Re: A Posteriori Art - follow-up

> From: "Dyske Suematsu" <[email protected]>

> Supposed you are an artist, but you find that you really enjoy cooking.
> Since you have a very little chance at achieving something profound with
> cooking, you suppress this desire, or keep it moderate, not to take too much
> time away from making "art". In this fashion, your true interests and
> passions get pushed down to the bottom of your priority list, because, as an
> "artist", your priority rests on creating something profound. A healthier
> approach would be to simply follow your passion, whatever it is. If
> something profound and meaningful comes out of it, that's great, if not
> that's great too; at least you didn't alienate yourself.

Pace my previous post. Dyske, I think you miss what it is to be an artist.
You say that you may be an artist, but cooking could be your passion.
However, you cannot pursue cooking to the exclusion of art, because cooking
is not profound. I would suggest that often artists would love to do
something that produces simple results, but the artist inside them will keep
dragging them back to the struggle with more complex issues. Which cannot be
explored in cooking. Its not

> Supposed you are an artist, but you find that you really enjoy cooking.
> Since you have a very little chance at achieving something profound with
> cooking, you suppress this desire, or keep it moderate, not to take too much
> time away from making "art".

actually its possible to do both. I'm an artist but the profundity of my
chocolate cake is breathtaking;-)

The events that create the ['net.] artist as genius' is multiple texts like
this by people that go to bed with a copy of derrida's greatest hits under
their pillow.

http://www.rssgallery.com/trivialconnections/cookthecode.htm
http://www.rssgallery.com/trivialconnections/computerand-cup_red.htm
http://www.rssgallery.com/trivialconnections/rundamnyou.html



o
/^ rssgallery.com
][

I guess what gets me about the original post is the subtext that artists are
frauds, conniving at producing what the world expects rather than what they
'really' should be producing. And that 'art' and 'other stuff' can be
separated into neat compartments.
Of course there are people like that, but what of it? For most artists the
struggle is their life.
Cheers,
Ivan

From: "Jess Loseby" <[email protected]>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Friday, May 02, 2003 11:25 AM
Subject: Re: RHIZOME_RAW: A Posteriori Art - follow-up


>
> > Supposed you are an artist, but you find that you really enjoy cooking.
> > Since you have a very little chance at achieving something profound with
> > cooking, you suppress this desire, or keep it moderate, not to take too
much
> > time away from making "art".
>
> actually its possible to do both. I'm an artist but the profundity of my
> chocolate cake is breathtaking;-)
>
> The events that create the ['net.] artist as genius' is multiple texts
like
> this by people that go to bed with a copy of derrida's greatest hits under
> their pillow.
>
> http://www.rssgallery.com/trivialconnections/cookthecode.htm
> http://www.rssgallery.com/trivialconnections/computerand-cup_red.htm
> http://www.rssgallery.com/trivialconnections/rundamnyou.html
>
>
>
> o
> /^ rssgallery.com
> ][
>
>
>
> + ti esrever dna ti pilf nwod gniht ym tup
> -> post: [email protected]
> -> questions: [email protected]
> -> subscribe/unsubscribe: http://rhizome.org/preferences/subscribe.rhiz
> -> give: http://rhizome.org/support
> +
> Subscribers to Rhizome are subject to the terms set out in the
> Membership Agreement available online at http://rhizome.org/info/29.php
>

And that 'art' and 'other stuff' can be
> separated into neat compartments.
> Of course there are people like that, but what of it? For most artists the
> struggle is their life.
> Cheers,
> Ivan
Absolutely, and it is this enforced separation (particularly endorsed by
academics) between the 'real' and' the art' that is creating what is so
often called digital divide. I think one of the most current and pressing
questions (re potentials of net.art) is how artists respond to the
pressure from critical writing and institutional thematics to keep the
internet and domesticity (the 'real') worlds apart.

jess o
/^ rssgallery.com
][

Seriously?

If an artist starts out to be 'profound' the artist is on the road to
failure. Most artists who stick with it for a few years figure this
out.

all good artists ARE following their passions. they are not taking
some toll road of 'art' and skipping all the exits. I've known many
artists who have hung it up to pursue want they've discovered to be a
more passionate passion like baking, teaching, and other careers.

Why pick on cooking? providing sensual pleasure and enjoyment thru
food for one's family, friends, or patrons is a very valuable thing
to do and carries great meaning in many cultures.



