This first picture is of one of my friends shooting pool.  Look for the words: Light, Shadow, Rob, Shirt, Cueball, Cue, Table and Background.

This second shot is another done from the “Dia de los Muertos” art outing we went to, thus the phrase inspiration for this piece.

Reference photo shot on the phone and all work done “in phone” using “Type Drawing”.  Yeah baby….

Cass of the Dead

Dan of the Dead

Here is my next entry in the “Phone Artwork” series.  Again, the theme here is that everything from start to finish (including taking the original picture) was done on a mobile device.  And by mobile device I mean the device you use, amongst other things,  as a telephone.

The other day our friend MentalSwitch offered up a delightful little post entitled “Hello Nurse!” It featured a photo of an attractive model dressed as … well, hell, rather than me trying to describe the shot and failing miserably, why don’t you just click on over there and see for yourself. But before you do, please be forewarned that the photo is NOT SAFE FOR WORK!!!!

Ahem. Well, actually, its worksafeness (or unworksafeness thereof) became the topic of some discussion here. Initially the pic was posted without a cut, meaning that the image itself would appear on the front page of S&R. Later, after some complaint and brief deliberations, we moved it behind a cut with the dreaded “NSFW” tag, indicating that the content would most certainly get you fired if it were accidentally viewed by any decent, God-Fearing American^® co-worker. And since way too many of our readers work in places where others might be looking over their shoulders, this was a practical concern. As one colleague put it – and we’ll let that colleague name himself if he wants to – “if the wrong person had walked behind me with that image up on my screen, I could have been walked out the door that day, no appeal.”

Such is the reality for millions and millions and millions of people living here in the Land of the Free^®, the Home of the Brave^® and the Birthplace of the Religious Freedom^®.

As badly as it griped me to see such a fine, artistic photo hidden behind a cut like some tawdry porno you’d pay a Times Square carney a dollar to see (price adjusted for inflation), I also had no interest in seeing any of our intelligent, hard-working readers escorted out of their places of employment at gunpoint.

However, my colleague Dr. Slammy suggested that the all-too-standard NSFW tag – the Modern American Internet’s version of the Scarlet Letter – was a lingering stain on the credibility of the artist, and in due course I (apparently being ill of will and sharp of tongue) was enlisted to pen what you may take as an official Scholars & Rogues policy position.

Briefly stated, when you put an artist behind the Scarlet NSFW, you convey a general social verdict that shame should be attached to the work. It is not fit for general viewing; it is likely to be deemed offensive to some people; and those who choose to click the link, well, that’s between them and Jesus.

It does not matter whether such a judgment is reasonable. For instance, in the case of “Hello Nurse,” what really is there to be scadalized by? Let’s take a close look:

What is the supposed objection? The subject is of consenting age. No aberrant sexual acts are depicted. Hell, she’s not even partially naked. No vajayjay showing. No boobies. She’s not fondling herself (at the moment, anyway). There is an aspect of the erotic in her pose, of course, but let’s be clear here: whatever obscenity might arise from the communication of this image lies entirely within the mind of the viewer.

Goddammit, people, you can see more NSFWing imagery any goddamned night of the week on any goddamned channel on television during goddamned prime time. If this is NSFW, then the publishers of every fashion magazine available in America need to be hung in the public square right fucking now!!!

Oh, I’m sorry – is my invective NSFW?

It is true, as another of my unnamed colleagues pointed out, that good art seeks to provoke. MentalSwitch isn’t an especially in-your-face artist, but it is also true that his work routinely challenges convention in ways that are guaranteed to provoke, and it’s not hard to conclude who the targets of his critiques are. As he explains in the notes accompanying a portrait of “Lizzy”:

If all Christians were like this guy then the world would be a better place. On the other hand, if all Christians were like this guy we wouldn’t even recognize Christianity anymore….

Well played, that.

Welcome to 17th Century Salem, folks. Welcome to neo-Puritan America, a land where dismemberments and flying body parts and mushroom clouds and elected officials intentionally and strategically lying to their constituents are cool but a woman wearing four times more clothing than every teenaged girl around every swimming pool in the United States is NSFW. Because she looks suspiciously like she might enjoy sex in a non-missionary position. And sex is not to be imagined. Pictures that might make us think of sex are not to be condoned.

In neo-Puritan America, millions of people wake up every morning praying that the Lord will afford them an opportunity during the day to be offended. Hypocritical offense is next to godliness and the Constitution apparently has a clause about the right not to be exposed to anything you don’t like. Lawyers will be summoned. Human Resources policies will be invoked. Sinners will be terminated. And Hester Prynne will have a red NSFW branded on her twitchy, hellbound little ass, BY GOD!

In case the theme of my rant hasn’t yet made itself apparent, the Scarlet NSFW brands the wrong person. Those whose visions challenge are to be positioned behind the screen of shame, while those who are afraid of ideas have their narrow prejudices reinforced by official policies and unspoken self-righteous bullying.

We will know America has finally attained a measure of enlightenment when the reverse of those statements is true.

In the meantime, I mentioned something about a policy, so here it is. Since, as I noted above, we have no interest in damaging the careers of our readers, and since we’re smart enough to know the reality of many workplaces, we’ll be placing things that we believe might offend the average granny-panty neo-Puritan behind a cut. But when we do, understand that it is not the artist whom we are indicting. It’s the Scarlet Letter crowd.

In addition, don’t be surprised to see NSFW replaced by NSFP – Not Safe For Puritans. (My original idea, Not Safe For Repressive Puritan Asshat Jesus Nazis, was deemed a bit unwieldy.)

At Scholars & Rogues, we don’t shrink from challenges. We’re not kept up at night by the unconventional. And we are absolutely, positively not afraid of ideas.

And we will not quietly pander to those who are.

New technology brings new creative outlets.  If you had told me ten years ago that I would be taking pictures and doing artistic manipulations on my PHONE I may not have believed you.  Yes, this piece (posted in the spirit of Halloween) was shot and fully edited on my iPhone.  It sort of reminds me of the closing scene of the director’s cut of Brazil (not the love-conquers-all version) and that’s okay.

Art as the Servant of Commerce

“… every Beatles song ever recorded is going to be advertising women’s underwear and sausages… It’s one thing you’re dead, but we’re still around! They don’t have any respect for the fact that we wrote and recorded those songs, and it was our lives.” – George Harrison, 1987.

“To have great poets, there must be great audiences.” – Walt Whitman

The Levi’s jeans company is currently running a new advertising campaign featuring Walt Whitman’s poems “Pioneers! O Pioneers!” and “America.” What sets the ads apart is the use of Thomas Edison’s 1890 recordings of Whitman himself reading the poems as images of 21st century heroin chic models clad in Levis cavort in scenes designed, one supposes, to suggest the new American realities – including as some in the blogosphere have noted, a scene in which a woman offers what can be interpreted as a Nazi style salute – but might simply be a dumbass mimicking a statue….

