Soul Music

It comes to mind that there are those who can't grasp why atheists like songs that use words like "soul" or "miracle". It's easy -- atheists understand the concepts and the multiple meanings or interpretations of such things.  For example, there is no such thing as a soul in the sense of a supernatural, eternal being -- you simply don't have one of those.  But anyone can relate to soul as a fullness of one's passions or depth of emotions or totality of mental experience.  Something is soulful because the experience of engagement is a fulfilling moment.  


Same with miracle.  While there is no magic being performed, there are things that yet lack explanation and others that are simply so unexpected they seem almost impossible.  When they do happen, the occasions are amazing, grossly fortunate, astounding... close to magical.  So the atheist can appreciate the notion of this according to a secondary or casual interpretation of the concept rather than the literal or primary term.


And sometimes good music is just good music and it's easy enough to overlook these ideas and just enjoy a song.  

Occupy, An Internet Conversation.

It went like this:  I posted a link to Occupy New Haven getting an eviction notice. Follow the exchange and,  like usual, I make no apologies for my opinion.

EG:  It's about time they got off their lazy asses and get some kind of job. Anything.

Me:  Lots of them work -- they leave during the day and camp at night. Don't be so fucking ignorant. And, by the way, I have a job doing anything because I can't get meaningful, full paid work -- because the shift in most industries is to part time work for minimum wage. That's why I live in poverty so take your bullshit perspective and choke on it.

EG:  Americans have become over educated and afraid of doing what you would deem shitty manual labor. Well guess what, I went to the same college you did, got an art Ed degree and decided it wasn't for me. So I got a job working with my hands, learned a trade and joined a Union. I help build America and I'm fucking proud of my work. So when I hear I can't find meaningful work, it makes my stomach turn. Some days at work suck, from freezing cold to blistering heat. My life isn't comfortable and I don't bitch about it. I work my ass off so my kid can have a good and happy life. So get out of the fucking park that my taxes help keep clean and safe.

MB:  Manual and manufacturing jobs are scarce too. If I lost my job, I'd be GLAD for the chance to do manual labor. To put food on the table and stay in the apartment. AND because I would stop getting desk-fat. I'm no different than millions.

Me:  Yes, get out of the park and stop using your Constitutional rights. Very patriotic of you.

I'm not talking about manual labor vs another form. What you do for a living is the irrelevant part of the conversation; it's how much work you can get and how much it pays that matters to a person's ability to be self sufficient and pay his or her bills. Check just a little bit of news or statistics -- look at the history of wages compared to the cost of living over the last 30 years coupled with the reduction in benefits, including health care, paid vacation time and even sick days. Now, no one has to pay you for any of those things because they can hire staff at half price and half time.

That your life isn't comfortable is exactly why those lazy asses (as you call them) are out there -- so that even YOU can earn more to make your life more affordable and give you better quality of life overall as related to your job and living costs.

What makes my stomach turn is when I hear someone say ignorant things like get out of a park you pay taxes for when part of your taxes are used to preserve public space for, among other things, the purpose of providing a public forum for a redress of grievances. It sickens me that anyone still buys into the "boot straps" defense when that is a manipulative way to blame the lower income classes for inability to advance economically in an economic structure that is designed to favor those who run it -- and is protected because they can buy their politicians. Or haven't you been watching the primary season, for example? And it's okay to blame the little guy because self-determination is the American way but when the little guy takes to the public square to assert his rights he is suddenly called unAmerican and lazy. Fuck you.

What Makes It So Tedious

I am currently involved in a conversation on Linked In.  The question posed was, "what do you consider a successful artist?"

I am excerpting the dialog between myself and another person on the thread for the purpose of highlighting the immense irritation it is to network and meet people who call themselves artists, because so many of them have no idea what it is to consider art and its broader impact in any socially relevant, critical way.

I first answered thus:
A successful artist is an artist who creates work that is worth looking at -- meaning there is something to think about and reflect on. You could be totally cash poor from making what you do but your sales needn't define success.


Dude (Name withheld):

I totally agree with (her) first sentence "BUT" I have never met another artist that relied solely on sales for income that was always cash poor from their sales and thought they were successful. No gallery owner can be in business or a gallery sales person have a job if they cannot sell the art


Me:
You are talking about two different things in what appears an attempt to make one point. You should maybe define what you mean by success and then refine the discussion from there. I, for one, would never consider Damien Hirst a successful artist -- but I don't consider him an artist so the case for adjectives is moot.

