4.10.09

Wake

I have been thinking a bit about the concept of transience. Last saturday (thats how long I've been meaning to write this post. Its been a fucking busy week)...Last saturday I saw so many amazing things, so many incredible little happenings that I experienced one by one by accident. All by my self, without my camera. And I think - I have to tell someone about this. I have to let someone know of all the small magical insignificant moments that occurred. And then I thought that no. How brilliant it is that there is no evidence. How amazing that I would be the only one to experience this day just as I experienced it and it would never happen again. How amazing that these things were here and gone. And if noone else could have the day like I did then why try to give them that experience, knowing that your attempts are futile. And so I didn't talk about it, except to tell people that saturday was good, and I didn't talk about it again, and I didn't talk about it again.

And I think, art, in itself, is a lie. Sure its a lie to tell the truth but why should it hold up next to the unadulterated truth? Yes a photograph can be beautiful, and movies intoxicating, and paintings and sculpture and music and so on. But my eyes see in billions of colors with gigantic resolution and infinite color depth. My ears here crystal clear uncompressed audio in ten thousand point surround sound. My skin feels the wind and the pavement and the rush of this city pulsing through my vains. I am the perfect entertainment system with beautiful experiences displayed through it eighteen hours a day, every day I live, and if I payed a bit more attention to it then I would perfect the art of living.

but that burden's not on you

3 comments:

Leemans said...

art isn't even inherently a lie, because as far as i'm concerned it never said that it is truth, so only if you view it as the truth- then it becomes the lie.

it's true that we are the perfect "entertainment" system in the techincal sense(uncompressed quality) but just because something is technically perfect doesn't mean it's interesting. Our life can be displayed perfectly but not necessarily interestingly.

So in the end the experience is not that much of 'us'; no matter how perfect we are, if we end up in an office there's practically no way to 'perfect the art of living'. I don't believe i'm being cynical.

And I don't mean to be a douche.

But you're lucky... really lucky. If any of this sounds like I'm disagreeing it's not intentional although it may be inherent. The reason is due to my personal (as of now) mute experience. Have I died?

Sticky said...

Holy shit, dude, your comment is depressing, but it also misses the point of my post. What I'm saying is a lot of good photographs I see are depictions of normal life framed in a way to make them interesting, and beautiful. Things like close up of plants or pictures of urban motion or just things shot around the artists living space, and many of these photos are beautiful. And I think, well, I see these things all the time, constantly, why do I need the frame around it to appreciate its beauty? When I am right there standing in front of it it is even MORE beautiful then in the snapshot, I just have to look around and notice it. But this beauty is all around me - and you too. I never realized how fucking amazing the bay area looks until I was back this summer.

Also I think that much of art (not all of it but a good portion) is intended to recreate an emotion for the viewer. To have them feel like the artist felt. To create empathy. And I think that going out and living that emotion is much more intense and moving then the art itself, and thats what I mean by the art of living.

and yes, we are the perfect entertainment system, technically perfect, we experience first hand better then any reproduction can do. But as a film teacher of mine once said "its not what you shoot with, what matters is whats in front of the camera. And so our job is to go out and find brilliant things to put in front of the camera of our eyes, and if we can do that we'd get it better then from any other camera.

Also dude, I get your feeling of being uninspired, but I really think you have to take responsibility for that. Your not just a victim here. Get out into the world and wake yourself up. Its on you.

Jacklyn said...

plz write book.