But I digress…

Over 20 years ago Apple Corps., representing McCartney, Harrison, Starr and Yoko Ono Lennon, won a legal decision preventing advertisers from using actual recordings by The Beatles as background music for commercials (this was precipitated by the infamous Nike “Revolution” ad). Beatle songs may be used in commercials, but only if they are performed by other artists. That explains Blackberry using “All You Need is Love” or Target using “Hello Goodbye” with other artists performing those Beatles classics.

Both Whitman and Harrison are dead. So if George was right, maybe having Whitman read his poetry to help a company that has offshored its plants and put thousands of Americans out of work to increase profits for stockholders and bonuses for its top executives while helping drive down wages for American workers is okay. And maybe using George’s song “Something” to sell Chrysler LeBarons for a company that was bailed out of bankruptcy by American taxpayer dollars (twice!) was okay because George wasn’t singing it.

But I digress again….

Art as Commerce?

Art has had a long history of depending on the kindness of strangers. Whether from royalty, religious institutions, or the wealthy, artists relied on patronage and commissions to support them and allow them to create their works. This made them vulnerable to patrons meddling – and perhaps to the enticement to compromise their art to guarantee they received support. The great “liberation” of artists that some claim occurred during the Romantic Period (two great examples being Beethoven and Byron who could command large fees from orchestras and publishers respectively because their work filled concert halls and sold books) is really a shift in support – from dependence on the support of wealthy elites, artists could look to the marketplace for livelihood. To achieve this end, however, required that artists consider how their works functioned as product in the marketplace. So again rises that issue of compromise (popularly seen as damaging to artistic integrity – and, indeed, to creativity).

Not all artists have accepted this view of work as product that must meet marketplace expectations, of course, and Whitman is an example – he worked variously as a journalist, teacher, clerk, and nurse to support himself because – well, initially his poetry didn’t sell. His poetry, far out of step with the verse of his time (which was highly formal in rhyme and meter) only gained acceptance slowly – and his reputation (and sales) have enlarged much more since his death than they did during his life. Even as art and commerce were merging (and audiences were turning from poetry to prose), Whitman made his poetry his life’s work – apparently without serious thought of recompense. And his reputation as America’s greatest poet grows with every passing year as audiences have come to appreciate his seriousness of purpose and artistic vision. (Think what

Harrison, on the surface, would seem the exemplar of the artist fully accepting his art as product. The staggering success of The Beatles music, based on its promotion and distribution as if it were “women’s underwear [or] sausages,” seems the triumph of commercial concerns over artistic ones. Yet the evolution of Harrison’s/The Beatles’ music from the simplicity that musicologist Wilfrid Mellers terms “Edenic” to the later problematic complexity that challenged, educated, and enriched audiences exploded the (once) popular conception of rock music as disposable and indeed raised rock musicians’ and audiences’ expectations of that music as an art form. As Harrison and The Beatles treated their music ever more seriously, their audience mirrored the artists’ seriousness by becoming serious listeners. As the art became greater, the audience became greater also.

So, it would seem from the examples of Whitman and Harrison/The Beatles, artists will find ways of expressing their art with integrity and creativity despite whatever temptations or rewards the material world may/may not offer. And audiences will recognize and appreciate this.

Artvertising

Art enriches human experience. It lifts us, changes us, takes us out of ourselves. It inspires us to think more, to feel more, to live life more fully.

The above claims are true, I suspect most of us would contend, but they can also be (and often are) attacked as truisms, as platitudes, as wishful thinking.

Making money, on the other hand, is, at least in one proven way, rewarding. Money will get us things – things like cars, video games, jeans.

And things – as we are constantly told by advertising – things will make us happy.

The above claim is untrue, I suspect most of us would contend, though advertising tries relentlessly to convince us otherwise.

And this is why advertising repeatedly attaches its claim to the claims of art. By associating buying jeans with great poetry or buying cars with a great song, advertising hopes that its audience will associate (or confuse, perhaps) the rewards of art with “getting and spending,”as Wordsworth put it.

But the public outrage that greeted the use of The Beatles’ work to sell sneakers two decades ago and that greets the use of Walt Whitman’s poetry to sell jeans today must give us hope that we are about more than things.

The Tate Museum has the finest collection of the works of J. M. W. Turner in the world, and from time to time they feel the need to refresh the public with another show to keep proving that Turner deserves the “greatest British artist ever” tag. Back in 2005 this resulted in a hugely interesting show called Turner, Whistler, Monet, which looked at the interactions between the three, and it was a genuine treat. This time around it’s Turner and the Masters, a look at the painters that influenced Turner. At least that’s the intention. And everyone loves it. Well, not quite everyone—only Brian Sewellseems to give it the critical eye it deserves. The Times calls it a “Magnificent and hugely ambitious exhibition.” It’s quoted right there on the Tate website. What it turns into, however, is something completely different, something along the lines of Turner the Competitive Cockney Gnome who Tried to Outdo Everyone without Ever Having an Original Idea.

This is certainly the impression we took away from the show, although I suspect it’s not what was intended. In fact, the real impression we had was the same as the one we had after seeing the Van Gogh and Millet show at the Musee d’Orsay in Paris many years ago—isn’t it interesting that van Gogh used Millet’s pictures as the architecture for many of his own paintings? It was known for years that van Gogh admired Millet, and even included “after Millet” in some of the titles of his works. But still, it was surprising to see how much copying was involved. “They are not copies,” Van Gogh told his brother, Theo, “but translations into another language.” Well, maybe, but after wandering through several rooms at the Musee d’Orsay, you’d actually be hard pressed to say that most of them weren’t copies, even if van Gogh transformed the scene with an entirely different sense of colour and a much more aggressive brushwork.

Van Gogh was at least lavish in his praise of Millet (”Millet is father Millet…counsellor and mentor in everything for young artists”), and never denied his debt. Turner, on the other hand, comes off poorly in this show, which was probably not the intent of the organizers. Yes, Turner was a prodigious painter, and the show concentrates on a small percentage of his output. But still, nearly every painting by Turner is paired with the painting that he was modelling in one way or another, and very often they are direct copies, with the only difference being Turner’s different use of colour and, again, his distinctive brushwork. And while he knew how to compose a picture as well as anyone, there are some pictures where the perspective just doesn’t make sense. And of course, like Bonnard, he just can’t paint people, a fact usually overlooked—or just ignored.

Now, this is always interesting—no artist works in isolation, there are always influences, and much of the fun of art appreciation is figuring out what those are. The fact that Whistler and Monet were friends shouldn’t be a surprise, but it’s something you normally don’t think about. We think of artists as solitary beings, but even if that has some truth in terms of their lifestyles, it can’t be true in terms of where their art comes from. The line from Millet to van Gogh couldn’t be more direct. And it is interesting to see what Turner derived from, say, Rembrandt, or Watteau, of Cuyp, or the painter that Turner felt himself most in competition with—Claude. Turner often is a great artist. But here in London he’s not only a great artist, but the greatest of all time, it seems. One gets that impression, anyway—from the time Ruskin started trumpeting him as the greatest British artist ever, the art establishment in the UK has shown no signs of disputing this. Turner, like the Impressionists, has become an industry. Sewell, who has a reputation for not liking much of anything, has some words of praise for the show, but he also captures it about right, warts and all:

Turner belonged to a generation of artists whose work was deliberately rooted in the past, who could be measured by the comparison that revealed how much they had retained, how much rejected, and how much moved on by adding something new and of their own that might suggest that they had exceeded the successes of their mentors. Turner painted not in slavish imitation but in rivalry, and two centuries on it is easier to see where he matched Claude’s subtleties and Rembrandt’s bravura and where he failed utterly — for this is an exhibition not only of Turner’s occasional sublimities but of dogged recapitulation that is dull and failure that is ludicrous.

