Back in my day, you had to suffer before you were given any acceptance *shakes cane*
ANTI-ART SCHOOL AT ART SCHOOL?????? And not just any art school, but my alumnus.
*brain explodes*
Massart is suddenly getting way too cool...I cannot imagine what it would be like going to Art School these days, with circus, acrobatics, burlesque, hooping, iron pour fire spinning, marching band chaos, and Dr. Sketchy's all as ACCEPTABLE, local creative opportunities out there...Emilie Autumn up on stage at The Armory, with fire hooping, fire eating corseted pirates...Amanda Palmer at the Pops...come on, even JK Rowling, Twilight, etc...
This has been on my mind a lot lately, especially after the Emilie Autumn show.
a) Are the institutional art professors just as set in their ways as they were then, giving an in-school experience similar to the one I received, regardless of the wildness around town?
b) If you are 13, 17, 19, 21, in the midst of all of these things, how much has all this affected your creative growth and inspirations and creations and future trajectory?
c) What do those a decade or more younger than my peers get from all of this that we missed?
Conversely:
d) What did my age group experience that the younger age group missed out on? (Dot com boom and bust, Manray, D&D/Cyberpunk, the 90s fetish scene, FF/Ooze/4, Grand Opening/Kim Airs and the sex-positive counterculture she promoted, Cynthia Von Buhler in Boston, and the beginnings of all of the current movements started by folks in my age group and older)
e) How did being around at the beginning of these things, watching and creating new things which evolved and snowballed into far-reaching subcultures, within much smaller incubators, affect our own growth, creations and futures?
f) What do you do when what you build (with sweat, tears, love) and was once cutting edge, and is now passe -- has all been seen and done before (by armies now of hundreds or thousands worldwide)? Do you stick it out and build yourself an niche empire, or do you keep tinkering and fiddling and creating something new?
I think about this a lot lately. I do not have an answer, it is just a series of curiosities and ponderings.
Back in my day, Geekdom and Weirdness were not cool, but it was a part of who we were, and we embraced it. We found other like-minded geeks & weirdos, and some became billionaires, making geekdom cool, or famous, making weirdness sexy. Now there is a new generation of geeks and weirdos -- are they still left out of the mainstream like we were, or is it hip to be square?
Or am I just looking at this from the inside out, and really -- these younger ones are going to look back in 15 years with the same concerns and questions? Are we all doomed to a "been there, done that" jaded view as we get older, or is there some secret key to keeping inspiration at 18-y.o. passionate I'm not quite seeing?
I think I'm going to have to go to the Dr. Sketchy's at the Pozen center. I cannot keep away. But damn does it snap and pop my synapses in a way that dressing up like a Zombie for a Gothic Bellydance Hafla could never do*...it just does not compute with my experience in the Illustration department. Without that kind of experience (which creator Molly Crabapple also went through), Dr. Sketchy's would not have existed. The subversive is coming home to kick the establishment in its bitter babyboomer balls...just like Shepard Fairey at the ICA...it...my...brain...HURTS.
I never agreed that suffering for your art WAS a necessity, but that was exactly the lesson that was hammered home at me while I was there, regardless of how hard I fought back about it. I didn't win any approval until after I pretty much broke down and rebuilt (my art improved, sure, but the rest of me took years to recover). Everything I and my classmates fought for as legit and awesome were shot down back then as a waste of time, and now? All of it is legit and cool and acceptable...(or is it...?)
I am glad that weirdness seems cool against though...for awhile there, it was pretty grim. Even around RISD, things were looking fairly khaki a few years back. But now the Gap in Central Sq. is gone, and the economy is slowly tanking some yuppie upstart shops in Harvard Sq. as well. Thrift store chic is back. Bring it on.
Its funny though...I have another post about related stuff waiting to come out at some point, when I can articulate it. Regarding art reacting to the world reacting to art, and where my own creative trajectory is headed next...but I'm still in transition with that stuff, waiting to find the time to sort it all out.
*If you had told 18-yo me I'd be a zombie in a gothic bellydance show, I'd have believed you, it would have been right in keeping with life back then. If you had told me Massart would have Dr. Sketchy's Anti-Art School Burlesque Life Drawing as a special event...nope. Not in a million zillion years. Annie Sprinkle's abstract boob art classes, yes maybe...
