life!’ which is impossible of course, it would be like thinking that praying to the image of a god or a saint will change your life, which is simply a delusion.

 

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to judge myself for having ever been fascinated with creations because I have now judged this as ‘vain’ instead of realizing that just as anything that we create in this world, we can appreciate it for what it is in its physicality and no longer having the ‘artistic value-frame’ with which I was trying to measure it against, as this is once again trying to control and impose my own perspectives and experiences toward ‘art’ itself upon others’ creations. It would be like trying to define which human being is more ‘beautiful’ than another or which tree is ‘more expressive’ than another – it is really pointless and a waste of breaths to be dwelling upon this kind of questions, because ultimately if there’s something in art is that precisely this whole ‘valuation’ scheme is meant to be broken or questioned at least.

 

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to have judged this point as ‘petty’ or ‘non important’ or there being more ‘relevant things to blog about’ but, I realize that due to the actual judgmental view that emerged within me while watching Marina Abramović’s documentary and when getting to know of artists gathering to create something around people that have disappeared through political reasons, it was then a point to of course review and open up within myself so that I can align this one point within me and my day to day living and so stop the judgmental me toward art or artists as a constant source of conflict.

 

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to believe that I have some ‘right’ to judge something because of having ‘studied’ it, which is essentially a belief learned from how our system operates with licenses and such, without realizing that a judgment will always be a judgment specifically when it’s made in an attempt to debase or ‘debunk’ something as to ‘make it less’ in a way, wherein then my judgment becomes in my mind something ‘superior’ to point out.

 

In this the application is actually to ensure that I can investigate all things and keep what’s best, instead of investigating all things, judge and criticize with an attempt to ‘debase’ something and then place my judgment as ‘superior’ which is obviously a destructive and consequential way of looking at things.

I realize that I can use anything and anyone in my world as a mirror, and in this, whichever I may think, believe and perceive relates to ‘another’ is in fact about myself, because I can only think/judge something about someone  if I have judged myself in the same way.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to not realize that I was in fact desiring to ‘take a position’ or ‘take a side’ in relation to art because of the self-definition I have created within and towards ‘art’ which is how one then creates a sense of ‘righteousness’ as in having ‘one stance’ in relation to it, which is all knowledge and information based, it is not at all considering what is common sensical or looking at what’s supportive within something – but instead, immediately putting on the ‘judgmental glasses’ and ‘finding fault’ eyes going into ‘attack’ mode to point out all the ‘flaws’ but all of these flaws are pointed out within the starting point of me already seeking to ‘debunk’ another, which is quite the usual nasty game that we play when we want to impose our own mind/righteousness, what we believe is ‘right’ above others.

I forgive myself that I haven’t accepted and allowed myself to question the ‘impulse’ that I sometimes have in relation to wanting to talk about something/someone in an attempt to ‘debunk’ them while still holding a judgment with experience in it as to ‘prove it wrong’ – instead of realizing that I can talk about something/someone without having to resort to taking an antagonist stance toward it, but simply be able to reference it, to look at it in common sense and then  focus on reflecting any judgment back to myself, that’s the only way one can really develop self-honesty, and stop only criticizing things for the sake of feeling ‘righteous’ about something or someone and so justify my experience toward something or someone, in this case, my ‘experience’ toward art which shouldn’t exist at all as an experience.

In this it is to realize that any experience that I have toward something/someone, it indicates I have created a relationship to it, and so it becomes a point for me to take self-responsibility for which means: it’s never about ‘art’ itself, it’s about how I see it, who I am toward it and this is then a much more supportive starting point to look at art and visit art galleries, to see ‘what comes up within me,’ instead of visiting and looking at art from the starting point of ‘proving it wrong’ or wanting it to ‘match my ideal’ of art, which is why all this back and forth friction toward it emerged: it’s all an inside job.