And that seems about right. When Turner was good, he was as good as anyone. But he often wasn’t that good—and yet somehow we’re supposed to ignore the fact that he often painted bad pictures.

The show brings up two reservations. First, if the show is representative of Turner’s output, it’s an extraordinarily derivative output, without a single new idea until very late in Turner’s career. I suspect that’s an unfair portrait of Turner—he was prolific, and this is just a sampling. But the Tate is telling us it’s an extremely important sampling, and there’s nothing in the show to tell you otherwise. Turner painted what other artists were also painting, and we’re supposed to take away that, well, he was Turner, that’s al you really need to know. It’s a bad analogy, I know, but I’ve been looking for a place to use it ever since I saw the movie Mama Mia (the biggest grossing movie of all time in the UK, amazingly enough)—my main reaction was “Who knew Abba wrote so many bad songs?” Sewell is absolutely right—there are an awful lot of bad paintings by Turner here, especially the ones on mythological subjects. And to pretend otherwise is just silly, and a bit insulting.

Second, it’s a chronological show, so you can see how Turner developed as an artist. Yes, he had many skills, but it wasn’t until he was old that he became Turner. The Turner we think about, and whose art still stuns, is the Turner who lapsed into pure light and atmosphere. And he didn’t start doing these paintings until he was an old man (or relatively one). Turner was bon in 1775. And those extraordinary maritime paintings, with the storms, and the clouds, and the spray, and the sun—the ones that really do take your breath away—those are from the 1840s. And while Turner was acknowledged as a major painter by his contemporaries even before he was painting these stunning seascapes, some explication of how Turner got to this style would have been appreciated, other than the bland comments we’re greeted with in the narrative.

Still, it’s a very interesting show, worth seeing. For one thing, it’s not often that the competitive nature of genius is acknowledged, and it’s refreshing to see it so openly acknowledged. And Turner was competitive, absolutely. And it is interesting to study the comparisons to see where Turner was successful, and where he failed. Plus there’s the bonus of seeing some exceptionally good art that doesn’t normally show up in London. The Rembrandts are at treat, for example, including The Old Mill, normally at home at The National Gallery in Washington. And Claude—well, you can see why it was that Turner targeted him as the one to beat. And there’s a small masterpiece—The White House at Chelsea, pictured just above—by Thomas Girtin, a friend of and (in the spirit of the show) competitor to Turner. Girtin died when he was quite young—in 1802, at age 27. And the show quotes Turner’s comment that “had Tom Girtin lived I should have starved.” Looking at this little gem, surrounded by dozens of larger and more grandiose pictures by Turner and others, you understand exactly what Turner meant.

I’m not sure when it started. As long as I can remember I’ve adored those silly beanie caps, especially when they’ve got working propellers. One in particular sticks out in my mind: Some years back at an antique mall I saw one that had “Fort Logan” printed on it. Fort Logan, if you’re not already aware, is a mental health facility on the Denver/Sheridan line (next to the national cemetery), which includes some group homes and whatnot.

By no means PC, but I’m still kicking myself for not buying it.

Sketchy sketchy! These came about while I was working on Mr. Sacramento (along with the accidental birth of a teen heartthrob):

This one’s name is Dakota:

The girls all swoon because he volunteers at the Cincinnati Panda Rescue on his off time. “You know,” he’ll say over a malt and a burger at the local ’50s theme restaurant, “when you flush a panda down the toilet, he doesn’t go away. He takes residence in the sewer and plots his escape, all the while remembering your face, hopefully not your name, and thinking of new questions he would ask you were he to track you down and actually resist the urge to beat you within an inch of your life with your own freshly severed leg.

“Oh, not like Skyler, though. Skyler has a playful mischief about him. All he did to avenge his flushing was steal little Johnny’s identity and run up $80,000 in gambling debts. One thing about Vegas, I guess, is that they don’t care what species you are if your tush is seated at a table with money to burn!”

Later, the lucky girl of the hour, high on stories of cute panda antics, gleefully cleanses her esophagus with Dakota’s genetic code in his convertible before they retire to his den to study for the algebra test. (And that’s all they do, because they’re saving themselves for their starter marriages.)

Now, meet their king:

Also see his cousin, Miss Chico, and her sexy, sexy sisters Miss San Leandro and Miss Tupelo.

My muse, lately, has done little more than get me consistently buzzed on marker fumes. With the job market as it is, there’s been plenty of time to devote to such a delicious distraction. Yes, the arts are thriving… at least in my mother’s basement!

I submit, for your viewing pleasure, the latest bubbling beaker in an ongoing experiment in post-9/11 psychedelia (marihuana cigarette consumption prior to viewing optional):

Meet Miss Chico!

One of the patterns in this series, which I kinda-sorta started without realizing it in the Spring, is that each of these luscious ladies represents a city whose name ends with the letter “O”.

Also see: Miss San Leandro, Miss Tupelo.

S&R, on the other hand, writes about music. About literature and poetry. About art. Education. Sports. Culture and popular culture. The Ramsey case and what it tells us about the state of media. And now that the election is over, S&R is writing about politics less than ever.

So really, what is S&R?

One response might argue that tout est politique. I’ve never been terribly comfortable with totalizing positions like this, though, because they tend to trivialize – if everything is politics, then nothing is. However, there’s no denying the fundamental truth that many things we don’t commonly associate with politics are powerfully political in their implications.

Take popular music, for instance. It’s impossible to consider the sweeping cultural and political upheavals of the 1960s without the soundtrack – Dylan, The Beatles, Woodstock…the list goes on and on. Some of those artists were quite explicitly agitating for political reform while others wove themselves into the social tapestry in less obvious ways, but the sum total of the music of that decade was inherently political.

Contrast that with the music of the Bush administration. Where was the protest, the outcry? Who was the Dylan of the 2000s? What record will we be comparing, come 2024, with Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band?

The absence of such a voice was not an accident. Part of the grand conservative plan, the blitzkrieg that was launched upon Reagan’s inauguration, was the neutering of music’s political possibility. When Ronnie’s FCC hacks, Fowler and Brenner, decreed that “the public interest is what the public is interested in,” it did so in order to subvert, once and for all, the power of the creative social mind to the will of corporate logic. It dismantled radio ownership limits that assured a massive diversity of options for artists and audiences alike, and found its ultimate expression in Clear Channel’s pro-war, pro-Bush rallies and the banishment of those who chose to give voice to their dissent (the most notable case being the attempted silencing of The Dixie Chicks).

So when our generation needed to be marching in the streets and demanding an end to the outrage in Iraq, where was the soundtrack? Who ultimately benefited from those policies way back in the early ’80s? We’re fighting an unjust invasion and occupation and the rallies in the streets are for the war?! Corporate-sponsored pro-war rallies?!

