golden tears
out of desert dry ducts
hit joyous, expectant lips:
naivete pays out huge

(when it does at all)

but misses the sign:
objects may appear closer than they actually are.

David Foster Wallace (1962-2008) Or, Art, The Artist, and Suicide Or, Why I Like Dystopian Art (Or Any Art.) Or, Is Art a Naturally Social Relation?

i had never heard of this guy before tonight when i clicked on a link announcing his death. turns out he killed himself. he was a relatively young - 40's - american author. he seems just brilliant – and was also thought to be so by a great many people. i've read some blog comment sections and people are devastated. of course, the people most likely to post are the people that care the most. but i've read a little about the main themes of his work, a poignant excerpt or two, and a quote on dostoevsky (coincidentally enough since i’ve been reading him lately); and i've become just horribly broken up myself.

it's no secret that i am commited to the belief that the artist can affect change in the larger social structure of which he is a part through reaching individuals on a mass basis (and really defining them as a part of a community). it's of slightly less certainty that my life is committed to this view. but it's as near certain as possible that i believe my life needs to reflect this value in the deepest possible way.

however, it is clear that we, as a people, do not appropriately deal with the artist's contribution. perhaps we are even unequipped and therefore unable to do so. This is really the chief concern. but first: who is the artist? upon asking this, there appears to be an even more prescient question: what does the artist do? what is the artist's contribution? for artists are human beings - first and foremost - and we are defined by our actions, not our professed beliefs. Aristotle said it best: "We are what we repeatedly do." almost at once though, this categorization seems problematic, and i think i am putting the wrong issue at the fore. the first issue is of course: what is art? The rest will follow since they are inevitably, inextricably linked.

[[this is not a new issue. the definition of art has been under attack in private for sometime, but it has reached more mainstream ears and minds with forums such as blogs and youtube, arenas designed for rapid idea dissemination. this was not the first step, though. with the creation, installation, and occupation of the internet, the information age, which had been accelerating for years, brought this new ability to the masses. But in this entire time previous, we had been building towards such freedom, like so many training wheels and tricycles. we rode under our own direction; we steered we decided. we filled our baskets with information, idiosyncrasies, and beliefs - we used our own creative design or we stenciled with the help of a template, knowingly or unknowingly. either way, it was an act of creation; there was a sense of ownership in the idea. we had been learning and growing with these newfound talents - as a culture - for quite some time before the internet came along with its forum for mass individual-to-individual expression. the most relevant consequence here is that the market for ideas became flooded. though nearly everyone will give some form of the now grumbling cliche, "Don't believe everything you read/see/watch (ed - "experience") on the internet"; it is highly unlikely that they consider any contributions they might make as within that subset of suspicious activity.
On the one hand, expertise is now a matter of the person's trust in the source. On the other hand, it seems more pertinent to examine intent: what is the desired end? Does one desire truth - as relative and undefinable a term that there may be? Or does one desire to maintain previously accepted beliefs, some static empty, box of truth that is packed and re-packed, wrapped and re-wrapped? ]]

The point is this: art has gone the way of every other discipline; it did not find itself immune to a flooded marketplace and, perhaps, an undiscerning consumer. the quality of acceptability is broadening with the increase of evaluators, and the definition of art, like most words or concepts, is dynamic but increasingly hard to get a good grasp on- akin to super string theory's progeny of intermittent existence (erm. the string.). here is the massive distinction i have been building towards: art and entertainment. entertainment provides a nicely wrapped happiness box with a note: please take me as i am. art asks something substantive and meaningful - no, it demands it: take me into your mind, mix me around with your reflective experience, and see how i change you. it is clear that this is a two way process. the intent, the willingness, the openness must be there on the part of both creator and receiver.

the artist transmits their subjective experience, the sum of their perceptions and reflections, in whatever form possible. this subjectivity is not a limitation; in fact, my usage here is not necessarily indicative of the artist's intent at all. [the artist may acknowledge that their work is an embracing of subjectivity. or, they may maintain that their work is a groping towards, or perhaps even a reflection of, objective reality. i argue that these are two sides of the same coin. but this merely belies the fact that i believe there is no real, objective reality out there. we can have truth, but only on our own terms. we are not reaching out and grabbing something that wouldn't be there without us; it is contingent on us - our mind, our senses, our memory, our reason. so, in reality, these "opposing" sides are expressing the same idea but with different underlying assumptions. one accepts the situation, the other strives toward a perfect one. either way, though, they both concern themselves with ideas that they believe to be manifestly universal. this is an odd thing, to say that the subjectivist believes himself to be creating ] it is representative of my belief that all we have is subjective experience, whether the writer is embracing it fully as in the case of a Henry Miller, putting a moderately subtle filter on reality in Fitzgerald's work, or creating whole new characters as Hemingway strived towards. so, whether the writer wrote word for word from conversations that actually happened, or whether the writer never used a single autobiographical word or event, is not actually relevant; this is: that the artist creates through a lens and this lens is the product of a person from a certain socio-historical time, a certain set of genes, a certain set of environmental conditions. when the artist creates, these ideas are necessarily the result of different conceptions of love, justice, beauty et al. but this does not mean that everyone's conceptions are different. it just means that each individual had a different life experience which informed them. and the degree to which they are particulars to generals we all share in, the smaller the difference between those two concepts, and the depth to which it makes us delve into our own experience is the barometer for art.