 

I realize that ourselves as human beings tend to seek for answers or ‘find ourselves’ ‘out there’ instead of realizing that everything we require is already here, as ourselves. So in this, I commit myself to stop judging anything that we do/use in order to get to this point of self-realization, wherein I see that art can be used as a tool of self-reflection as with anything else in the world and what we create and do within it. This is where I then have to realize that my process and realizations cannot be the same as others’ and so, I have no authority to judge others’ processes, ideas, beliefs and perceptions – this process is about self-responsibility so here I then commit myself to always see art as a cool point of self-reflection wherein I stop all judgments ‘toward’ art or artists themselves, but rather see ‘who am I’ toward it and use that for my own process of self-honesty.

 

I commit myself to integrate the realization that everything that I judge or criticize in a judgmental manner is and only has to do with myself and the relationships I have created toward something/someone in my past, and so I can only look at things/people objectively where I can first identify if there is any reaction, take it back to self wherein I see the origin of such judgment toward it, do a self-reflective analysis on it in order to support me in common sense to immediately realize: I am imposing my past definitions upon this moment here –  and so I then focus on seeing, watching, reading and participating in anything related to art for what it is – no hidden agendas allowed within me.

 

For a review on the documentary:

• Podcast: Marina Abramović: The Artist is Present

 

 

 

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387. The Love/Hate Relationship with Art

Here we go…

I require to open up – again – the relationship with art. I’ve noticed that I created some sort of past bad relationship experience with it, similar to the ones that I’ve had with people throughout my life wherein there were things unsaid, situations undirected and just cutting it up from one day to another without further communication. I realize I’ve done this with art creation and the general regret I’ve had in terms of the decision I took some 8 years ago to go to art school and actually drop out from my first choice which was linguistics and which would have probably been a lot more supportive for me to have as a degree than arts, and so there goes regret as well for the choices I made in the delusion of ‘I want to express myself ’ and limit that definition to only ‘arts’ and specifically visual arts. To begin with, a disclaimer here is to understand that I am walking/writing out my frame of mind and that whichever judgment I place here in relation to arts/artists/creative processes in art is what I’ve conjured up throughout time and self-reflection about my decisions in life and in no way does this imply an actual ‘bashing’ as all of these judgments, ideas, perceptions, conceptions will be self-forgiven.

 

The Illusion in this world is my responsibility

It’s been a bit over 10 years when I first begun painting and the experience within that was that of enjoyment when being able to pull out everything that I would usually write in creating these images/paintings that I then started defining as ‘who I am’ and within that, already beginning to define and limit my future according to wanting to be an artist, to be able to write or paint or play music or anything that had to do with what I assumed would enable me to express myself and at the same time, be able to instigate some sort of change in the world.

I’ve mostly walked throughout the years the ‘emotional’ aspect to art and my decisions to be an artist in order to not have to ‘be in the system’ and not have to face it, and not have to deal with a lot of people, being able to stand in the ‘background’ so to speak, like someone with ‘special needs’ or ‘special mind’ and ‘special interests’ hidden in a room behind some canvass or else, yet at the same time having the works themselves get to as many people as possible…. So that’s the type of idea of a nice, lavish lifestyle I was pursuing some 8 years ago, and I was quite on the ‘good track’ getting some initial points of recognition that also led me to see the ‘fame’ for what it was and really question myself if that is what I really wanted: to have some pictures in some room in another place in this world seen by other people and be glorified by how nice they are? Well, I decided it was not the way to do what I was already veering myself to do, which is wanting to ‘Change the world’ and thus using art as the way to change the world…. separation here, yes, in trying to use this one thing to ‘change the world’ without really realizing that nothing/no one can ‘change the world’ in itself, but ourselves.

 

So that’s where we begin.

The idea of Art as an instrument to “Change the World.”