When I’m writing a TunesDay piece on some band or another, providing a video link or encouraging you to check it out at eMusic, part of what’s going on is purely and simply about the music as art. But it’s also about the bigger picture, about the need for our culture to build a strong platform whereby artists can be heard. If they use this platform to sing silly love songs, that’s fine, so long as the platform is there when they need to sing about injustice. I recently did a piece promoting The Well Wishers, Maximo Park and The Dandy Warhols, and none of these bands may ever contribute a note to the cause of world peace. On the other hand, if I flash back to 1997 and Green Day’s Nimrod, I’m not sure I could have predicted American Idiot, a manifesto so powerful that not even the soul-deadening corporate might of Clear Channel could contain it.

What political blogs do is important, especially in a society where the legacy press has largely abdicated its responsibility to watchdog our institutions of power. Who Obama selects to run the State Department matters. His choices for Treasury and Defense and our various intelligence and military leadership posts matter tremendously.

But empires rarely rise and fall as a result of a couple close-in political knife fights. In my view, a great deal of what even the best poliblogs do is tactical, street-level and near-term. This isn’t true across the board, of course. There are outstanding thinkers and writers who are looking at the big picture and the long term. And this is where I think S&R has done and will continue to do its best work. Not in the political battle, but the culture war.

We may debate some of the nuances and specifics amongst ourselves, but in general it’s safe to say that those of us here at Scholars & Rogues have a shared vision of a more progressive society. I don’t use that word in any sort of conventional, partisan sense. By “progressive” I mean more enlightened; better educated; more appreciative of the cultural arts; better informed about the forces shaping our world; more productively spiritual (and less dogmatically sectarian) in our approach to life; more generous and charitable; more tolerant and more willing to understand the value of diversity; more committed to community and the common good; more literate; more intellectually curious and prone to critical thought; more responsive to the well-reasoned than to the passionately felt; and above all, more insistent that those we choose to represent us, to lead us and to govern us be the best America has to offer, not the worst.

Some of the solutions that get us to our destination may be “liberal” by our current reckoning, some “conservative.” The best ideas may be “idealistic” or they may be “pragmatic.” But in the end, I think most of us believe that a society that reads – in an environment uncluttered by censorship, either active or passive, governmental or cultural or corporate – is in better shape than one that doesn’t read or won’t. A society whose citizens not only have knowledge in their heads, but who have been trained to use it in innovative ways is more likely to solve more problems faster and more effectively. A country that thinks and thinks relentlessly is nearly immune to the machinations of despotism. A nation whose mythologies make clear that war is the last resort, not the first, is more likely to achieve greatness both at home and abroad. A nation whose media structures are designed to foster the best that is thought and created is one whose streets are less likely to flow with the blood of aggrieved citizens. A culture where competition aims to help people up the ladder instead of keeping them in their place is one that maximizes its collective genius. A political economy where genuine opportunity arises from a level playing field is certainly more likely to produce spectacular successes than one where the reality is that of a rigged game played beneath a banner of cynical egalitarian rhetoric.

And the most actualized of all possible societies is one where happiness and satisfaction have nothing at all to do with purchasing power.

This is what I think Scholars & Rogues is. We’ve covered a lot of ground since we launched less than two years ago, and at that point I deliberately chose not to compose a mission statement. Our philosophy was simple: invite the smartest people we could find to share their thoughts and trust the power of that intellect to start great conversations, attract more great minds and build the foundation of a thriving community. With that in place, I wanted to learn what we were rather than dictating what we would be.

Some of what we write may look trivial at first, and the occasional item may even prove trivial in the final analysis. But I think we now have a good sense of what we are and why our readers keep stopping by. We hope our political writings are worthy in the coming months and (if we’re lucky) years, and we expect that our audience will grasp the deeper political mission embedded in our far-flung musings.

Meanwhile, we’ll continue to work toward a better culture, and in doing so will trust that if you enlighten the people and establish social structures that exalt the best they have to offer, the merely political will take care of itself.

When is a Work of art truly original? Put another way: when is a Work not derivative of someone else’s work?

It is hard not to be influenced by other’s work, especially when the Work is memorable, or stunning. We all become attracted to Works that speak to us deeply in Form Language. We absorb elements of those deeply-felt, deeply-held images into our minds. And often unknowingly, we regurgitate those spatial or stylistic elements into our own work, creating homages and lineages of the original. It is very hard to escape this transmission, and re-transmission, of culture.

Maddeningly, we are circumscribed to a fixed set of ideas transmitted by our Culture. Our accumulated knowledge in this space-time dictates the idea-palette to work with. We will take artistic risks often within the bounds of what has been taught to us as acceptable risk via mentors [institutional knowledge], books and schools. We can only use what is known to create Works. We are trapped in Time.

Isn’t it common knowledge, a truism, that Art’s potential is limitless? I am struck at how limited the range of expression is.

What is the list of images I can portray in Art, anyways? It is a rather fixed list: the body, the gender, the animal, the lovers, the group, the life scene (birth, sex, death), the sky, the darkness, the colour field, landscape feature, form itself, the molecular, the geometric, the symmetric, light/shadow study, and the retransfiguration of all of these (by filter, by color, by medium, by process). Ask me to create something truly new, not derivative: that is very difficult.

Why do you think categories and taxonomies exist to group Artistic works? Because they lend themselves to such designations.

At this stage in my life, I have convinced myself that I can create some signature-styled portraits, pretty damn near my own creations — but on inspection, I can usually trace other artists’ genetics in my Work, from all the ideas I have observed and read in my lifetime (vis-a-vis Derrida’s Deconstructionism). Rarely can I witness a totally new direction, a new initiative, to anything I have ever encountered.

I get excited when this happens. I say to myself: this new work is truly NOT derivative! Of course, if I had access to the entire history of creative work — all the drafts of all the works of every artist and would-be-artist who have ever lived, I might uncover the original DNA of the new work I celebrate. That would not surprise me.

We, as humans, have a fixed set of experiences. We have a fixed set of tools. We have a fixed set of colours. We have a fixed set of styles. We have a fixed set of archetypal themes. We have a fixed sensory range. We are human, and thus we are bound to repeat ourselves. Don’t think Picasso or Moore were the first Primitives. Don’t think Rodin and Michelangelo were the first Egyptians. Don’t think Manet was the first Eroticist. Don’t think that Braque was the first Cubist. Don’t think Valesquez was the first Sensualist. And so on.

There are true and utter Originals — paradigm destroyers, and they are rare. Their actual values are priceless, beyond the tens of millions of dollars that are commanded for the most popular [albeit admittedly vibrant, breathing] works. Yes, save the Picassos, but save the Originals, too! And, most importantly, celebrate the messages of the Originals, and of the Picassos, that speak to the Humanity of us — about the Humanity of us.

Where we are going. This evolutionary existential animal of progress.

Michael James Hawk is an artist who lives in Seattle. Media he currently works in include: wire figurative sculpture, organic gourd-like wire lamps, hydrocal plaster figurative sculpture, clay set-ups for bronze figurative sculpture, modal-animated poetry films, acrylic painting, and spraypaint abstract.