Dude:

I would like to know if you have ever been a professional artist and if so why not now. You may consider yourself an art critic but that doesn't make you an artist, I don't go to an art critic to see if my work is good or not, I talk to other successful professionals, I go to art festivals and gallery's to see what is selling and then adapt my style if necessary for a new trend to add to my work, then I look at my sales and net profit and smile.
It's easy to talk the talk with out walking the walk and pick and choose from a multitude of artists to suit your own personal taste.

Me:

I don't consider myself an art critic. I also fail to see why only an artist's perspective is to be valued in the discussion of art and its greater value to society more broadly.

This is exactly the practice that I find insincere and possibly anti-art: "I go to art festivals and gallery's to see what is selling and then adapt my style if necessary for a new trend to add to my work, then I look at my sales and net profit and smile." That states you are not in it for what you create but will be a chameleon to cash in on a trend. But at least you have clarified what you mean by success. From my perspective I call that a failure. But what do I know? I have no right to a perspective on the arts.

Dude:

You are absolutely right your opinion doesn't count for much, as for being a chameleon I suggest you look at yourself as it is you that preys upon artists with your ego as to what is or isn't good, you pick and choose what works for you to make a profit.
As for keeping up with a trend, you are a fool not to adapt your talents as to what the public wants as well as doing what your heart desires.
Your art critic resume may impress a 7th grader or an up and coming artist that has no clue to the direction they should take but to a proven professional it's a joke .
You see unlike you I have walked the walk, every inch of it to be where I am and my advice whether or not used by another artist is sincerely given based on real life and experience to help them along the way.

I read your profile and experience, hmmm you took a course on Gallery

management but your work history is a visual store merchandiser ? LOL

You have spent most of your career showing off what is the new trend for a 

"home" furnishing company and yet you try to criticize me for adapting some 

of my art to trends in the art world ! What a piece of work you are !! And now 

you want to show the world what it needs in art ?

Idiots should listen and not speak but it seems that isn't the case with you .

Second Dude (Name Withheld):
(Dude), If I get this right, I think you are saying that an artist should judge their success criteria more on sales and modify their work to sell well. That is commercial success, no? Isn't that approach more of a designers role, all be it a creative and skilled one, than an artists, or perhaps that's just a UK perspective.

Dude:

All I am saying is that we as professional artists "must survive" so if your sales are slow  then why not adapt your skills to what the public wants but in your own creative style, no matter what you create it is your passion and skills that make it unique!
For example lets say you lived close to the ocean and you paint solely seascapes and have been successful and satisfied with sales but now you have moved to the mountains and are still painting seascapes but your sales are way down because the people are buying the landscapes of mountains and valleys, can you as an artist not create a wonderful work of art of the mountains, it is still your creation and talent but you have adapted to live a more comfortable life.
(Withheld), you are correct, art is tough to sell these days, people are more concerned with buying gasoline and food and just don't have the disposable income they once did. Art is always a sensitive topic, why because we devote our lives to creating and want our work to be accepted and bought, "THE highest compliment you can pay an artist is to purchase their work" because then you know it means enough to someone that worked for their money to give it to you because you have created something they want in their life ! Do you think Michel Angelo would have been the great and successful artist he was if he had painted and sculpted in the style of Picasso?

Me:

If you looked at my profile you would know I took a course in curatorship AND I managed a gallery at a university -- that is a non-profit environment and open free to the public for viewing and educational programming. That gallery did not and does not sell any work or arrange the sale of any work. My duties there included assisting any number of faculty with Q&A when they held class in the space, acting as faculty aid during regular class times, acting as educator/organizer for students in the gallery course, as well as facilitating and teaching programs to primary and middle school students as requested by the art education faculty.

I do not make a profit on art, I volunteer as a docent in an edcuational program with a well established museum in the contemporary arts. It is a non-collecting museum so the focus is always in the most present concept of contemporary and they choose to show emerging and mid-career artists rather than established personalities -- so I know a little something about the current art culture. They do not host retrospectives, nor do they sell any of the work on exhibition.

