On the surface of things, I have moved on pretty easily from the disappointment of having ENDGAME be rejected by Burning Man. I have even seen it as a bit of a blessing, a bit of a door opening to new possibilities. But I think that, deep down in my vulnerable artist core, I am hurt by the rejection. Mostly because I believed in the piece; I felt it was well developed and was strong.
I've asked for feedback from Burning Man... some sense of why they turned it down... and they have indicated to me that this is forthcoming... but it hasn't come yet. However, as time passes and ENDGAME "recedes in the rear-view mirror," I feel more and more certain that the message was probably too dark. Or rather, not the actual message, which I believe is a positive exhortation to change, but the way that message is conveyed through... I guess "violence" is probably the best word. It was probably just too much for Burning Man to embrace. The title ENDGAME may also have reinforced this perception. (The original title was the more cumbersome, but also less negative and more ambiguous "Interreciprocity.") I've had an interesting conversation with my dad about this proposal, and his perception was that the proposal conveys "no hope." I actually disagree; much like With Open Arms, this piece presents a representation of one possible future, and asks the question "Is this really what we want?" The 'hope' comes in the immediately subsequent step... the process that happens within the viewer who must internally answer this question and then contemplate how to avoid this future.
The complication for me here is that I am always drawn personally to art (by which I also mean music, film, etc.) that has an "uncompromising" take on the human condition, by which I mean it is usually somewhat dark. To me, those are the works which push people deeper into their own understanding of the world and of themselves. Something I read not so long ago and which I've quoted on this blog before, which had a big impact on me is "make the art that you want to see in the world." Implied in this is the idea that one should not make art that they think, or guess, other people want to see in the world.
Among the many legitimate roles that art can play is the role of temporary reprieve from the miseries of everyday life. I'm sure that even I occasionally experience art that way, but ultimately that sort of light and diverting art never really holds my interest (with the exception, it seems, of the female nude). My favorite artists are always those that take an uncompromising view on things... Francis Bacon, Alexander McQueen, and my new favorite Caravaggio. These are people who were trying to find something meaningful and real in the world, and because they remained true to themselves in this quest, they found something original. I guess I'd rather remain true to my own vision and uncover something original and meaningful than try to guess what "people" want to see and try to make that. I think that is a surefire route to mediocrity.
Ironically, two of the pieces I've made which I think are most successful (Becoming Human and With Open Arms) can both be read as fairly dark, but they are both ambiguous, so that's not the only way to read them. Perhaps Endgame was too unambiguously dark. Perhaps slyly incorporating that sort of vision into more multi-layered and open-ended sculptural images is the way forward...
Well anyway, one of these days I'll get over it.
______________________________________
Caravaggio is my new favorite artist, or "art-crush," as I've previously termed it.
Ironically, just like Bacon and McQueen, he was a tortured gay man. OK, to be honest, Caravaggio's personal sexuality is a bit of a mystery - he lived and died a little over 400 years ago and much of his life is shrouded in mystery because... that's a long time ago. But he never painted a single female nude*, painted plenty of young male nudes, and it seems to be pretty widely acknowledged that he had sexual relations with his young male models. However it seems that he also had relations with female prostitutes. The only reason I bring this up is that I'm intrigued by this commonality he shares with Bacon and McQueen; it begs the question: "How does the personal sexuality of these artists tie in with, or contribute to, their dark personal vision?" Probably all of them felt some level of persecution or prejudice based on this. In light of the fact that I'm not gay, I may not be the most qualified person to speculate further... and I guess it's also possible that it's a coincidence and not particularly relevant. (Amusingly, a 2007 Italian film about Caravaggio's life posits his downfall as a result of his tragic love for a female prostitute. My first assumption is that Italians just can't stomach the idea that one of their most famous sons was gay, but I will watch it soon and have a better idea then.)
A large percentage of Caravaggio's artistic output was secular in a time when pretty much all painting was religious. On the urging of some of his powerful patrons and friends, he did at a certain point begin to paint religious subjects, but he seemed fond of choosing atypical moments from these religious stories, often involving murders and decapitations. If we throw in all the naked boys in his secular paintings, we could safely point to "sex and death" as a favored part of his oeuvre. Interestingly, he lived a short and violent life, dying at the age of 39 after having murdered 2 people (probably), having been imprisoned several times, and having become the most famous painter in Italy even during his lifetime. He is credited with having begun the Baroque phase of painting, he introduced the idea of painting "the critical moment" in an ongoing action, and is often referred to as the first modern painter.
*Apparently he did actually paint a partial female nude... Probably my favorite painting of his is called Judith beheading Holofernes; I love this painting primarily for the complicated mix of emotions that Caravaggio managed to capture on Judith's face. It seems that x-ray examination of this painting shows that Judith was originally painted topless and that her blouse was added later. Too bad.
______________________________________
Speaking of "doors opening to new possibilities"... oil painting. I've finally come around to the honest self-assessment that the only reason I haven't truly started oil painting is fear, and I've resolved to just get over it and start. It seems like a long time now that I've been talking about starting to paint (and not actually doing it), but to be fair we did just come back from a week in Mexico city, and there is always too much to do around the homestead. I've resolved, though, to start this week and I think it's going to be tomorrow. Part of the issue, I think, is that the first image I want to paint is this really ambitions, life-scale thing (that I've taken weeks to meticulously mock up in Photoshop), and I think it would look great as an oil painting, but I don't know how to do it yet. So I've finally decided to paint a few smaller and less ambitious canvases first, to get the hang of it, and let the big ambitious one wait until I know what I'm doing. I had obligations yesterday and today, but nothing tomorrow.
______________________________________
As briefly mentioned above, last week Christina, Kodiak and I went to Mexico city to celebrate Christina's birthday, joined by our good friend Cedar.
I was going to cram in a bunch of photos of our trip here, at the end of this post, along with stories of tacos and Frida Kahlo and volcanoes, but... upon looking through my photos, I realize that it really deserves its own post. So, keep an eye out for another post coming very soon about Mexico City, heavy on the photos.
No comments:
Post a Comment