How important is art in your life? Is it frosting on a math
or science cupcake, as it is for those who cut the funding for arts in the
schools? Perhaps your definition includes art as entertainment---or art therapy
or cathartic self-expression? Or maybe you only look at the jewels of the past
in museums or contrarily the avante garde is more valid. It can be these things,
but it begs the question what is art for in your life, how does it function
personally.
Living in Europe, Mexico and Asia I have developed a keen
interest in how art functions in society. And what I have come to understand is
that art defines our relationship to
reality, both personally and collectively. The definition of reality is the state of things as they actually
exist, rather than how they might appear or might be imagined. Art can function
in society to help bridge the disconnect which we witness on our planet which
has led to the unsustainability of our current use of resources. Art, however,
does not function as a problem solver, but more as an initiation into a kind of
living that honors the mysteries of life.
Artist have in the past and are at this moment creating
literature, music, theater, dance and screen plays that reflect the most
intimate and important decisions and quandaries of our lives. Artists are not
particularly understood and therefore not supported in our culture, yet they
are out on the edge of realty for us all. But,
can someone else interface with your reality? If you are on default mode,
then yes---just as someone can make your political decisions.
This does not mean that you have to produce works of art, but
unless you are somehow in the dialogue within yourself, with your time and the
great mystery of living then reality has been defined by others and is not
connected to who you are. Open Studios is a great opportunity to talk your
community of artist to see if their process in anyway reflects your personal
concerns and passions. Just finishing Open Studios, I have to say, there were
few conversations with non-artist that asked for my accountability as frontier
sentinel of our collective reality.
When I did Ex Voto
projects with the children of migrant workers, a kind of Retablo Art, those
little kids told and illustrated powerfully moving stories of miracles in their
lives. These children brought up in poverty on the fringes of society were
still heirs to a rich culture that supported the important changes in life.
They had more understanding and comfort with life and death than most adults in
our society could express. I am not saying that they were right or wrong in
what they believed, but their culture expressions supported and made sense of
their daily changing reality in terms of the big questions.
It is paradoxical that we have become separate from life and
the great mystery of life at the same time
we have become a force as powerful as nature---as
powerful as colliding with another celestial body or a change in the tilt of
our axis. We are capable of threaten the balance of life here, and yet we do
not understand our place. If you have not experienced living in a society where
art functions as an investigation for living, it is difficult to relate to the
true value of art participation.
It is believed traditionally in Japan, how you do one thing
is how you do everything. In other words how conscious you are shows up in
everything that you do and thus requires a concentrated practice. Japan is a
culture, until most recent decades, where everyone oriented their life through
some form of art, even criminals. It could be calligraphy, archery, tea
ceremony, flower arrangement or something in the arts or martial arts, all of
which demands mind/body integration and practice for living life.
In a cross-cultural exchange with students at an art college
in Kyoto, I was at a loss to help them access content of Western art in a
meaningful way. One of the greatest single most realizations I made living in
Japan was how materialistic I was, even though I was not a consumer or
collector. We all are much so than we realize. Modern art in the West reeks of
commodity. I wished that I would have had the book at that time by James Elkins, Why Art Cannot Be Taught.
Elkins, an art professor, claims aside from technique that you really cannot
teach art. Although I have to agree with his conclusion my stance is the
opposite in that I believe that we need to find ways to offer creative process
to people who have no yet been taught to think like artist. Through cross-cultural
reflection I begin to re-define the function of art in my life and to think
about how to make it available for others.
Peter London in No More Secondhand Art states simply
that if art is in the service of transforming the individual and society, it
would serve in these ways:
1. Renewing and reaffirming the covenants between
humankind and nature and between man and Source
2.
Grappling
with the ephemeral qualities of life and with our own mortality
3.
Marking
significant times, places, and events
4.
Celebrating
the gifts of life
5.
Fulfilling
individual potentialities and collective possibilities
6.
Discovering
the actual range of human possibilities
7.
Awakening
us to higher levels of consciousness
Maybe it is about time to make a place for art participation
in your life not for making products but explore rewarding meaning making
process through venturing through our inner landscape. Majio