“I’m interested in what motivates you, and how you understand the world.” He glanced sideways at her. “Rausch tells me you’ve written about music.”

“Sixties garage bands. I started writing about them when I was still in the Curfew.”"Were they an inspiration?”

She was watching a fourteen-inch display on the Maybach’s dash, the red cursor that was the car proceeding along the green line that was Sunset. She looked up at him. “Not in any linear way, musically. They were my favorite bands. Are,” she corrected herself.

He nodded.

- William Gibson, Spook Country

I’ve always been intrigued by the curious dynamic of influence. This passage from Gibson’s latest finds the protagonist, a journalist who was formerly part of a short-lived band (of precisely the sort you’d expect to fascinate Gibson – not a huge commercial success, but possessing an intellectual depth that would assure riveted cult status for a generation or more) talking with her new employer (again, a typically Gibsonian character, intrigued by the potential to bridge the critically obscure with the commercially popular). In the exchange, we understand that Hollis (the protag) was influenced, but not in a linear (read, discernable) fashion, by music of a completely different genre than what she was producing.

I was thinking about this as I listened to Midnight Matinee, the new release from The Lost Patrol, a band that made my Best of list last year for their outstanding Launch and Landing CD. When you visit their MySpace page and scroll down to “Influences,” you get the damnedest list: Ennio Morricone, John Barry, Johnny Cash, The Cramps, Siouxsie and the Banshees, The Ventures, The Stranglers, Phil Spector, Julee Cruise, Cocteau Twins, Jesus and Mary Chain, Gary Numan, The Church, The Damned, The Chameleons, Dusty Springfield, The Cure, V.A.S.T., The Nightblooms, The Cult, The Beach Boys, Jerry Murad’s Harmonicats, A Flock of Seagulls, Dead Can Dance, Smashing Pumpkins, Sisters of Mercy, The Shadows, Al Caiola, Jack Nitzsche, Herb Alpert & The Tijuana Brass, The Verve, Jean Michel Jarre, Duane Eddy, Andy Williams, Angelo Badalamenti, Allison Krause & Union Station, Mazzy Star, Tarnation, The Catherine Wheel, The Sundays, Sigur Rós, Echo and The Bunnymen, Medieval Baebes, Aimee Mann, Miranda Sex Garden, The Shaggs, Joanna Newsom, Goldfrapp, X, Kate Bush, Lovespirals, Abby Travis and Curve.

Now, a lot of this makes sense when you listen to them. But then you get some more influences: films by David Lynch, Hal Hartley, Jim Jarmusch, Wes Andersen, Sergio Leone and John Waters.

Again, a lot of this makes sense when you consider the way in which The Lost Patrol’s music connotes landscape – wide, empty, frontier spaces at dusk, burnt oranges fading to blackest, solitary blue.

Once upon a time I thought of influence in that linear form that Hollis references – poets inspired by poets in ways that were evident upon reading. Musicians whose lineage could be tracked in quirks of phrasing. Painters whose technique never quite escaped the gravitational well of the masters they copied in their adolescence. And so on. As I learned and developed in my own right, though, I came to understand the non-linearity of influence: how one musical style could inform something new and apparently different; how certain types of influence can hide in the woodwork, only revealing themselves to those who study the hardest; and how influence can work across genres – music on poetry, painting on film, dance on sculpture, etc.

Those who have read my poetry have noted the straight-line artistic heritage: Eliot, Yeats, Thomas, Charles Wright. (Not that I’m worthy of those comparisons at all – it’s just that whatever I have done has aspired in the direction of these epic artists.) But I also like to note how important my early exposure to ancient masters like John Donne shaped my perspective – I doubt that’s as evident to most readers.

Earlier in my “career” I played with rock music influences, as well, sometimes going so far as to riff on Springsteen and Mellencamp and U2, and today my poems are frequently indebted to all kinds of musical insurgencies.

But there’s more. My writing has always been pretty impressionist. I’ve never worried about the hard narrative edges of the “stories” being told, but have instead focused on the imagistic, on the colors and vague shapes and details that were deliberately misremembered. There’s a lot of Monet and Degas in my poetry, in other words.

I was once called a “Jungian pagan” by a friend (who’s probably reading this and can identify himself if he wants to), and while I’m not 100% sure I’ve figured out what that means, there’s no denying that my writing trades heavily in the iconic, the totemic, the deeply symbolic. Jung? Sure, but also Yeats doubles back in here, and I can’t disregard the importance of Tarot in helping me think about what lies at the core of certain people, events, relationships, etc.

And what about the guy quoted at the top, William Gibson? The world I write about is frequently technological and urban, concerning itself with how my culture and my generation are being, have been, colonized by autonomous technology – that is, technology that appears to operate with its own agenda. Gibson is a core part of that, as is Bruce Sterling, and in depicting these moments I also draw on visual imagery from films like Blade Runner and the oeuvre-wide vision of directors like Tim Burton.

There’s nothing terribly profound in all this. Essentially it boils down to “influence is a highly asymmetrical, nonlinear process.” But since a novel and CD got me to thinking about my poetry, it seemed a worthy subject for a Sunday blog.

Grab a walking stick, sling on a backpack, grab a notebook, and don your pith helmet. Keri Smith and her inventive new book want you to go exploring in an effort to free your creativity.

How to be an Explorer of the World: Portable Art Life Museum challenges readers to look at the world around them with fresh eyes. “Creativity arises from our ability to see things from many different angles,” Smith writes.

In that vein, Smith’s book reads like a primer on how to capture everyday wonder.

Set up like a workbook, How to be an Explorer of the World is divided into three main parts: a how-to-use-this-book section that helps a reader discover the right mindset for exploration, a section that contains almost 60 exploration exercises, and a section for jotting down field notes.

Smith invites readers to think of the book as a “metaphorical suitcase,” a place to collect and document thoughts, ideas, and observations. “It is also your museum,” she says. “Your very own museum that will contain your unique vision of the world… You can visit your museum whenever you need ideas (or if you want to see what is floating around in your brain).”

The book appeals to both mind and hands. Smith urges readers to collect, examine, touch, consider, move, write, manipulate, listen, reflect, wander, and wonder. She starts by offering a list of 13 tips on how to be an explorer of the world, a list she came up with one night when she couldn’t sleep. “Always be looking,” she advises as her number-one guideline. “Everything is interesting. Look closer.”

But she’s quick to point out in her opening that she’s trying to create a frame of mind, not a set of immutable laws. “There are no rules, only suggestions,” she says. “Treat everything as an experiment. Start with whatever makes you feel a twinge of excitement.”

Some of the advice that follows seems obvious and commonsensical, but part of her point is that the things that are obvious to us are the things we are most apt to overlook. Readers might sometimes be half-tempted to think, “Well, duh!” but Smith’s straightforward sincerity completely disarms such thoughts. She is as earnest as a golden retriever in her encouragement and enthusiasm. The world through Smith’s eyes is an exciting place.

Smith places great emphasis on “found” things—items a person might happen to find lying around the house or in the forest or in a corner of the basement. Wonder exists all around us in everyday, mundane things.