The point is I tried to make My definition of Art fit with what would enable me to use it to demonstrate that it is possible to change the world. However I realized that no matter how many images I make, how many pictures I take, how many great ideas I would have I was entirely mostly having an imaginative outflow of how this could operate without ever really landing it into any serious/real project. I always kept everything at a low-fi level because right after the first year in Art school, I discovered Desteni and my interests veered dramatically – hence the ‘shutting down’ of any pursue to further my career to make a name of myself etc. However little did I know that as I’ve seen throughout time, many artists or creative people are the ones that have been able to conceive new ways of how to develop a society that is better for everyone. Somehow people related to art are at the head of certain movements like the proposition for a Basic Income by Enno Schmidt who is an artist. The example I’ve been able to see with a more ‘landed’ discourse on social change is Joseph Beuys that dared to propose an economic, political and social change through the realization that such change begins with self, using one’s thoughts and actions as the tools with which to sculpt ourselves and so becoming the change that we want to see in this world, by understanding the interdependent relationships we have toward one another and our necessity to establish a genuine economy that reflects the true inputs of the real capital – human work/intellect or applied intellect and the use of resources to provide a dignified living to everyone in a particular society/environment- which means everyone should be equally involved in this.

“Social Sculpture, a concept and medium the artist devised and later theorized in “I am Searching for Field Character” (1973), which articulates his belief in the creative capacity of every in-dividual to shape society through participation in cultural, political, and economic life. With his proclamation that “EVERY HUMAN BEING IS AN ART-IST,” poised to join others in the construction of “A SOCIAL ORGANISM AS A WORK OF ART,” Beuys reprised the fervor and axiomatic language of manifestos written by avant-garde artists in the early twentieth century. This promulgation expanded what art could be by acknowledging the viewer’s ability to co-create meaning alongside the artist and, consequently, placed the production of art and knowledge within the scope of the viewer just as much as that of the artist.” – Joseph Beuys – Organization for Direct Democracy by Referendum

 

He went on as far as creating direct democratic referendums as part of his work of art and forming part of a political party, as well as founding a school that was aimed at providing the necessary platform for people to continue the work of social sculpture – which unfortunately I haven’t seen any further fruition from it. He also went on with economists and discussed the concept and idea/symbol of money and with that book ‘What is Money?’ realizing that the idea of social, political and economic change is not an entirely dissociated idea from an artist’s field of work. He also even funded an educational institution which is part of his legacy to continue understanding the multidisciplinary processes that education should involve.

It is so that having the ability to question more, to question reality, to analyze it in its complexity from the ‘eye of an artist’ can lead us all to become better social scientists,   questioning things that have become automated in our reality: money, politics, education, social structures, words and their definitions, mass media and its power to brainwash everyone… then I found people like Guy Debord and Marshall McLuhan who completed the narrative in relation to the world system as the reflection of ourselves, of our ‘revolutions’ as failed attempts to change something that first should be changed at an individual level – and this all made sense, I am grateful for having read these individuals to confirm what I was at the same time walking with/as part of Desteni as well as Foucault on his first chapter in Madness and Civilization about the Ship of the Fools or Stultifera Navis wherein every person that would be defined as ‘crazy/ mad/ eccentric’ would be ousted from society along with every other individual that would simply not be willing to conform to the norm or be defined as mentally insane. I could relate to all of this, however it was all still too defined within the ‘artistic realm’ and so what I did is that upon realizing that ‘art’ for now is ‘just another sector of society’ and almost another cult/religion in itself, I tried to dissociate myself from such tag just because I had judged it as pretentious and ‘special,’ because that is how I came to judge myself or who/what I was going to ‘become’ as an individual if I hadn’t actually stopped myself from upgrading and accumulating all of this definitions onto the ‘artistic persona’ I was aiming at becoming.

I’m also glad that I’ve done that because then the whole ‘specialness’ and ‘uniqueness’ idea of myself that I had about me and that I believed that I should be ‘recognized for’ in the world has been mostly vanished. But after that, there’s  a ‘void’  left in terms of the relationship to art/creative expression as I mostly simply stopped it altogether and wanted to have– apparently – nothing to do with it, which involved me having finished also school in Arts where most of the time I was already knowing that I wasn’t going to become an ‘artist’ in the most traditional sense of the word. I learned about many points wherein artists have participated in ‘revolutionary movements’ but certainly it is no different to how any artist at the moment goes out and paints murals about Snowden, Manning and Assange to glorify them as heroes and shouts at the front of some parliamentary building demanding change… which is absolutely futile.