At 9:11 +0100 5/2/03, Ivan Pope wrote:
>> From: "Dyske Suematsu" <[email protected]>
>
>> Supposed you are an artist, but you find that you really enjoy cooking.
>> Since you have a very little chance at achieving something profound with
>> cooking, you suppress this desire, or keep it moderate, not to take too much
>> time away from making "art". In this fashion, your true interests and
>> passions get pushed down to the bottom of your priority list, because, as an
>> "artist", your priority rests on creating something profound. A healthier
>> approach would be to simply follow your passion, whatever it is. If
>> something profound and meaningful comes out of it, that's great, if not
>> that's great too; at least you didn't alienate yourself.
>
>Pace my previous post. Dyske, I think you miss what it is to be an artist.
>You say that you may be an artist, but cooking could be your passion.
>However, you cannot pursue cooking to the exclusion of art, because cooking
>is not profound. I would suggest that often artists would love to do
>something that produces simple results, but the artist inside them will keep
>dragging them back to the struggle with more complex issues. Which cannot be
>explored in cooking. Its not

–
<twhid>
http://www.mteww.com
</twhid>

—– Original Message —–
From: "t.whid" <[email protected]>


> Seriously?
>
> If an artist starts out to be 'profound' the artist is on the road to
> failure. Most artists who stick with it for a few years figure this
> out.

Any artist who does *not* attempt to create anything moving or insightful
will have a *far greater chance* at success, because creating work that is
moving and insightful requires something far more "multidisciplinary" than
art school can provide. So, we have a lot of very "succesful artists"
running around saying "nothing" because it provides them with the easiest
stepping stone to "creating something" even if they are only running around
creating "nothing."

But, you can't evaluate failure by this mechanism. If an artist creates
something meaningful, is that because he did not "start out" trying to make
something profound? If the piece is meaningful, because the artist has a
mastery of his abilities, does that mean that they failed because he "set
out" to make what they made?

Did Beuys start out by rejecting the idea of making his work communicate
something meaningful?
How about poets, did Rilke or TS Eliot set out to make "entertainment" as a
first priority and then "stumbled" onto meaning? How about in cinema, we
have Wim Wenders, or even Woody Allen, but certainly a long tradition of
films that have succesfully "moved" thier audience and created "insights."
Who are the cinematic "artistes" who reject the profound outright in thier
"art"? Maybe Barry Sonnenfeld?

The rejection of this comes solely out of the prison of
hyper-self-consciousness that originated out of the ass end of post
modernism. "Meaning is passe. And so Fascistic!" If you reject being moved-
if it makes you feel like the artist is "embarrassing himself" by creating
work that tries to *transcend* these little hampster wheels we call lives,
then that is a problem with the viewer, not the artist. An artist should
have no consideration for whether what he/she does is "embarrassing" or not,
particularly if that embarrassment comes from the attempt to communicate
something the artist finds meaningful.

-e.

At 13:26 -0400 5/2/03, Eryk Salvaggio wrote:
>—– Original Message —–
>From: "t.whid" <[email protected]>
>
>
>> Seriously?
>>
>> If an artist starts out to be 'profound' the artist is on the road to
>> failure. Most artists who stick with it for a few years figure this
>> out.

the self-consciousness of being 'meaningful' or 'profound' usually
leads to crap. (there are many roads to crap) That's not to say that
it can't lead to something interesting. I doubt Beuys thought to
himself, "I'm being profound and meaningful, ain't it great!," and
Warhol obviously didn't, though his work has had a profound and
meaningful effect on contemporary art over the last 40 years.

If one is interested in what the world might define as 'profound' or
'meaningful' subjects, than perhaps one's work will be 'profound' or
'meaningful'. If one is not interested but takes these subjects
anyway, one will probably churn out self-conscious badart (i'm going
to use that as one word from now on, badart).

But seriously, these terms are so vague… the color red could be
'profound' and 'meaningful' to someone and it could be a paint chip
to someone else.

It has nothing to do with post-modernism IMO, a modernist, a
symbolist, a romanticist, (probably not a neo-classicist) could all
follow the same advice which is simply the old cliche, "follow your
passion," which said another way could be, "do what YOU find profound
and meaningful to YOU."

So, we are in agreement.. I think.

I personally don't attempt to do any work which is 'profound' or
'meaningful'. Those thought patterns simply don't go thru my head
when I'm thinking about new work.