i believe in the power of the artist - not because of their ability to concoct direct polemics to the head (polemic-on: apply directly to one's mind) - but as a mediator of the most troubling parts of human experience, the oil in water of ethereal feelings. these are the emotions that many struggle to put into words for themselves (for myriad reasons), and much of the time are not even talked about. i like to characterize this as The Lacking - the feeling of a void without the ability/willingess to cognize it further if in fact it can ever be fully known! i think we'd need a person from a different paradigm altogether - different conditioning, different values - in order to evaluate what the fuck is going on. They of course would be bringing their own preconceived notions to the table, as well, but perhaps they stand the best chance from the outside looking in. of course all we have is ourselves. we don't have that luxury. and im torn on the implications: does this mean we can never see It? and i don't mean objective reality. i don't mean that at all. When we have the capability of freedom, how can we deal with the problem of being the (somewhat) natural outgrowth of our particular time and place; of the conditioning that was necessarily a part of that age; of picking up our own brush and painting freely. How able are we to recognize our own plight?

If we go by ourselves as the measure of plight understanding, the answer is typically disappointing. Millions upon millions have read salinger and Huxley, and yet we still live in an inane, phony filled world. Is this the result of a rational rejection or a lack of understanding? I do not know. I do know, however, that many artists commit suicide, and I can’t help but wonder how much guilt resides on our doorstep. The artist seems driven to create as an ethical existential imperative, despite whatever foreknowledge they may have as to the improbability of impact.

does it not seem as tho the artist is predisposed to suicide? especially within our society? despite the fact that it can't help but create capable, feeling human beings unable to stifle transmission? the social structure seems even more likely to produce individuals who are incapable/unwilling to deal with these universal feelings, and this is why suicide seems almost inevitable. The need to transmit, and stay firm in one’s standards, outweighs the pressure to conform to dissonant surrounding standards. The artist has chosen a life of meaning and this does not mean happiness. But it does not preclude it either. Happiness derived from meaning is superior to any other happiness. Meaning is the product of the sum of one’s actions. It is our character. It is not the product of any singular item. In the Greek vein, happiness is the result of living well.

Why do I suggest that the artist commits suicide because of this lack of reception? Though the art springs from a particular mind, there seems to be a inherently social facet to artistic creation, a reaching out. For we are not individuals in isolated pods, as much as we are trying to fit ourselves into that definition.

Perhaps the most important point is left for me to make at the end of this rambling string: the artist chooses to deal with the responsibility of consciousness, of thinking, head on. At least to a point, then seemingly the disappointment, the lack of effect, the lack of actual change or meaning, overwhelms the ability to rationalize one’s actions as “the best I could do.”

I’m going to end with a little bit of a speech David Foster Wallace gave a few years back. I can’t help but feel him alluding to some of the issues I’ve touched on here, especially the problems of incompatible standards, no change, and no meaning. Further, I sense a stress to have the courage of one’s convictions, thereby reducing the social nature of it and maybe a large chunk of the tension. But I could be way off.

[L]earning how to think really means learning how to exercise some control over how and what you think. It means being conscious and aware enough to choose what you pay attention to and to choose how you construct meaning from experience. Because if you cannot exercise this kind of choice in adult life, you will be totally hosed. Think of the old cliché about quote the mind being an excellent servant but a terrible master.

This, like many clichés, so lame and unexciting on the surface, actually expresses a great and terrible truth. It is not the least bit coincidental that adults who commit suicide with firearms almost always shoot themselves in: the head. They shoot the terrible master. And the truth is that most of these suicides are actually dead long before they pull the trigger.

the hallway is Bright,
but an anviled feather.
it keeps you proud and right
but you're a horse wrapped in pleather

a gross abomination.
a stain.
sincerity? (pssh)
you're an atheist bishop

dogma the world 'round
the answer is money?
does a voice need money?
or just an open mind?

you can't break the mirror
so don't even try
you should hear your terror
as you lie, lie, lie.

the king's dead
but everyone's keen for the crown
the thrill fills your head
but you're just a clown

i hate pretension, you cry
but it's just a lie
a silly mask
one puts to mind like lips to flask

a douche by any other name
i wouldn't blame
but spitting in one's own face
deserves a special place

words, words, words, words
without action
you're a lord
with no army.