“Fartists”, Light triumphs, Grow!Grow!Grow!

Still Sundays.

November 13, 2011.

Stillness is a guardian angel.

That being said, on days where the frozen wind in New York City feels like the wrathy breathing of some evil gods, I do yell aloud, forgetting all I know about seasons, climate, and weather, “God you can’t be real! Because no one in his or her right mind would actually create a day this cold!”

Yet so far November feels like early spring. Will March then be like early winter? Maybe winter has never been that long after all? Climate change is changing.

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What do I know without a doubt this Sunday morning as this calendar year is almost over?

Light triumphs. Again and again and again. I used to think that the authors and artists and musicians who have stood the test of time were just selling some cheap crack version of the cocaine of hope and I was an addict because humanity is so dark. No, they were telling a Universal Truth: Light triumphs despite all the darkness. But you can’t tell that story unless you know this truth without an iota of doubt. When you know this then you must present all the facts, not like a good lawyer does because a good lawyer only presents those facts that favor his or her case, and most facts are dark. When we read or see or feel a flicker of light in a work, it is not our imagination: we have just grazed necks with possibility. The best of what is today, despite all that is not, is because someone recorded in whatever medium what is possible.

At best what is being offered today is runts of grunts. A hoary marmot that tugs the imagination. How limited is yours?  Forget not: a marmot, however ‘exotic,’ is still a rodent.

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New York City is a tumbleweed of ideas disengaged from the root of impossible.  Yesterday I saw first hand anyone can be anything here.

Yesterday in Manhattan’s SoHo neighborhood I came across one of the worst art I had seen in a long time (online world not withstanding). I couldn’t believe it was selling—in front of my own eyes two Turkish men were paying cash—for $1500 and above. Gigantic canvasses. What made it bad, in the view of someone like me who doesn’t draw and paint professionally, was the fact that it all looked the same and without effort (here I don’t mean to imply “without effort” as “so talented that it looks effortless”).  It looked like a boy had used graffiti spray cans to draw his high school fantasy women in the form of big Blonde Phantom comic book characters (except with different hair colors and no story other than hyper-sexualizing the female anatomy). I shared a photo with my brother and he said, “Wow. That is really amateur. That’s a true fartist.”

I was curious so I spoke to him for a little bit. I can’t count the number of chips on his shoulder. Before this phrase—“chip on one’s shoulder”—became metaphorical it actually meant that one is carrying a chip on his shoulder as a form of physical challenge, inviting opponents to knock the chip off and so provoke a fight. At one point I had to wonder how can someone with that many “chips on his shoulder” be standing in the first place!

He wanted to know was I surprised that someone from his ethnicity drew all these “white women”? He wanted to know was I surprised to see such a “successful” artist in scrubs? He was rude and his sidekicks who managed his budget said he is known for his attitude; this is his trademark. Well, his art sure as hell couldn’t be his trademark, I thought to myself but didn’t say only because I didn’t get a chance. I didn’t want to know anything except: who in the world actually pays for this [junk]? As in where does it go? Clubs in foreign countries? Where? He said art is not about making a living because one can make a living selling peanuts. Really? Had he ever talked to anyone selling peanuts on a cold New York City street? 12 hours selling peanuts?

I have known artists with more narcissism but they were actually good. He possessed a pretentiousness that is often found in extremely insecure people. Pretentiousness is defined as—and here I define not because the average reader may not know what it means but we all have tendencies to attach meanings to a word that is so far removed from the actual meaning that the impact is lost—“attempting to impress by affecting greater importance, talent, culture, etc. than is actually possessed.”

The only thing on his “About” page of his website is about how he is tormented by what he sees in this world and he considers his talent a “curse from God” but despite the demons he offers it all as a “gift in the form of his art.”  It is obvious to see that he is still creating from a space where he stopped growing: probably 8^th grade.

And people think “growth” is some new-age spiritual haute couture! Growth is at the epicenter of who we are as a species. Art is some God and you must develop your potential to stay in the game of Evolution in a Universe that is continuously expanding.

I could offer his website here I suppose but I have made my point. But why?  I suppose it is no different than performing acts presented via social media where no one questions anything and is afraid to uphold anyone to a personal standard because we don’t even know our own thoughts without subjecting them to 8^th grade fears of “will I still be liked?”

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We all go through periods where we pause to gather it all in and exhale: I really don’t know what next. As educators. As parents. As artists. As photographers. As writers. As people. Or at least we should. The difference is some people are so afraid of this dark nothingness that they create identities and attach themselves to those and continue to create (be it art, photos, blog posts, fiction (print or online), articles including those in well circulated and respected magazines not just social media cliques) from that space. We can’t really ignore that tugging within that demands grow, grow, grow!

Our egos are a chip on evolution’s shoulder. Let’s get out of the way of Ourselves.

Who am I to say all this? Just someone who knows what she likes and can sense and rejects all that feels pretentious and makes no apologies for it. If the result of my compassion enables another’s stagnation I respectfully detach myself.

Mama says being insecure about your work—your craft, your product—is akin to being insecure about your children. Is my child behaving properly when out in public? Is she being threatened when being herself? Is he lying? “If you are worried, you probably have some reason grounded in some reality to be so.  Solution: do something about it! Maybe it is all in your head after all, projecting unrelated insecurities onto the product, even so it must be addressed.”

What do most do? Create on. Look the other way (in the literal sense as well as when it comes to the craft).

If you are still long enough, you realize you don’t have to stay attached to darkness as some identity in order to create or just be.

Who is going to create a standard for you? Only you can.

Stillness brings forth much that scares, but it also offers what’s real. And although the real is often more than anything imagined, but unlike what is imagined it never betrays Light and what is still possible.

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