In that spirit, her book has a homemade feel. It’s entirely hand lettered, for instance, which allows the text to wander across the page in much the same way Smith encourages readers to wander. The charm lasts for the first 60 pages or so, but after that, it does get a little tedious. When Smith includes hand-drawn graph paper in the back of the book, it’s hard not roll one’s eyes.

Fortunately, Smith packs enough cool ideas and explorations into her book that the book never gets too tedious. Smith’s own sense of wonder is far too effervescent to let that happen.

In one activity, she encourages explorers to go for a walk and indentify existing “art” found along the way—accidental art not created on purpose. “Some examples include stains on the sidewalk, spilled paint…residue, corrosion, rust, things that are damaged, random arrangements of objects that you find interesting….” In another activity, she challenges explorers to “come up with several ways of documenting the passage of time, based on where you are sitting.”

While the book’s intended audience may be visual artists and writers, teachers of all grade levels will also find this book a welcome addition to a classroom. For elementary teachers, How to be an Explorer of the World offers fun, hands-on activities applicable to a variety of disciplines, while middle- and high-school English and art teachers will find useful tools for unlocking student creativity.

But in a wider sense, anyone looking to challenge the way he or she looks at the world, anyone looking to think outside the box, and anyone looking to explore will all find How to be an Explorer of the World an invaluable source of energy and inspiration.

Happy exploring!

Last night we watched the Final Cut of Blade Runner again, and if you don’t have this package I can’t recommend it highly enough. 25 years on, Ridley Scott was able to finally re-craft the film as he wanted it originally, and the result is a stunning achievement. Scott has been one of our greatest directors for a very long time, but this may be his finest moment to date.

This viewing (probably my 35th or 40th – I lost count a long time ago) got me to thinking, all over again, about how little the film was acknowledged at the time of its release. While it was nominated for two technical Oscars (Art Direction-Set Decoration and Best Effects, Visual Effects), it’s hard to look back and argue that it got anything like the critical acclaim it deserved (a point underscored by how well respected the film is today). In addition, it didn’t do very well at the box office (it drew a little over $6M that opening weekend, and the theater I saw it in was 90% empty).

Now, though, history has reassessed Blade Runner. Roger Ebert added it to his list of greatest films after seeing the Final Cut, and our friends at Wikipedia catalog the rest:

• In 2007, the American Film Institute listed it as the 97th greatest film of all time, making it new to the list, having been left off the 1997 version. In 2008, Blade Runner was voted the sixth best science fiction film ever made as part of the AFI’s 10 Top 10.[72]
• Blade Runner is currently ranked the third best film of all time by The Screen Directory.[73]
• One of Time’s 100 All-Time best movies.[74]
• British movie magazine Empire voted it the “Best Science Fiction Film Ever” in 2007.
• In 2002, Blade Runner was voted the 8th greatest film of all time in Channel 4’s 100 Greatest Films poll.

All of which brings me back around to a favorite topic of mine: art whose greatness was not realized in its time. “In its time” is a malleable phrase, of course. With film it might mean anything from “opening weekend” to 25 years or beyond, and with other, older forms of art we could be talking about decades. For purposes of today’s ArtSunday, I’ll let you, the reader, make you own calls about this.

From where I stand, Blade Runner is the greatest example in film of a work that critics and audiences whiffed on at the time of release. It was largely ignored or panned, over time evolved into “cult status,” and was eventually validated both critically and commercially well after the fact. No other film I can think of surpasses Blade Runner in this respect.

Other genres have their own examples of greatness discovered late (or even too late), of course. The poet Gerard Manley Hopkins, now regarded as one of the greatest poets of the Victorian Era, was never published in his lifetime, for instance.

Today, then, we invite our readers to offer their favorite examples of “the Blade Runner Effect” – that is, the condition of “late greatness” by art that was not duly acclaimed in its time.

That done, I’m certain a store near you is selling the 25th anniversary box of Ridley Scott’s classic. Go grab it, and while you’re out, stop by one of your finer bookstores and pick up a copy of Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, the superb Philip K. Dick novel on which it was based.

Oh, yeah – Philip K. Dick. Speaking of artists who never really got their full due….

Some of my favorites are of course Colorado, Kentucky, Ohio, and Wyoming (”The majority of Wyomingites are uneducated, foul-mouthed cretins who look like toothless meth addicts out on parole. But those are just the Republicans who hate to pay taxes and abide by federal regulations”).

When it comes to art, part of me has never fully grokked the photorealists. I mean, in an age before photography, sure, but these days if you want photorealism wouldn’t you prefer, you know, photos?

Then there’s the other part of me, the part that’s always cognizant of Keats:

‘Beauty is truth, truth beauty,—that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.’

The truth is that what some of these artists are capable of is nothing short of remarkable. Their technique is necessarily flawless and the best of them can infuse a subject, by design, with a greater degree of character, gravity, even intent than a photographer, who is more or less constrained by what’s in front of the camera.

There, that ought to get an argument or two started.

But I haven’t come here today to debate photorealism. Instead, I have come to praise it, and more specifically, to say some nice things about a Denver artist I just discovered this past week: Jerry Van. Jerry’s galleries cover his work with florals, landscapes, wildlife and people. While he’s done some wonderful work in all four categories, his flowers are especially striking. Like “Croton,” which fairly explodes off the canvas.

I was also immediately drawn to “Stripes,” perhaps because of the stark foreground contrast, but more likely because there’s something so very compelling about the expression of the zebra closest to us. “Soulful” is a little too easy a word. Instead, there’s a weariness that invites empathy, expanding the emotional depth of what seems at first glance like a fairly straightforward picture.

Maybe that’s just me – by all means, surf his galleries and draw your own conclusions.

In any case, photorealism is a challenging genre that’s capable of tremendous beauty, drama and intellectual depth. May be your thing, may not. But I imagine having one of Jerry’s paintings hanging in your living room makes it a more vibrant and interesting place to sit, relax, and reflect.

Jerry Van is a working artist, so if you see something you like in the store it can be had. Also, if you’re a Denver area resident and you’re interested in Jerry’s work, he’s offering a 25% Parade of Homes discount on all of his original works through August. This discount isn’t available through the online store, so if you’d like to take advantage of it hit the Contact tab at the top of the page and I can put you in touch with him.

So, in completely unrelated news, they’re testing the Hadron Collider this weekend.

Our economy has demonstrated remarkable resilience.

— President Bush at a press conference; July 16.

We’re spending like a drunken sailor.

— Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., predicting the federal budget deficit would double this year; according to Manu Raju of The Hill newspaper, the Congressional Budget Office has estimated that, for the first nine months of fiscal 2008, the government ran up a $268 billion deficit, $148 billion more the same period last year; July 17.

The government of my country snubs honest simplicity, but fondles artistic villainy, and I think I might have developed into a very capable pickpocket if I had remained in the public service a year or two.

— Mark Twain, in “Roughing It,” published in 1886.

Our results, frankly, reflect all the difficulties weighing on the media sector … but we have been in down cycles before and know how to manage through them.

