Aug. 10, 2009
This week's show is the second part of my thoughts about craft and art, this show focusing more art.
Right off the bat let me confess that not once did I get the title of the book by John Carrey that I keep refering to, which is What Good are the Arts.
Terrible oversight on my part and while there is no defense let me
repeat that the book and it's correct name is less important to my
remarks than the thoughts and ideas that were spurred by it. With that
in mind, here's a link to The Craftsman by Richard Sennett. I think it has a lot to say about methods of producing quality work for anyone, including filmmakers.
The
great thing about having all these diverse sources of information and
opinion is not so much the opportunity to learn as it is the ideas and
where they take me, and the things I think and believe.
I
generally find that I come to understand what I think and believe by
saying it out loud, either to myself, to others or to you in this time
shifted fashion. There's a monitor in my head as the words come out
that evaluate the rightness of what I'm saying against what I think.
Sometimes when they are at odds I find that what I have said is more
true to what I believe than what I was actually thinking. The sense of
smell and taste comes to mind as a comparable experience. Often they
are very different experiences and one or the other will become the
defining sensation.
So despite how dense, or confusing this all
may sound, I found it necessary to work it out, out loud and as I say
in the end, I have a better understanding of how I think and feel on
this subject, for the present time.
But I feel a need to say
these things not only to clarify my own thoughts, but because this is
an important issue we all have to face and settle for our own selves.
Everyone in the world is a creator and the more culture and technology
enables anyone to share to larger groups of people, the more the
question of craft versus art comes back at us.
Speaking of which, I'm currently reading a fascinating book, Here comes Everyone
by Clay Shirky. It addresses the impact of social media on creativity
and the changes it has had and will continue to have in the future. You
should read it.
Finally, as I was putting together the links for this post I came across a comment
(goodreads.com) from a reader of John Carrey's book who was
disappointed that they didn't finish the book with clearer
understanding of what art is. Diana commented that his definition of a
work of art is 'anything that anyone has ever considered a work of
art'. She goes on to say, "In other words anything, and
correspondingly, nothing" A few more thoughtful reviews are found on
the Times Online, Denis Dutton Online and The Reason Online.
This perspective, which is the cultural norm, that calling something
art acts as a qualifier, sieve, gate and value judgment. Defining art
is like separating the sheep from the goats. Not only does this
approach lead to fruitless and unending debate, I think it's
destructive and wrong.
I couldn't find a way to artfully add a couple links into the show notes, so I'll just list them here:
The Emoti-Chair
CBC Spark episode # 71 about the Emoti-Chair
Here's the transcript of the show, it may or may not help.
Let me know what you think.
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Hi, and welcome to the Video StudentGuy show, the weekly journal of a video student. I'm the guy, Paul Lyzun.
This
is the second part to a show I posted a few weeks ago, Show #128, which
was about Craft. In this show I'm gong to be talking a little bit more
about art and some more about craft,
I began that show by
talking about the path you might follow to make a film. I just wanted
to sum it up in a tight little package, from my own narrow little
perspective.
Along the way I got lost talking about
craftsmanship. I don't apologize for wandering off the path,
craftsmanship is the subject of my recent film. Craftsmanship is
integral to filmmaking, and for myself, the duality of Craft and Art
has been a lifelong tug of war.
I think I did a passing fair
explanation of what I felt craft was, and by implication, what it's
value is. I'll work hard not to go over the same ground in this
episode. Let me just mention one more time how much I enjoyed the book,
The Craftsman, by Richard Sennett, and if you are at all interested, as
I am, in the meaning of art and craft, particularly what it means in
your creative process, I strongly recommend you find a copy and read it
a couple times.
The last two things I mentioned in episode #128
that leads into today's portion of the conversation are that art, or
better and broader yet, creative expression, is a form of
communication, and the other is the question and the book that bears
the name, What is Art Good For, by John Carey.
Let me start with
the idea that I got form the book, which is what good is art for? Let
me start with the idea that was spawned by the book, which is, what is
art good for?
The first thing I'm going to do is dispense with
the word Art – it's a loaded word meaning everything and nothing. Just
trying to narrow it's definition would take more time than it's worth.
I'm going to use "it" in exchange for Art and you can assume when I say "it", I'm saying Art.
I
want to start off that way because it eliminates preconceived ideas of
creativity. It eliminates pictures of what is not art and removes the
risk of applying taste and prejudice (same thing? you decide) to the
topic.
That frees me up for a few minutes to look at the question itself, which is really very telling.