ta,

twhid

>
>Any artist who does *not* attempt to create anything moving or insightful
>will have a *far greater chance* at success, because creating work that is
>moving and insightful requires something far more "multidisciplinary" than
>art school can provide. So, we have a lot of very "succesful artists"
>running around saying "nothing" because it provides them with the easiest
>stepping stone to "creating something" even if they are only running around
>creating "nothing."
>
>But, you can't evaluate failure by this mechanism. If an artist creates
>something meaningful, is that because he did not "start out" trying to make
>something profound? If the piece is meaningful, because the artist has a
>mastery of his abilities, does that mean that they failed because he "set
>out" to make what they made?
>
>Did Beuys start out by rejecting the idea of making his work communicate
>something meaningful?
>How about poets, did Rilke or TS Eliot set out to make "entertainment" as a
>first priority and then "stumbled" onto meaning? How about in cinema, we
>have Wim Wenders, or even Woody Allen, but certainly a long tradition of
>films that have succesfully "moved" thier audience and created "insights."
>Who are the cinematic "artistes" who reject the profound outright in thier
>"art"? Maybe Barry Sonnenfeld?
>
>The rejection of this comes solely out of the prison of
>hyper-self-consciousness that originated out of the ass end of post
>modernism. "Meaning is passe. And so Fascistic!" If you reject being moved-
>if it makes you feel like the artist is "embarrassing himself" by creating
>work that tries to *transcend* these little hampster wheels we call lives,
>then that is a problem with the viewer, not the artist. An artist should
>have no consideration for whether what he/she does is "embarrassing" or not,
>particularly if that embarrassment comes from the attempt to communicate
>something the artist finds meaningful.
>
>-e.

—– Original Message —–
From: "t.whid" <[email protected]>

> the self-consciousness of being 'meaningful' or 'profound' usually
> leads to crap. (there are many roads to crap)

Any path can lead to success or failure depending on:

A. The definition of "success" or "failure" one implements for oneself.
B. The competency and ability to achieve the task one sets out to do.

But to declare that "intent" is in and of itself a problem- and that the
artists who "do it for a while know this" strikes me as cutting off far too
much possibility.


> That's not to say that
> it can't lead to something interesting. I doubt Beuys thought to
> himself, "I'm being profound and meaningful, ain't it great!,"

I don't know about the "ain't it great" part. But I also doubt that his
interest in art was simply to entertain. I think he engaged in deliberate,
conscious acts. So did Duchamp. So did the situationists, the fluxus
artists. Even Cage, in his chance pieces, was "saying something." Warhol was
consciously "saying something" with his "nothing." Warhol most certainly
knew what he was doing.


> If one is interested in what the world might define as 'profound' or
> 'meaningful' subjects, than perhaps one's work will be 'profound' or
> 'meaningful'. If one is not interested but takes these subjects
> anyway, one will probably churn out self-conscious badart (i'm going
> to use that as one word from now on, badart).

Of course. Integrity is important to the success of any artwork.

>
> But seriously, these terms are so vague… the color red could be
> 'profound' and 'meaningful' to someone and it could be a paint chip
> to someone else.

"Profound" is subjective but "Meaningful" is not really that vague. It
simply implies that the work means something, that a piece of art has
something to convey to the audience. The debate as I see it revolves around
what that meaning is. Of course, none of the most meaningful work can be
discussed in terms of theory or critical assesments. You are moved,
inspired, or come away having some insight into your self or the world that
you did not have before. The idea that an artist can not "intend" this is to
say that all the great artists are merely awkward stumblers into brilliant
accidents. [Death of author is "post-modernist".] That this conversation is
very "trite and cliche" is post modernist.

"Must" an artist make work that is meaningful on a true level, a level that
goes beyond the capacity of most art, (which is "meaningful" on an
intellectual level only), or engage the audience to simply "reconsider thier
viewpoints"? Must" an artist make art that reveals layers of mediation that
are imposed by humans onto thier environment? I don't know. I don't know if
anyone "must" do anything. But profound strikes me as a term used for this
sort of cutting away of mediation. The establishment of a new paradigm, the
revelation that old rules do not apply [when they actually *don't* apply.

There is a difference between *profound* art and "profound" art. The problem
is that a history of hacks has made profound into a dirty word, people are
afraid, "do I come off as too profound?" In actuality this is a ridiculous
thing to worry about. "Do I try to be profound and fail dismally because I
have no understanding of what I am talking about?" is why "profound" has a
dirty connotation. Of course, any work that is actually profound doesn't
have to ask. [Except in the case of inflated vanity.]

>
> It has nothing to do with post-modernism IMO, a modernist, a
> symbolist, a romanticist, (probably not a neo-classicist) could all
> follow the same advice which is simply the old cliche, "follow your
> passion," which said another way could be, "do what YOU find profound
> and meaningful to YOU."


I was referring to the conscious decision to reject art that has meaning or
sets out to be profound. But mostly, to the idea that artists cannot
"intend" certain results, or that an audience "takes the result to the art".
An artist can influence others through art, an artist can most certainly
intend to be profound and do so. If, as you say, the artist is capable and
ready to make a profound statement. Maybe 999/1000ths of the people who seek
to make "profound art" are capable of it. And so for some reason we've
assigned the label of what those seekers "want to achieve" to them as if
they achieved it- all very ironically, but it seems people are forgetting
that "profound" has a meaning beyond irony. There are a million hard drives
and servers broadcasting the end result, just as there are canvases in dusty
basements, or, in all honesty, art that is being sold for millions and
hanging on gallery walls and in permanent collections.