It is likely (and decidedly so) that I will never make a profit on art as I am seeking to work in an outreach capacity with a community justice or ecological organization. But you read my profile so you should know that.

Working as a visual merchandiser is a thing I am good at and like and it pays bills. It also fits in with a broader definition of visual culture and has many duties in common with gallery management. And I am still seeking work as a Visual Merchandising Manager because it is easier to get a job in that capacity than find one in an arts institution. (And also because I like using the skill set needed for the job, which includes things like having to plan changes for an 80,000 sq ft space three weeks in advance based solely on a shipping manifest and truck schedule. Or adapt plans once they are set in motion to comply with safety and zoning regs. Or trouble-shoot floor changes for one location while being on site at another.) Working in such a position would also grant me more free time to develop my own art and research projects.

I suggest you get your facts straight about a person before attacking them.

Frankly, all of this is how I define success for myself generally but also as it pertains to working in an arts capacity.

Dude:

As I said you know little about art and I need not waste my time and energy on a want to be social art diva when I can hopefully help fellow artist that are creating and trying to make a living.
As far as I'm concerned this is the end of the subject with you.

(That last comment made me laugh.  Oh, people are funny...)

My Own Circumstance

I decided to get that MA in art history and spent two years saving the money to do it, putting together over $10,000 and paying off all my debts except the car, when I was fired during a company bankruptcy related round of mass firings in 2006.  I went to work quickly with another company making $11,000 less per year and started using my education fund to pay my rent and utilities.  (I went from 42k to 31k and in CT neither of those figures makes an adult fully financially independent.)  Then I got sick and, thanks to a very bad health plan, paid out over $1,000 of my own money just for diagnostics.  

Then I added another $2,000 to that in preparation for school, including a laptop, books, and airfare to London where I earned that degree in one year.  I sold my my car prior to starting school because I could not afford to make payments on it while attending school full time without a job.  I started my degree in September 2007 as the run on UK banks unfolded and the housing crisis became apparent in the states.  I graduated in October 2008 (at age 38) as the financial crisis went full tilt and came home to zero opportunities, even in my old career, which I was willing to re-enter under the circumstances, even if my degree was earned in order to leave that old career.

Now I am  41 and still working the same part time job for the same ten dollars an hour that I got in 2008.  I live in my mother's very small house, sleeping in a 7x5 bedroom.  I recently found out that I am technically defined as homeless but am not counted as such because I am sheltered.  Anyone in this circumstance is said to be the "invisible homeless."  My student loan was just shy of $45,000 when I graduated and, because I haven't been able to afford payments for two and a half years, it is now due at over $58,000.  I cannot qualify for deferments under my loan agreement because some weeks I work over 30 hours and the federal government considers 30 hours full time -- deferments are available to those working part time.  Like most student loan holders, I do not qualify for any kind of debt forgiveness and I know there is nothing available thanks to Rep. Murphy's office researching the case for me.  

As this country has never really addressed ageism in a culturally meaningful way, we middle agers are likely to have the hardest time getting rehired and back to full wages, meaning our futures are more greatly compromised than those 20somethings the news takes great pity on.  Most of us do not have significant savings (I have $5,000 left over from my last loan disbursement that I use periodically to buy groceries for the household or cover an unexpected bill) or investments or any substantial finances to fall back on.  

I am delaying a needed cervical biopsy because I cannot afford to have it done and have not yet heard from the hospital charity if they will cover the expense.  This is almost funny against Jennifer Granholm's recent interviews in which she has cited socialized medicine as one reason US companies take their businesses to other countries.  

Perhaps none of this would be so hard if I had a spouse to share expenses but I am single and child free so I do not qualify for public assistance or even a mention in political rhetoric about the difficulties of the economy.  

So what about me?  What about all those people like me who just wanted to make the second half of our lives better than the first?

Occupy

I attended the October 15 occupation of Times Square in New York City.  It was a pretty intense scene -- real demands being made, despite what the "real" news media report.
There is much negative criticism and even dismissal of the movement for its pluralist workings and broad range of complaints.  Both these points are things I had been wondering about for some time and having been part of the protest, I now see them as essential to the movement.


