0050
Ideally, there shouldn't be any conditions for making art.
Having
conditions can also be seen as making excuses. In music, I never make
an excuse: I just come up with ideas and I pursue them to see if they
are viable. I don't say to myself, "Well, if somebody will listen to
what I'm doing then I'll make more music." Ironically, I seem to be
saying to myself, "If somebody bought my artwork then I'll make more
artwork."
I've come to the realization
that while I have the desire to make art, the effort required doesn't
always have a satisfying payoff. All I would do is take a photograph of
it, document it, and then put it somewhere on the internet, share it out
on social media for perhaps a few hits and Likes, then put it in the
archive. I prefer to spend my time on music because there's no effort
involved and it doesn't make any objects, and I don't have to make
excuses for it, such as "If somebody will listen to it then I'll make
some more music." It is an autotelic activity, done purely for
intrinsic rewards. It's a way towards a more meaningful life.
Art-making
shouldn't involve excuses. If you have excuses, then you have to ask
yourself why it is that you're making excuses. If it's easier to do
nothing, then do nothing. Think about why you have a desire but never
act on it, or keep having the desire in second thoughts.
There's an interesting passage in Paul Bloom's book The Sweet Spot on the negotiation of effort versus rewards:
[There] is a theory of why
effort is often, unpleasant. The phenomenology of getting tired doesn't
reflect a diminishing resource, rather, it is about growing opportunity
cost. This feeling of difficulty is a signal that there are better
things to do elsewhere. This theory has the promise of explaining why
only some activities wear us out. Looking out the window doesn’t feel
effortful because this mental activity doesn’t soak up capacities that
you could be using for other things; there are no opportunity costs.
Listening to classical music doesn’t exhaust me because I can do it
while I check my email. Compare this with moving boxes or adding numbers
in your head. These are tiring, because they take you away from other
activities, and so they claw away at you. The fatigue of effort is a
neural reflection of FOMO.
Lots of
artists are now making mostly digital art and trying to sell them as
NFTs, as the real intention seems to be mostly wealth and popularity as
opposed to aesthetics. Art shouldn't take too long as "there are better
things to do elsewhere." I always look to art legends like Jasper Johns,
or any elderly artist or composer continuing to make art into their
80s, 90s, or even 100s. (Elliot Carter was still composing and doing at
103).
But even if you're making digital art
that takes a few minutes or hours to make, and it pushes you along,
perhaps while you're trying to be an art celebrity you'll move on to
make some art that takes days or months or years.
Recently, I watched the the documentary The Lost Leonardo.
(I still don't think it's a Leonardo, and I have different reasons for
that), but the point is is that things can redound to excessive politics.
Once the groupthink sets in then it's more difficult to determine the
provenance from a purely historical standpoint--not just to appraise it.
That's what the NFT world is essentially. The Blockchain is the only
provenance that matters. So in 500 years that entry will still be there
(maybe), and it won't be tampered with (maybe). But if the master file
is missing, and all you have is a thumbnail, Christie's probably would
still auction it because of the mystery and the money.
"The
emergence of NFTs brought the financialization of art to a climax. NFTs
exist only in theory. An NFT is not a material entity. It comes into
being through a financial transaction, in which the purchaser acquires
ownership rights to a digital image otherwise available to anyone with
an Internet connection. Anyone can view the artwork, but only the buyer
of the NFT can own it. The pleasure of ownership is now an aesthetic experience. The
blue-chip auction houses fell over themselves in their rush to validate
digital art NFTs: these days money talks and walks (and runs) too. An
artwork’s total lack of physical existence is evidently no obstacle to
its acquisition of financial value." https://quillette.com/2022/03/09/against-de-materialization-tom-wolfe-in-the-age-of-nfts/
So why make anything, especially if it takes days or weeks of work? Why not just copyright a color?
The NFT world operates on the condition of
being overblown. Perhaps it's fun and exciting for some people, so they
don't have to be pushed to make something. That's a good thing overall,
but can you make something with the same motivation just for the sake of
itself and for yourself?