*brain explodes*
Massart is suddenly getting way too cool...I cannot imagine what it would be like going to Art School these days, with circus, acrobatics, burlesque, hooping, iron pour fire spinning, marching band chaos, and Dr. Sketchy's all as ACCEPTABLE, local creative opportunities out there...Emilie Autumn up on stage at The Armory, with fire hooping, fire eating corseted pirates...Amanda Palmer at the Pops...come on, even JK Rowling, Twilight, etc...
This has been on my mind a lot lately, especially after the Emilie Autumn show.
a) Are the institutional art professors just as set in their ways as they were then, giving an in-school experience similar to the one I received, regardless of the wildness around town?
b) If you are 13, 17, 19, 21, in the midst of all of these things, how much has all this affected your creative growth and inspirations and creations and future trajectory?
c) What do those a decade or more younger than my peers get from all of this that we missed?
Conversely:
d) What did my age group experience that the younger age group missed out on? (Dot com boom and bust, Manray, D&D/Cyberpunk, the 90s fetish scene, FF/Ooze/4, Grand Opening/Kim Airs and the sex-positive counterculture she promoted, Cynthia Von Buhler in Boston, and the beginnings of all of the current movements started by folks in my age group and older)
e) How did being around at the beginning of these things, watching and creating new things which evolved and snowballed into far-reaching subcultures, within much smaller incubators, affect our own growth, creations and futures?
f) What do you do when what you build (with sweat, tears, love) and was once cutting edge, and is now passe -- has all been seen and done before (by armies now of hundreds or thousands worldwide)? Do you stick it out and build yourself an niche empire, or do you keep tinkering and fiddling and creating something new?
I think about this a lot lately. I do not have an answer, it is just a series of curiosities and ponderings.
Back in my day, Geekdom and Weirdness were not cool, but it was a part of who we were, and we embraced it. We found other like-minded geeks & weirdos, and some became billionaires, making geekdom cool, or famous, making weirdness sexy. Now there is a new generation of geeks and weirdos -- are they still left out of the mainstream like we were, or is it hip to be square?
Or am I just looking at this from the inside out, and really -- these younger ones are going to look back in 15 years with the same concerns and questions? Are we all doomed to a "been there, done that" jaded view as we get older, or is there some secret key to keeping inspiration at 18-y.o. passionate I'm not quite seeing?
I think I'm going to have to go to the Dr. Sketchy's at the Pozen center. I cannot keep away. But damn does it snap and pop my synapses in a way that dressing up like a Zombie for a Gothic Bellydance Hafla could never do*...it just does not compute with my experience in the Illustration department. Without that kind of experience (which creator Molly Crabapple also went through), Dr. Sketchy's would not have existed. The subversive is coming home to kick the establishment in its bitter babyboomer balls...just like Shepard Fairey at the ICA...it...my...brain...HURTS.
I never agreed that suffering for your art WAS a necessity, but that was exactly the lesson that was hammered home at me while I was there, regardless of how hard I fought back about it. I didn't win any approval until after I pretty much broke down and rebuilt (my art improved, sure, but the rest of me took years to recover). Everything I and my classmates fought for as legit and awesome were shot down back then as a waste of time, and now? All of it is legit and cool and acceptable...(or is it...?)
I am glad that weirdness seems cool against though...for awhile there, it was pretty grim. Even around RISD, things were looking fairly khaki a few years back. But now the Gap in Central Sq. is gone, and the economy is slowly tanking some yuppie upstart shops in Harvard Sq. as well. Thrift store chic is back. Bring it on.
Its funny though...I have another post about related stuff waiting to come out at some point, when I can articulate it. Regarding art reacting to the world reacting to art, and where my own creative trajectory is headed next...but I'm still in transition with that stuff, waiting to find the time to sort it all out.
*If you had told 18-yo me I'd be a zombie in a gothic bellydance show, I'd have believed you, it would have been right in keeping with life back then. If you had told me Massart would have Dr. Sketchy's Anti-Art School Burlesque Life Drawing as a special event...nope. Not in a million zillion years. Annie Sprinkle's abstract boob art classes, yes maybe...