The nation has been abused by a bad economic structure for the last fifteen or more years; evidenced by near stagnation of wage growth against the cost of living, rapid bank growth and mergers, loss of health coverage under increased premiums -- all things you knew as they happened.  Then there was deregulation and the spread of the derivatives market, mortgage bundling and selling of risk, predatory lending practices, and so on -- things that came to light only later...


The point is there are multiple causes for the current economic crisis in America which, in turn, affects different people in different ways.  While we may be the same in that we have to struggle with less money, how it plays out in one person's life varies (some people can't keep their houses and rent small apartments, some have mounting debt to not finding good paying work, some people are newly homeless, and so forth).


There are some common themes, though.  The popular media would like you to think it's all as simple and vague as hating the banks but it's not.  What the participants in the Occupy movement hate is the unfair banking practices the big banks engage in, and the way the US government rewarded said banks for bankrupting private individuals but did nothing to help the persons whose livelihoods were destroyed.  That's the anger.


Within that there are real problems, all of which need solutions.  There is a student debt crisis in America, with default on the increase at a rapid pace.  There is a health care crisis in America which maddeningly defends its free market system, allowing only some persons access to care and denying coverage to people at whim.  There is a housing crisis whereby home owners are under water or losing their homes.  There is a jobs crisis -- few are being created and reported unemployment remains at nine per cent.


Given this there can be no single demand to come from the Occupy movement.  It took many mistakes and many bad social mechanisms to make this mess, it can't be hard to understand it would result in many different crises across a population of 300million people.  All of these problems are part of the larger issue at hand -- that there has been allowed a culture to exist that favors profit over the well being of private citizens. Don't think so?  Review the anti-union movement sponsored by various state governments and private companies over the summer, look at the average minimum wage by state, look at the jobs numbers reported for the last quarter, look at teacher lay-offs, look at the increased out-sourcing of jobs over the last two decades.  (I could hand you these stats but if you really want to know maybe you should do some work to find out.  That is a point made in this movement, that you should be informed and involved.)


The Occupy movement may well remain a broad set of complaints under one banner.  If you want to boil it down to one coherent idea, consider this:  That all people should have the right to go to work for full, life sustaining wages which enable them to provide for themselves, pay their bills, and save for the future.  Access to good jobs should be equal and fair wages guaranteed.  The government is in place to protect the people whether from foreign invaders or domestic employers and institutions.  If this really happened there would be no crisis bringing people to the streets.

Fuck That

I have an account on Linked In where I belong to a few groups focused on visual art and careers in the arts.  One of the moderators posed a question about free speech and profanity.  There is a whole subset of discussions on that alone but he was wondering with regard to that particular group should comments be deleted for certain vocabulary choices participants make when commenting on the board.  Frankly, I fail to see what makes "bad" words inappropriate in a professional context, especially in the arts when you think about all the forms and expressions of artists we are supposed to be open to. 


Coincidentally, this conversation started almost the same time that the issue came up on the docent blog on which I contribute as a member of the docent staff. I responded on Linked In with this:

"Frankly if one's vocabulary choices are appropriate to the content of what he/she expresses then there is no bad language.

What's offensive is to ignore this basic rule: Say what you mean and mean what you say. You know, capturing the intensity of an emotion or thought might be best summarized with what some people call profanity. But they're just words and at some point you have to say what you mean. And at some point, people choose to be offended by inconsequential things.

It's not merely a defense of the crude on my part. In getting to some of my career goals I will likely work with a very broad spectrum of "the public." Some of those persons will likely be from disenfranchised communities or other challenged circumstances. I should ignore the validity of their experiences and perspectives because they don't speak eloquently? That's ridiculous. How can I ever want to take a proactive role in using art as a social outreach tool if I deny others voice simply for having their own means of using that voice?

What lowers the level of discourse is to dismiss critical content because you think words are bad. Worse, people oft employ the bad words defense as a means to deflect attention away from the content because the content makes them uncomfortable. They would like to avoid this discomfort so they blame others for speaking out of turn as a means to kill the conversation. That undermines real discourse and is a source of real offense.

If we're on this board, participating in this discussion then we work in or around the arts and are concerned with all forms of expression. It's a disservice to enact this kind of censorship for petty reasons when really some of us should be more proactive in questioning what it is that truly makes us uncomfortable."