To
rephrase the question, "what is it good for" is a universal and a
common, commonly asked question. It places the focus on the practical
and pragmatic. Things exist because they perform a function. In a
Darwinian sense, you could say things exist because they're food for
something else, or are means of avoiding being food. Every detail in
the construction and appearance of everything has a purpose. I believe
that's true whether you believe in a higher power or the evolutionary
process, or both. This isn't about who's responsible, this is about
dealing with the way things are.
So, asking what is it good for
implies there must be a purpose, that things exist for a reason. As I
just describe, I concede they do exist for a reason.
Imagine
that I made something. At a very minimalist level it is good for being
the result of an effort of realizing an idea in the real world, the
world outside our minds. We're thinking things all the time. Making
stuff up that never was, and is not. But when someone takes an idea and
makes it, physically, it becomes separate from the maker, beyond their
control.
Now, why would anyone want to do that? Well, perhaps to
get a more concrete grasp of this idea, Looking at it externally allows
me to refine it's nature until it matches my expectations OR it changes
the way I think.
Once I put an idea in the physical world, my
mind isn't solely in control of it's idenity. The world that we both
occupy now has some claim to it's meaning and in the process I can
change as well as it can.
The thing I made changes me.
THAT, is the real power of creativity!
Being able to change yourself.
That makes it worth the effort alone, just to experience change in how I perceive the world I live in.
But
it doesn't end with communicating with the world separate from myself.
When I put it out there in a world of other individuals I open it and
myself up to further change through the reactions of other people and
how they view themselves and the world, the same world I live in
objectively, but not subjectively.
It's a means of expressing a human experience and a means of sharing a human experience
Sounds complicated eh?
Well, getting back to the main question, what is it good for?
It's good for changing myself, changing other people – changing the world.
What is it again?
It is art, it is creativity, it is human expression, it is communication.
Everything
changes all the time. Scale isn't the issue. We are bombarded, shot
through every iota of a moment with information that changes our world
view and I'm guessing here, but I wouldn't be surprised if someone told
me we don't register most of it.
So the volume and the scale, it doesn't matter very much. Everything changes, all the time. You can't take it all in.
That's why we're all different right, we are the sum of what we choose to perceive.
Now, lets get a little more concrete. I want to talk about the book "What is Art Good For? by John Carey.
Because
once we get past the abstract, fundamental view I've just presented,
things get immediately sticky and oh so thick. Watch out that you don't
loose a shoe in the mud.
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I have not read this book, I'll tell you right up front and as long as I'm being honest I'll say that in all likelihood I won't.
I
think I would enjoy his writing and find I would agree with a lot of
what he has to say. I just don't have the time or inclination. I'm not
saying this a means of passing judgement on his book, it's just a
matter of personal bandwidth.
By all accounts John Carey is a
good writer and very convincing in his arguments. He is witty,
intelligent and dead on in his ability to deconstruct and lay bare the
self serving mystification of the art establishment. His books are a
pleasure to read. One author thought he was just a little too forgiving
in his appraisal of the one medium he feels is superior, but overall,
he thinks that it's a good book.
I've read a number of reviews
and I've put a couple links on the blog page if you'd like to read them
as well. After several different articles read, I feel I can made some
generalizations (obviously without having read the book) and offer this
simple, perhaps unfair generalization.
He says that the art culture is pompous and hypocritical
and that greatest art is literature.
See the time I saved you!?
The
primary reason I'm discussing it here is to present an alternative view
to his perception that all other creative works are subordinate to
literature. And since I haven't read his book I'm not going to indict
him personally, he may very well feel misunderstood on that count, I
just want to use his premise as a jumping off point for this idea of a
hierarchy in value to art – that there's always a pecking order.
The
more we embrace technology in our lives, the further we become removed
from our origins, the places and things that have shaped us as human
beings over our time here on earth. Despite the pervasiveness of the
technology surrounding us today, it still doesn't have the same impact
on the way we think act and feel as "natural" environmental shapers.
So,
we've surrounded ourselves with an environment of our own making –
which is alien to us in a historically cultural sense. Plastic, steel
concrete – they register in our higher functioning brain, but not in
our unconscious mind, which got us by for hundreds of thousands of
years before we began collecting together to build farms, towns and
cities.
The invention of writing and the ability to read has had
a profound impact on our culture, both as a means of advancing it, and
archiving it. Certainly our success in living in an artificial
environment is due mainly in part to reading and writing. But whatever
we've read, whatever has been written, is a memory that connects us to
a real experience of something we've felt, touched, smelled, seen and
heard at an earlier time. I believe these senses are more immediate and
transfer information to our brains in a more visceral and direct way.