 

 

So the disillusionment with arts have to do with My Own expectations about it. How I thought that this was ‘the way’ to change the world and of course I didn’t follow through with ‘becoming an artist’ in the traditional sense which I then perceived as myself already ‘opting out’ of it all and seeing the sheer idea of dedicating myself to ‘create art’ as utterly selfish, without realizing how much I had desired ‘that’ to be my reality before. I’ve also been recently sharing about these points with people, explaining how I’m not proud of the decisions I made earlier on in my life and how I would not recommend anyone to study arts. I do however not say ‘don’t study arts’ but simply place my own expectations, my own experience, my decision to do something else and how such studies were a nice platform but not real tools to do what I am doing now. So when I find ‘artists’ defined as such, there’s an attempt to me to see if they also see the futility that I see in art as well – well this happened with one specific person in one specific moment.

A Spell to Ward off the Darkness is the title of a documentary/film that is mostly existential in nature and more like an ‘art film’ than documentary – even though I agree with Ben Russell, one of the directors, on how an objective documentary doesn’t really exist as there’s always a ‘frame’ that is defined by the one filming/directing, so from that perspective yes it’s not really ‘objective.’ However I did notice that this movie was entirely aimed at creating an emotional experience about it, with majestic landscapes, very little dialogue and loud black metal music at the end. I had the opportunity to ask a question to Ben after the screening and when I realized that my theory of how and why Black Metal emerged ( lol ) was nowhere near their intentions within this movie, and he veered off into something else I saw myself judging the individual as ‘typical artist’ that responds with quite a lot of rhetorical rubbish before getting to answer the question. It didn’t end up there, I wrote him back an email essentially asking him whether he considered art was meant to be a hammer with which to shape the world, to prove that we can change it. And then I got quite a bold and rather supportive reply from him which made me realize that I was being an ego myself trying to impose onto other artists/film makers My idea of what art should be, and how if their creations were merely ‘emotional’ then they were useless to what I’ve defined ‘the purpose’ of art.

I realize that after this brief exchange with him where I had certainly ‘demanded’ some answers from him about his intent on his film, he essentially told me that maybe this wasn’t a text/film for me, and that left it very clear how I was trying to make such film fit my standards of what art should be and be used for, instead of it being a creative process in itself.  I also see and realize that I’ve become a ‘victim’ of my own judgments, my own definitions and so I’ve generated a rigidity about what art was supposed to be, what art didn’t ‘fulfill’ within me and thus justify the reasons why I got to see art as entirely useless and self-centered activity. These are all judgments of course that should be seen for what they are, my own creation in order to become my own ‘word – redefiner’ – (see previous post on Rumsfeld) – in order to make of my decision to not further any artistic endeavors as the ‘right thing to do’ and so justify it with now ‘bashing’ artistic views that are not the same as ‘my own’ somehow so as to make my decision sound right and be righteous about my decision. This is not only the desire to be right about this, but also imposing the same mind-frames with which we have created religions and beliefs in the past, and we’re definitely here to stop such knowledge and information rigidity.

 

Also, the point here is not to go into the usual ‘extremes’ I would tend to go into when quitting/stopping/halting something wherein the entire love-hate relationship is generated. And this is quite the perfect example of how we create ‘hate’ – and even if in my case I wasn’t emotionally ‘hating’ art –  when our initial expectations about something/someone are not met and so, we become the epitome of ‘not wanting to know anything about’ that which we had previously set a high standard upon. This implies also the pattern of ‘blaming’ it, blaming apparently ‘art’ for not fulfilling or satisfying my initial intentions, without realizing that it was me that wanted to first make of art my ‘way out’ of ‘the system’ or a way to evade it, and when realizing I really can’t do that, then I simply believed that I had to ‘let go’ of it overall and completely –  without realizing that this is no different to just running away from a relationship that ‘didn’t work out’ without first taking the time to understand Why it didn’t work out or how and that means that through understanding the problem, we can also create solutions.