> I personally don't attempt to do any work which is 'profound' or
> 'meaningful'. Those thought patterns simply don't go thru my head
> when I'm thinking about new work.


So, what does?



-e.

like it!

:-)

ruth

Dyske Suematsu wrote:

> A few things to add:
>
> In terms of supporting any activities that are yet to be "art", I must
> emphasize once again that my criticism is more towards the artists
> themselves than towards the institutions of art.
>
> Your own ideas need your own support too. There is only so much time in a
> day, and in your life. You need to define priorities. For an "artist", any
> activities that do not appear to have much profound meaning are pushed
> towards the bottom of the list. The same process will occur at the
> institutional level as well. The unfortunate thing about this process is
> that we often achieve great things if we didn't intend to achieve great
> things. If we try hard to attract someone, we fail, but when we have no
> intention of attracting anyone, we end up attracting someone. When we try to
> be funny, we fail, but if we stop trying, we naturally become funnier. Our
> intentions are overrated. We accomplish much greater things if we just let
> it happen; if we didn't sensor ourselves with intentions.
>
> Many famous artists live miserable lives. The only solace that they can
> find, what keeps them going, is the notion that they are doing what they
> love. It is not that they are truly doing what they love, it is the idea
> that they are supposedly doing what they love, is what gives them the
> comfort and pride. Meanwhile many of these established artists are slaving
> themselves to the market that demands and expects a specific brand of
> products from them. All they do is to churn out what is expected, like
> factory workers, because their concerns are more with preserving their
> status as artists than with doing what they love. Granted, there are many
> happy artists too, but it should strike you odd that in the field where
> people are supposed to be doing what they love, they are just as depressed
> as people of any other fields. I personally see this as a result of
> alienating themselves for the sake of being "artists". They suppress what
> they truly want to do for the sake of what could give them the title of
> "artists".
>
> Supposed you are an artist, but you find that you really enjoy cooking.
> Since you have a very little chance at achieving something profound with
> cooking, you suppress this desire, or keep it moderate, not to take too much
> time away from making "art". In this fashion, your true interests and
> passions get pushed down to the bottom of your priority list, because, as an
> "artist", your priority rests on creating something profound. A healthier
> approach would be to simply follow your passion, whatever it is. If
> something profound and meaningful comes out of it, that's great, if not
> that's great too; at least you didn't alienate yourself. However, this
> approach does not get much support, neither from yourself nor from your
> community, because there is no real grounds on which the meaningfulness of
> your activities can be justified.
>
> The term "art" is completely arbitrary. There is no substance that the word
> points to. Its definition is utterly biased and culturally dependent. Yet,
> we fund and support "art" based on this arbitrary grounds. For those who do
> not see the arbitrariness of the term "art", funding on the grounds of "art"
> seems perfectly sound. To me, it is as meaningless as funding someone
> because she is 27 years old. This is not to discourage funding. It's a
> positive thing, but I do not believe that funding "art" is any more
> meaningful than funding 27 year olds.
>
> -Dyske
> http://www.dyske.com
>
> + ti esrever dna ti pilf nwod gniht ym tup
> -> post: [email protected]
> -> questions: [email protected]
> -> subscribe/unsubscribe: http://rhizome.org/preferences/subscribe.rhiz
> -> give: http://rhizome.org/support
> +
> Subscribers to Rhizome are subject to the terms set out in the
> Membership Agreement available online at http://rhizome.org/info/29.php

t.whid:
> > That's not to say that
> > it can't lead to something interesting. I doubt Beuys thought to
> > himself, "I'm being profound and meaningful, ain't it great!,"

Eryk:
> I don't know about the "ain't it great" part. But I also
> doubt that his
> interest in art was simply to entertain. I think he engaged
> in deliberate, conscious acts.

I agree with Eryk here - people have "deep" reasons for doing things
that aren't always calculated and rational. As an atheist, I do find it
hard to understand that people do things for anything but cynical,
personal, selfish, secular, and worldly reasons.

But I realize that people do have deep feelings and often express those
feelings. I'm not usually one of them. But (besides mental illness)
there's no other way to explain things like the Crusades or suicide
bombing or Ray Charles singing "Drown in my own Tears".

-Cf

[christopher eli fahey]
art: http://www.graphpaper.com
sci: http://www.askrom.com
biz: http://www.behaviordesign.com