And yet, the further we move into the future, the less exposure we have
to these sense touchstones. It's sort of like living without knowing
what the midnight sky looks like without light pollution.
How
much are we really missing? How much are we really separated from the
past, from the real world in terms of the artificial world that we've
created for ourselves?
Well, if you're honest, you know you
can't beat a tornado. The best you can do is hunker down with Auntie
Em. And how different is that from hiding from a tiger in a cave.
Of
course it can be rightly said that writing presents information in an
organized manner. After all, how valuable can art be that slips by your
conscious understanding and sits like undigested meat in your colon
until it finally integrates into your body you're not even aware of the
cause of any change that's taken place? Or that change has taken place.
Actually, I think change that occurs without knowing is an an awesome power.
So
think about music, the texture of a basket or the smell of a leather
coat. It's a message organized in a different way. Nonlinear, holistic.
And
you could say that writing has achieved a greater cumulative scale in
meaning than any other media, but I reject the importance of volume and
scale, in favor of the specific impact a creative work can have on an
individual.
Let me use a specific instance to clarify what I
mean about this unique effect that non verbal art can have on different
individuals.
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About communication through the other senses
Spark #71
http://www.cbc.ca/spark/2009/03/episode-71-march-25-28-2009/
I
listened to a show called Spark . It's from CBC Radio in Canada. It's a
great show. Each show has several stories of different length about
current and bleeding edge technology and how it's transforming people's
lives. I like it mainly because, although it's all about technology, it
dares to find ways in which technology is changing the way we live – as
we're living it. Right now! That, is cool.
One of the stories in
a recent episode, episode number 71, was a conversation about the
creation of an emoti-chair, a device which produces electrical
impulses, tiny shocks, that are triggered by the sounds in music.
When
you sit in this chair it actually – it can actually feel like something
is touching you. The creators of this technology have developed a new
form of expression based on the sense of touch.It has begun to morph
quickly. One example is that deaf people can sense music in a greater
dimension.
Someone who was deaf described how at a party
everyone who couldn't hear would hear the music through feeling the
vibrations, barefoot, through the wooden floors. The difference with
the emoti-chair is that each instrument creates a different sensation.
Instead of all of the music coming through as one vibration, you had
different vibrations at different locations on the chair, which of
course affected different parts of your body. For each instrument. This
mechanism allowed a deaf person the ability to experience music through
assimilating multiple layers of sensation, in this case tactile, which
mirrored closely the manner in which a hearing person experienced music
through their ears.
Another person, one without hearing
limitations found that the emotional impact of the music was
intensified with the combination of the sensations that were generated
by the emoti-chair. It literally brought her to tears in a way the
music did not.
Finally, a musician who was composing music for
the chair found that he was able to elevate the effect that the chair
on the senses, not by writing a great song, but writing the music based
on the sensations produced by sitting in the chair.
So the chair itself was his feedback loop, not his ears.
Is
this any less the impact that literature has? Is the argument that
literature is more powerful as a single force and to the greatest
number of people because of it's ability to cross reference itself and
establish a more cohesive, inter-referential whole? Is it because it's
easier to document and catalog it's impact that sets it apart in value
from all other forms? Is it the consistency of the media over
generations that makes it easier to judge?
Okay, this is where you're saying, well Paul, you should just read the book and find out. Find out why he thinks that way!
Well, my point at it's very heart is that any creative expression has to be judged on it's own and by an individual.
So,
the first point is that there's all this bogus mysticism about art, and
it's being propped up by museums, and art collectors, and art
speculators and so forth. That has, for generations and hundreds of
years even, affected the way we perceive art. Remember, there was a
time when art and craft were one thing. They were just simply creative
expressions. At least in western culture, it wasn't until the
Renaissance that they sort of split apart. And so there was a humbler
form of creativity, and a higher form of creativity.
But, that
was just simply a societal choice. Up to that point people didn't make
that distinction and there was no need to make that distinction. And I
believe very much that that was generated by money.
If people
valued it and therefore they had to identify that it had a special,
unique value, that set it apart. Supply and demand so to speak.
So
however powerful any work of art can be, I just don't believe that
there is a greatest hits of art. There is great art, there is universal
art, but I think it's important to value work based on a personal level.
Just as one's knowledge and understanding of math and science is easier
to measure compared to the arts in general, like in SAT scores, so
society believes that's the better organized the information is, the
better it represents a higher intelligence.
After all, isn't
that how we were able to create a sophisticated culture? And I'm not
saying that we can throw that away, but I think that it would be good
to embraced that disorganized, holistic, intuitive aspect of ourselves
just as much. This is what we're starving [for], currently, in our
culture
So the idea of having the ability to quantify and
categorize and hierarchize and organize art - that makes it much easier
sort-of-like to build a mountain of blocks and then see which comes
upon top.