— Craig Dubow, Gannett Co. chairman and chief executive, after Gannett reported that second-quarter profits were down 36 percent from a year ago; revenue fell 10 percent, shares were off 7 percent and USA Today advertising sales dropped 17 percent; July 17; emphasis added.

[The loss reflects] a weakening economy and a continued challenging business environment in the publishing division.

— Marshall Morton, president and chief executive of Media General, owner of 22 dailies and 275 weeklies and other publications, on its second-quarter loss of $129,000 vs. a $5.2 million profit a year ago; its newspaper ad revenues fell 17 percent; July 17; emphasis added.

Unprecedented fuel prices have created a real crisis in the airline industry, and Delta has been a leader in responding with quick, decisive action.

— Edward Bastian, president and chief financial officer of Delta Air Lines, following the announcement that Delta posted a $1 billion loss in the second quarter because of high fuel costs; Delta said it will reduce flights and cut about 4,000 jobs this year; July 17; emphasis added.

My co-workers are doing a great job working through the significant challenges facing our industry. We will continue to work together to react to the market and maintain our focus on providing quality service to customers.

— Larry Kellner, Continental Airlines’ chairman and chief executive officer, after Continental reported a second-quarter loss of $3 billion; Continental plans to reduce domestic flights, retire 67 aircraft and cut 3,000 jobs; July 17.

It seems to me that other financial institutions not accepting these checks is only furthering the panic. Sure, IndyMac will give you a check, but what good is it if no other institution will accept it?

— Sheryl MacPhee, 46, of South Pasadena, Calif., who tried to deposit a check from an IndyMac branch in another bank only to be told she could not have access those funds for up to eight weeks; regulators from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. have taken over the ailing bank; July 16.

My hope is that people take a deep breath and realize that their deposits are protected by our government.

— President Bush, at an unscheduled press conference, reminding Americans that the federal government insured their deposits up to $100,000; July 17.

It affects everybody, and you need not be a home owner, or have credit or be a consumer. People are getting used to a new terminology; they know all sorts of credit-crunch-related terms. Money can be made now, but generally it’s a hugely unfortunate economic time. There’s a lot of talk about how bad it is.

— Martin Slaney, head of derivatives at GFT Global Markets in London, discussing the global economic slowdown; July 17.

You see a consensus developing that the current system is unsustainable. But actually saying what has to happen next is a little bit scary if you’re in a campaign, especially if some of your most prominent supporters have such deep ties to these entities.

— David C. John, a senior research fellow at the conservative Heritage Foundation, discussing the rumors of insolvency regarding Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae and the virtual silence about them from presidential candidates John McCain and Barack Obama; July 17.

The business was going nowhere, so the only thing I could fund the business with was more credit cards. I just started panicking.

— Jeremy Riney, describing how he started Music America Records in Los Angeles by financing his business with personal credit cards until he owed about $100,000; The Washington Post’s Simone Baribeau reports that “[s]mall businesses will charge 2 1/2 times more this year than they did in 2002, when credit card charges ran about $140 billion”; July 4.

Blindsided, distraught, disrespected. All those adjectives. I definitely feel insulted. … I didn’t realize my salary was that much compared to everyone else’s. They basically dumped mine and got nothing in return.

— former Denver Nuggets center Marcus Camby after being traded to the Los Angeles Clippers; Mr. Camby will earn a base salary of $8 million and could make as much as $11.7 million if he hits all his incentive bonuses; July 16.

A lot of the busy guys used to brag that they had patients waiting six months or a year. Granted, I thought it was exaggerated for their own p.r., but now you almost never hear that. Now you hear a month or two.

— Dr. Michael A. C. Kane, a plastic surgeon in Manhattan, about complaints from plastic surgeons that the economic downturn is affecting their business; June 16.

These United States are confronted with an economic affliction of great proportions. We suffer from the longest and one of the worst sustained inflations in our national history. It distorts our economic decisions, penalizes thrift, and crushes the struggling young and the fixed-income elderly alike. It threatens to shatter the lives of millions of our people. Idle industries have cast workers into unemployment, human misery and personal indignity. … In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.

— from the first inaugural address by President Ronald Reagan; Jan. 20, 1981.

When we work on tough issues in the U.S. system, which is the best system in the world, it takes a while. There’s never unanimity, but I am feeling very good.

— Treasury secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. about his plan for the federal government to rescue the nation’s two largest mortgage finance companies, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac; July 17.

The economy has continued to expand, but at a subdued pace.

— Ben Bernanke, chairman of the Federal Reserve, in testimony before the Senate Banking Committee in which he did not utter the word “recession”; July 17.

Those will do more than any $300 you might send out to the taxpayers.

— Sen. Johnny Isakson, R-Ga., criticizing Democrats’ plan to provide more consumer incentives and agreeing with the White House position that adopting legislation to limit home foreclosures and expanding domestic production of oil would to more to stimulate the economy; July 16.

It’s just amazing. It’s irresponsible. This guy does not have any love or care for the sport. The unfortunate is that we are learning that things that look too good to be true are too good to be true.

— British cyclist David Millar after Italian rider Riccardo Riccò became the third rider in the Tour de France to test positive for the performance enhancer EPO; July 17.

We’re absolutely stunned by what is happening and by the behavior of one of our riders. He seems to have secretly used banned substances, hiding everything from everybody else in the team.

— from a statement by Caudio Corti, manager of the Barloworld team, denying knowledge of drug use by one of his Tour de France riders, Moises Duenas Nevado of Spain; July 17; emphasis added.

[Police found] numerous small medical materials like syringes, needles, and medical drip bags which theoretically a cyclist should not have in his room.

— Gerard Aldige, the state prosecutor in Tarbes, France, discussing what was found in Duenas Nevado’s hotel room; July 17.

As our society becomes more fragmented, more bombarded with images, more numbed to feeling, more restless and impatient, what the artist has to offer becomes more and more essential to the health of the community. In a sense, there are three basic artistic strategies which fulfill this function. One is to make art which states the problems or wounds of society; which makes people aware of the underpinnings of the society and wakes them up to act or make changes in their lives or in their communities. The second is to make art which offers an alternative; that demonstrates human behavior which becomes a paradigm for what creativity, cooperation, freedom and playfulness could be. The third is to make art which in itself provides glimpses of a larger consciousness or reflects upon the inexplicable. Some artists mirror the time in which they live. Others convey in their work a sense of timelessness and continuity. That we have this variety of approaches is healthy and meaningful.

— from a speech titled “Some Thoughts About Art, America
And Jumping Off The Cliff” by Meredith Monk, an American composer, delivered in April 1990.

I leave with the belief that this eclipse of the soul will soon pass and with it the lunacy that sees artists as enemies and ideas as demons.

— from a speech at the National Press Club by John Frohnmayer after being deposed in February 1992 as chair of the National Endowment for the Arts by President George H.W. Bush; Republican challenger Patrick J. Buchanan had threatened to make a campaign issue out of President Bush’s support for the then-controversial NEA and Mr. Frohmayer’s leadership.

This is to ensure that we have flexible funds to devote to both building our collections and undertake targeted strategic initiatives where we feel we can really make a difference.