My overall attitude to this all, however, was within the mentality of not wanting to create anything but still be interested in looking art, admiring paintings or other artists and kind of playing the game of I like it but I shouldn’t like it – I mean, it is quite an unnecessary game that I create in my mind just because I had previously given too much value onto ‘art’ and what it ‘meant to me’ and how my entire life was supposed to be ‘intertwined’ around art, and how the moment I started dissociating myself from it it meant like a literal relationship breakup, when it should Not be like that at all. I mean if I had criticized this types of relationships between individuals, how hadn’t I seen that I’ve been living the exact same pattern with my relationship to ‘art’ and within that every other person that I related myself to from the art-vein of my life-experience? It doesn’t make sense as that implies I resist ‘it’/them which implies I hold a dear relationship of separation. So this is a till here no further.

 

I have to then point out the practicality of the decision here which I might have written out before but here it comes again so as to iron out any wrinkles on my side. It is no doubt that we all can create things, be expressive in any artistic endeavor and enjoy the process of creating it and sharing it with the world etc. – however at the moment in our world and reality, I do see it as rather impractical to be fully dedicated to the creation of art/plastic arts specifically when there’s so much to get done in this world in relation to education, to understanding who/what we are as human beings in our minds, how we direct in our lives, how we’ve created this world system and through understanding it all, be able to now establish and conduct solutions at an individual and collective level – and this is what I’ve decided to do. However I see that even if for me this is ‘clear’ there’s still a shadow of a doubt in relation to how people ask me ‘what am I doing’ and within this believing that I should be speaking about the many paintings or etchings or whatever I’ve created as a result of my work as ‘an artist’ in the formal/traditional sense of the word.  So I come upfront and explain how I’m not doing that and what I dedicate myself to, which sounds ‘interesting’ to most but I see that as long as I still hold on a judgment about this as me ‘having wasted my time in art school’ or ‘not developing myself as an artist’ then no matter who/what questions are asked, I’ll still experience that shadow of a doubt simply because I’ve judged it as a failed decision in my life.

 

The dictatorship of definitions

And this I might have shared before but it’s relevant to bring it up again as it’s been coming up many more times, as well as with what ‘I do’ with my life since I mostly work on the internet and there is currently no institutionalized career that defines what I do within this process at Desteni to be a point of support for myself and others in this world to walk this process which I do entirely see as vital and the most important thing to dedicate ourselves to in this world, which is a necessary step if we ever want everyone to genuinely enjoy an artistic lifestyle of creating/expressing in a world where hunger, wars, poverty, corruption, greed and a lousy economic system can be no more. All changes begin within self and so I have entirely decided to step aside from my artistic endeavors to dedicate myself to this process of Education, of being an example of this change myself, of supporting other people walking this process, of investigating economic and political solutions, of sharing/talking about these necessary changes at an individual and collective level, as that is how we can then all as human beings take self-responsibility for the world in shambles we have created – so that is what our artistry has been defined by, and I’m in no way proud of the world we’ve wrought here.

 

 

I have also said before how this process in itself is a self-creation process, hence I am my own work of art. However the ‘art’ definition here is obviously not the common one and that’s probably my inner dissonance which I am here to straighten up and redefine so that I stop separating myself from what I’ve defined as ‘artistic creation’ in the most traditional sense and what I ‘should’ be creating,  and rather integrate the principle of self-creation in whatever thought, word, deed as myself including the activities I’ve defined as merely ‘artistic’ such as ‘creative writing,’ shooting videos, painting pictures, taking pictures and lol even as I write this it is like oh shit that’s all just pointless drama-creations of me, who I was before. However that’s how I’ve limited them to be instead of seeing how visual art is quite a powerful way to provide/promote a message and a more digestible or ’friendly’ way to explain living principles through images, films to make them more palpable – whereas with just theory not everyone might be able to find it or understand it.