Is that the reason literature achieves greater significance over the other arts?
I'm
not going to enter into that argument. I can only say that measuring
the value of something through the volume of it's impact is
dehumanizing. Creativity is expressed on a personal level and impressed
on individuals in the same way. Hundreds of people can view a painting
at a museum in a single day. Thousands of people can hear a musical
performance at one time in a concert. Millions of people can watch a
movie on TV simultaneously. But every person internalizes that
experience on a personal level.
Painting, music, literature,
origami, everything touches everyone of us in a different way at
different times and while you generalize about the critical defining
characteristics of one medium, you also lose a lot in the streamlining
process. And in that process you disenfranchise a lot of people from a
lot of creativity.
It's not just about what you see and identify
as art, it's what you allow yourself to believe what you can do, as far
as art. And if you think that knitting is secondary to some other art
form, then you're always going to feel like a second class citizen of
art. Of creativity, forget the art word.
[Streamlining,
simplifying art is a form of marketing. For money, for ideology, take
your pick. The honest reaction of an individual to a single creative
expression cannot be calculated, summed and expressed in anything more
than a gross generalization that distorts its value.]
But I'm
not interested in changing the world on this point. For myself, I feel
that holding this thought, this consideration, as I create, will help
me keep my balance against any outside pressure of generalized, common
knowledge, wisdom and understanding.
Well, now that that's
over I don't think I enjoyed it very much at all. How about you? It was
hard work and I don't think it makes any difference.
Well, maybe
a little difference. Now that I've written this down and thought about
it, I have a better idea of what I think I think, and I can consider
whether it makes sense or not. I don't know about you.
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After
I wrote all this that I just told you, I had some other thoughts and I
decided that, instead of integrating them, I'd just simply leave them
as a footnote at the end .
I think the reason I'm going on and
on about the idea of craft and art is this (and remember when I say
art, I mean an expression of creativity and a desire to communicate):
Art
with a capital A, as I've tried to identify earlier, creates a sense of
heightened expectations. Somedays you don't feel inspired, you're glad
you can drag your sad butt out of bed and put your shoes on the right
feet.
Days like that can make you wonder if you should even put
in the time. Everyone has days like that and you can't control when
they happen. Frankly, I don't want to live with the weight of
expectations about what I'm going to do or how well I'm going to do it,
while I'm in the middle of my work. I don't want to be distracted, I
want the creativity to flow out of me without any speedbumps.
That's
the feeling I want, regardless of how useful, attractive or successful
is the thing I end up creating. When I'm in that frame of mind, what I
make is almost always good and whether it's what I want or not, it
leaves me feeling good about the work and myself. And that just
perpetuates more creativity.
[So I think all the talk about art
is an after the fact thing. It's hindsight. Who knows how many trials,
experiments or dead ends any creative person has to pass through before
the finished work of art is delivered. No one wants to know, no one
cares. So why do people who are making the thing itself have to think
about it.]
I know, there's all kind of situations where you have
to keep your eye on the deadline, measure the work you're doing against
the anticipated product, keeping customers happy, keeping the business
flowing.
I'm not saying you can dispense with all those voices,
I only want to provide a little breathing room so we can create and
build, At the same time I'm also listening to myself think, I can watch
myself work, think about what I'm doing and have enough presence of
mind to evaluate it, or re-evaluate it and then proceed forward to the
next step.
When the focus is on craft you can have that kind of
internal conversation, just you and the thing you're creating. And you
can feel good about what you're doing, because you can see how you're
doing.
Immediate feedback loop.
//
There's
something about big people and little people when it comes to creative
endeavors and I don't like the mentality that we qualify the creative
value of something based on it's ROI. Yeah, we got a great economic
steamroller of a system, but when I make things, I'm answering a need
that places money below first place.
I'm not saying that we can
live in a world where doesn't money matter, only that we should choose
to live in a world where it matters a lot less than it does.
//
If
you're still listening, I applaud your fortitude. Thanks for letting me
talk this thing out. I think next week I'll do a short show about
something superficial.
I've got links on the blog to the various
podcasts, or books that I've talked about. Take a look at
[email protected]. You can also leave a comment or a criticism
at the website. Or you can send me an email at
[email protected].
Despite how I may come off, I am
interested in what you think, even if we disagree. In fact, I reserve
the right to disagree with myself sometime in the future.
I'm Paul, the videostudentguy, thanks for listening,
I'll talk to you later,
in the meantime, be creative.
Bye