No Cause for Celebration

Collaborations is the new exhibition at the Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum in Ridgefield, CT.  You guessed it, it's a whole museum full of works by collaborating artists.  But that's not really the point herein.


Among the works on view is All the Holidays At Once by MTAA.  It's an interesting premise; they are mixing up the holidays and the notion of artistic collaboration by asking the town's residents to lend them holiday decorations which they have arranged on the grass behind the building.  Donations include snowmen and Santas, pumpkins, skeletons, giant spiders, eggs, rabbits, and turkeys.  On the surface it's a nice bit of celebrating and lore and good times.  But it goes wrong really quickly.


The problem I have is the plastic.  It's all plastic propped and hanging everywhere.  Plastic!  I don't care what you're celebrating, plastic (and its source, petroleum) causes an enormous amount of damage to the planet's ecosystems.  On that point alone, the piece fails; what is being celebrated by the continued destruction of the planet and its life forms?


Let's take Christmas, the most represented holiday in the piece, and start by asking is it really in keeping with Jesus' teachings to abuse the earth in this manner, with our selfish and harmful use of resources?  By extension wouldn't loving your neighbor include simple things like refraining from poisoning his water?  And plastic is among the most common pollutant in the earth's waterways, just to make the point.  I'll admit, it's a little hypocritical for me to make this complaint as I do wear synthetic clothing and drink from a reusable plastic bottle.  But I try to limit my plastic habits in other ways as much as possible while recognizing it's a material we can't completely be rid of by now.  Still, does no one see the hypocrisy in plastic ornamentation?


All the Holidays at Once also includes nylon flags honoring Martin Luther King Day, Kwanzaa, Halloween, El Dia de los Muertos, Valentine's Day, Easter, Chanukah, and Earth Day.  A nylon flag honoring Earth Day?  My common sense chokes on the irony. 


Exacerbating the natural environment problem inherent in the piece is that the arrangement mimics Spiral Jetty, a work that was debated at the time of its creation as destructive to its environment and continues to raise questions about ongoing effects to the area.  In that regard, at least that's an appropriate reference.


In the figurative sense, the plastic bothers me still further.  As an observer of my own culture, I am concerned with the thing we call plastic values.  Not in the malleable, adaptable sense; I am talking about the synthetic and artificial.  We're caught up in a life that revolves around false notions of beauty, youth, productivity and worth.  Watch tv on any given day and we are driven by the pursuit, not of the new, but of the more.  We must always have the better phone, with its plastic casing and carcinogenic metals because without them we can't use the apps that don't add any value to our lives.


Which is much like celebrating a great deal of the holidays when you think about it.  Christmas is the ugliest, most hate filled, greed infected time of year despite the constant hitting over the head of good will and joy.  Those who do not participate in the celebration, whether for religious or moral objections, are labeled ill-willed, bad tempered, Scrooge and chastised for having different priorities.  Had Jesus been a real guy, I would fathom a guess he would be dismayed by this.  


Dr. King had a dream of all children being equal but we live in a world that still seeks to punish those who aren't like the loudest voices in the front of the line.  You are still lesser if you are black or brown, a woman, poor...  But we need to celebrate all the accomplishments we have made in equality even as we take those hard earned gains away.


New laws that will restrict voting access, women's rights, wage standards all stand before one state or other right now and the rhetoric continues to be America, land of the free.  We are seeing the beginning effects of global climate crisis and the argument is whether businesses should be restricted by environmental regulation -- because if business has to be mindful of the resources it depends on then how will it make as much profit as possible selling us things we don't need?  Thanksgiving is a "real" American holiday but we celebrate myth and ignorance, thinking the Pilgrims were passive friends to the Natives and not actively engaged in isolating and even killing Natives in their native land.  How many of your friends know why Memorial Day and Veterans Day are different?  How do we thank those who served our country?  By taking a day off to go shopping.  Plastic values. 


People decorate their homes and yards with garbage to celebrate holidays they don't understand.  They clutter their spaces to avoid the emotional garbage that clutters their lives.  The emphasis is on the conformity to superficial representations rather than genuine sentiments of thanks, love, or self-reflection.


Maybe All the Holidays at Once is good for exposing this arrogant stupidity and the hypocrisy that follows.  Maybe it's good for showing us the wrong ideas in our traditions but, as a celebration of cultural life forces, it's a sad disgrace.