— James Woods, chief executive of the J. Paul Getty Trust in Los Angeles, announcing the trust would cut 114 jobs so it could free resources to spend on its visual-arts programs; May 14.

A cat can draw
the blinds
behind her eyes
whenever she
decides. Nothing
alters in the stare
itself but she’s
not there. Likewise
a future can occlude:
still sitting there,
doing nothing rude.

— from “A cat/a future” by Kay Ryan, chosen to be the nation’s 16th poet laureate by the Librarian of Congress; July 17.

photo credits:

• credit cards: Ilya Genkin, Istockphoto.com
• Italian cyclist Ricardo Riccò: Nicholas Bouvy, European Pressphoto Agency

Quotabull is a weekly feature of Scholars & Rogues.

A few weeks ago we showed you a painting by Miro and posed the question: is this art? The consensus opinion seemed to be that sure, I guess it’s art, although I wouldn’t pay a penny for it.

Today we look at digitally generated images and ask the same question. Specifically, have a look at Electric Sheep, my cool new screen saver program. According to the Web site:

Electric Sheep is a free, open source screen saver created by Scott Draves. It’s run by thousands of people all over the world, and can be installed on any ordinary PC or Mac. When these computers “sleep”, the screen saver comes on and the computers communicate with each other by the internet to share the work of creating morphing abstract animations known as “sheep”. The result is a collective “android dream”, an homage to Philip K. Dick’s novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?

Here’s a nice sequence to consider:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Obviously this isn’t art in any traditional sense. It’s about as much math as art, arguably, and the creator doesn’t seem to be making any claims to artistic merit. Still, it’s hard to view the output of Electric Sheep – either the moving sequences or static shots – without the art question asserting itself. We’d need to consider the images against abstract art, of course, and I can’t personally fathom a critical standard that would allow Miro or Pollack while excluding Electric Sheep. For instance, how could we argue for this:

Or this:

Or this:

But against this:

You can’t do so on grounds of form since abstraction rejects form.

You can’t do so on grounds of requisite human agency for a couple reasons. First, Electric Sheep is the result of human agents, albeit ones working with computers rather than physical media. Think of their tools as really, really complex brushes. And second, doesn’t every major critical theory since Structuralism already reject the very existence of the subject, period? If you’re what Susan Sontag refers to as “pre-theoretical,” I guess you might be able to mount an argument, but that group doesn’t include a lot of “serious” critics, does it?

Could you argue that it isn’t art since it doesn’t intend to be art? Well, in a world where there’s no subject there’s likewise no intent, right? Even if you, like me, reject the whole “death of the subject” canard, which would allow you to privilege the creator’s intent, there remains a fact that all good artists know about firsthand: sometimes we create more than we intend.

The old “is it art?” debate has always been a trap, I suppose. And if it hasn’t always been so, it’s certainly been that way since the onset of Modernism. But if I’m offering you a sucker play here, it’s only to make a point, and one that’s probably obvious enough to those of you who have read this far. To wit: as technology has expanded what it is possible to do and how it is possible to do, as we have evolved not only productive capabilities but also consumptive capabilities, the boundaries of the artistic have expanded dramatically.

There’s a purist in me that still enjoys bitching about boundaries and criteria, but the observer of public life in me, living here in our capitalist consumerist culture gone mad, is keenly aware of how little we seem to care about the arts and humanistic education anymore.

In this context, perhaps I’m willing to revel in the innovative, the compelling, and the simply beautiful wherever I can find it. Which is why I have my screen saver set to launch after a mere five minutes of activity.

Happy Sunday…

One of my main interests is how we know what we know about the Civil War. My fascination in the topic stems not only from my work doing public history on the front lines at the battlefields in Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville but also from a public relations perspective. “The Lost Cause,” as a concept, was a basically huge public relations campaign to influence the way Americans remembered the war—or, as Robert E. Lee said, “to transmit, if possible the truth to posterity, and do justice to our brave soldiers.”

In that context, Gary Gallagher’s Causes Won, Lost, and Forgotten: How Hollywood & Popular Art Shape What We Know About the Civil War proved to be a fascinating and fun book to read.

Gallagher looks at four traditions of Civil War “memory”—in other words, the way we remember the war. The Lost Cause is one such tradition (the South fought valiantly against overwhelming numbers but couldn’t triumph over the invading hordes and their superior supplies of material; Lee and Stonewall are marbleized, God-like beings; James Longstreet is a boob because he single-handedly lost the battle of Gettysburg, etc.)

Another tradition is one Gallagher refers to at the Union Cause: The main reason for going to war in the first place was to preserve the Union. A third cause is called the Emancipation Cause: The war was really all about freeing the slaves, and the moral purpose that provided gave true meaning to the war. Finally, there’s the Reconciliation Cause: Basically, let’s forget all about all that fighting and concentrate on the mutual honor, bravery, and sacrifice that soldiers made on both sides.

Gallagher looks at the way movies and paintings have shaped—and been shaped by—public perception about the war.

The most dramatic example, perhaps, is Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain. Chamberlain led the 20th Maine Infantry regiment in a desperate battle on Little Round Top on day two of the battle of Gettysburg, and episode given considerable attention in Gettysburg. Ken Burns also gave Chamberlain a lot of attention in his documentary. Prior to those media events, Chamberlain never appeared in any Civil War-related media, yet he has since become a cottage industry. Chamberlain appears in more modern paintings than Grant, Sherman, Sheridan, Meade, and Reynolds combined (Reynolds gets a lot of attention because of his martyrdom in the movie).

Gallagher’s book, scholarly in nature but nonetheless quite readable, has fun offering critiques of various movies, from Birth of a Nation and Gone with the Wind that celebrate the Lost Cause to Glory, which promotes the Emancipation Cause. He pulls some great flicks out to critique, and even for people who’ve not seen them, Gallagher provides enough context to effectively make his point.

He also looks at the boom in Civil War art over the past two decades and compares the content of paintings to the art boom that happened after the war. The Lost Cause easily dominates the art world (Chamberlain and Gettysburg not withstanding), and Gallagher provides plenty of examples and explanations.

What’s especially interesting is the way the Union Cause has been forgotten. It is, Gallagher says the real lost cause. Preserving the Union was the single motivating force Lincoln expressed at the war’s beginning, and it was the overwhelming reason Northern soldiers joined up. In fact, when Emancipation became an issue, many Northern soldiers expressed open hostility to the idea. Lincoln, says Gallagher, would be befuddled that the notion of Union has completely fallen off the radar screen as far as modern audiences are concerned.

The Lost Cause, which probably has the single greatest impact on how American’s perceive the war, has fallen out of public favor in Hollywood, says Gallagher. Gettysburg and Gods and Generals were both Lost Cause slanted, but critics savaged the latter film (perhaps because it was just awful, though, not necessarily just because of the political slant it takes). Yet those movies also reflect pretty clearly the modern American view of the war, just as they’ve also had their own influence on that view of the war.

Is Gallagher’s book something the average Johnny Reb or Billy Yank off the street is going to want to pick up? Probably not. But anyone interested in how we know what we know—how society shapes our collective memory, heritage, and history—will certainly appreciate Gallagher’s critical view of the silver screen and canvas.