 

So, this is to see how it is about expanding myself to see the potential that exists in everything that is already here in this world. I would be my own worst enemy if I would define art or being an artist as something pointless or mere egotistic – it is nothing more and nothing less than a definition and judgment, instead of considering that as anything and every other job/profession in this world can be seen for what it is, for its potential, its redefinition to be self-supportive and to use it as a tool to provide ways to look at the world in a different manner and how to ‘eat it’ meaning how to live it, to understand it, to embrace it. That’s what I’ve also noticed is lacking within Art.

 

 

Art as a tool for change?

It’s relatively ‘easy’ to identify the patterns or the problems, and represent them – but driving the problem through to the solutions is mostly always missing. So that’s the kind of principles of self-creation that I’d like to contribute with in relation to art/art-theory if you want to call it that which is not limited to artists or people that study art, but to any human being that wants to become an instrument themselves, a tool with which to conduct and become the change that I realize is necessary in this world. I’ve identified the problems, so I’m working on the solutions and that is no physical ‘work of art’ but if I take on Sol Lewitt’s paragraphs of art in relation to making of the process itself, the structure, the plan of a work of art the ‘piece’ in itself or in other words “If the artist carries through his idea and makes it into visible form, then all the steps in the process are of importance. The idea itself, even if not made visual, is as much a work of art as any finished product. All intervening steps –scribbles, sketches, drawings, failed works, models, studies, thoughts, conversations– are of interest. Those that show the thought process of the artist are sometimes more interesting than the final product.”

 

…then my entire life is also then that: self-creation and supporting other people’s self-creative processes. Lol, am I theoretically justifying myself as an ‘artist’ here? Can be, but why not? I’ve read such blatant bullshit in art-theory that expanding art-theory to self-creation within principles of life in Equality, of Self-Responsibility, of Dignity, Integrity, producing solutions is quite the most meaningful thing we can do as human beings after centuries of emotional, material or conceptual glorification in art. Time for Life to be supported in everything that we do beginning at a thought level and that begins with ourselves, with becoming the master-pieces that I’ve seen and realized I sought to ‘create’ outside of myself or to use ‘art’ as some kind of alter-ego platform to glorify myself through the eyes of others. Self-honesty is required within art, understanding why one wants to create art and if the purpose, aim or objective and starting point of creation is actually aligned with a ‘higher purpose’ or goal which is then how I am seeing that art can be used to educate people, to wake people up, to provide new understandings and ways to understand, behave and co-exist  in the world – but that still has to be lived by and applied by each one of us first as first ‘test-runs’ in this process.

 

I realize there’s really ‘nothing’ that can ‘change you’ as that would then be the idea of this ‘magic red pill’ that you simply take it and understand everything about the Matrix and reality, the mind, who we are as our mind, the world-systems we’ve governed ourselves by, etc. So, in that sense what we can all do is become the example of what it is to walk such process, to provide and produce educational materials/writings/videos or whichever ‘tool’ we can use to support others in the inevitable process that is here as our process of realizing who we really are as life. Easily said, a whole other story to understand it as to what it in fact implies.

 

I’ll continue with walking Self-Forgiveness on specific points mentioned here, as well as the Self Corrective Statements to redirect my relationship formed with art/artistic creation and artists themselves so as to no longer limit myself and others through my own definitions of art or ‘what art should be’ and instead focus on my own process of self-creation and the endeavor I’ve taken on to be that point of support for others as well, a birthing-as-life supporter which is what I in fact really wanted to do since I can remember. I can use all tools available in this world for this purpose without limiting myself within it and that’s also the process of expansion here that is necessary for me to clarify and structure as well.

 

” Economics is not only a money making principle. It can be a way of production to fulfill the demands of people all over the world. Capital is human kind’s ability in work, not just money. Thus economics includes the creativity of people. Creativity equals Capital” – Joseph Beuys

 

 

Fuck it, Pollock has done it all  – 2005

 

Watch:

• Art and Politics – Living Income Guaranteed

• 2011 Art in Equality: Be your own Work of Art

 

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