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The Value of a Title (It's Not A Hobby, It's A Life.)
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qamar posted recently on Creativity and Education, as a followup to a 20-minute talk by an academic from TED (which stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design.)She opened with "All children are born artists. We don't grow into creativity, we're educated out of it." Which prompted a response by
morgan303 in the comments and on her own journal - the full contents of which are behind the cut:A wonderful friend of mine posted something very cool, but while I thought the crux of what she was getting at was one of those excellent things that the world should sit up and take notice of, I took issue with a single statement: "All children are born artists."
And I got that flash of something between anger and resignation that I get every time I hear that word abused.
It's a word that's thrown about like confetti these days and it makes me furious. And it's so deeply-ingrained in our culture now that everyone does it.
You draw furry porn? You're an artist. You have a DeviantArt account? You're an artist. You draw a bit as a hobby? You're an artist. You did some night classes in still-life? You're an artist.
Wrong.
You have a nice little hobby. An artist is someone who dedicates their life to their craft or who, at the very least has put enough study into it that they can say they are honestly educated (self or otherwise) enough to stand up and give themselves the title.
I do my tax every year; that doesn't make me an accountant. I cook dinner for me and
patchworkkid; that doesn't make me a chef. There is nothing in the least wrong, in fact there is everything right, with practicing art as a hobby. I'd encourage absolutely everyone to exercise their creativity to the utmost in a multitude of different ways. I spent a couple of very good years teaching drawing to people who'd never held a pencil. But it doesn't make you an artist.
I have made so many sacrifices for my profession. I scrape by to pay the rent, I spent most of my teenage years being ridiculed and even forbidden from following my career by one of my parents, I gave up a promising career as a classical singer, I spent years at uni soaking up as much information as I could and honing my skills, and most of my spare time practicing. I don't clock off at 5pm, I don't stop thinking about it and I struggle constantly to make something I think is worthy. So I really resent anyone who thinks they might like to have a little dabble being labelled an artist. It's a term that suffers so much abuse from both sides; either it's applied to hobbyists, or it's used to excuse or describe sets of negative behaviour ("artistic temperament" anyone?). You don't get this in "regular" professions; they're not cheapened like this.
When I say I'm an artist I do so with trepidation and a frisson of hesitant pride, because in doing so I apply to myself a title also held by some of the very greatest minds and talents in the history of humanity, and a collection of thoroughly extraordinary people - Duchamp, Barney, Burne-Jones, Vali Myers, Pollock, Malevich, Alma-Tadema, Da Vinci, and all the other names on that beautiful roll-call.
Thanks to the current usage of the word I'm also placing myself alongside any schmuck with a pencil and an internet connection. This also applies to writers, photographers, or pretty much anyone else working in the creative arts. Sure, it's muddy territory, it's subjective, poorly-defined, open to interpretation, and no-one in thousands of years of human history has yet managed to come up with an answer to the question "What is Art?" (it's up there with that other big one, "Is there a God?" and I can't help but suspect the two are inextricably linked).
But these are a collection of the most important professions we have. These are the people who make the culture that has defined civilisations. You don't have to have changed the world to qualify for the title, but at the very least you should have dedicated as much of your life to it as anyone else working in a professional field. It's bad enough that we barely get paid; having any dabbler claim the title you've paid for in blood, sweat and tears (literally on all counts in my case) is infuriating.
The word 'artist' (like the word 'hero' and a great many other things) has no currency any more, and we're poorer as a culture for that lack of respect. I don't say that because of how I make a living, I say it because it's obvious enough that I can draw you a flow chart on the subject.
A world in which nothing is respected means nothing is taboo.
A world in which nothing is taboo means it's a world in which nothing is sacred.
Living in a world without anything sacred means we never raise our heads.
All of which is an excuse for me to post this: the afterword to Christian Read's The Witch King, which I wrote back in 2005:
Nowadays the word ‘hero’ is practically devoid of meaning. You’re a hero if you save a baby from a burning building; you’re a hero if you get paid six figures to kick a ball in the right direction; you’re a hero if you accidentally leave the safety off your Steyr and wind up killing yourself and wounding two squadmates. Everyone’s a hero. The word has no worth.
The traditional comic book hero is designed to be your physical, intellectual and moral superior. A Fifties dad. A hair-ruffling G-man. A Bob Dobbs posterchild for steroids and conformity. A superman, for Christ’s sake. All buff, all male, all right, all the time. Hell, villains are more honest with themselves than that.
There’s something else heroes are: artefacts. Spandex-clad yes men were meant for an age when authority was to be trusted. Nowadays such notions become less relevant with each passing broadcast. Give me a King Mob, a John Constantine, a Gavriel, a Spider Jerusalem, a Bogart. Give me someone I’d be glad to buy a beer. Enough of the spin, the easy answers… enough of what we had last week, last month, last year.
People like that don’t walk a line between good and evil. They tourist on either side because they know that line doesn’t really exist. They are people like you and I, in extraordinary situations taking blows, making mistakes, living and dying and doing it with a style born of what I can only call honesty. They both succeed and fail, rise and fall. They are full of contrast, and therein lies their depth. When someone like that decides to do something you see the mechanism of that decision churning beneath their skin. They are real as you are real.
I believe the best anti-heroes know themselves, if only unconsciously. No matter how bad things get, no matter what or who they lose, they always have that one thing in themselves they can trust. Be it a black humour that sees them through, gleeful smarts or, as in Gavriel’s case, the quiet certainty that they have been underestimated. It is the immovable object they brace against when faced with an unstoppable force.
Which quite often results in them getting flattened. But, like Coyote of American Indian legend, they just as often pick themselves up afterwards, dust themselves off, and keep on walking… into whatever comes next. Their survival is their defiance. It is truth to self that keeps them going.
If you’ve ever kicked against the pricks, ever fought for the right to become the person you are, then you’ll understand what I’m talking about, and what this book is talking about. You can look into the eyes of these characters and see the writer looking back at you.
“Hate is nothing more than a sign that people are threatened by whatever you are,” Gavriel tells his brother.
The social mindset that has made the word ‘hero’ worthless is precisely what makes our anti-heroes so valuable: they’re not normal. They show us another, more intuitive, prouder way.
We must pay a price for them and we must pay a price to be them.
Cameron Rogers. October 4th, 2005. Melbourne.
EDIT 1/8/08: Updated with text of 303's post.
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and most fine comic retailers today! He said with half a grin...
But more seriously, me, I don't know what makes an artist. If you write a book and take some time off to work, do you somehow lose 'artist' status? Are you an artist is you produce commercial art all day? Is it publications? Showings? Distro deals? Is it having that 'passion' and knowing, deep inside yourself, where muppets and unicorns and your soul meet and dance that you are an artist(ugh)?
If you do a webcomic about sarcastic gamers and the mother-figures who love them and make ancillary deals off t-shirts are you an artist? Is it just money that defines it? (I'd be tempted to actually say yes to that. I often quote you when you once said I don't do it for the money but... I do it for the money.)
Personally, I'd imagine that notion of 'artist' is a bit of made up Romance. You do the work, other people engage with it, that's all I reckon matters.
Anything else and you end up sounding like the kind of bugger who argues 'what is art?' when you're over 20 years of age.
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Look, for me, it's about a certain level of respect. And I can respect someone who is obviously passionate and committed to what they're doing, even if the end result does nothing for me. I can respect the work and focus they put into it, and the attempt to better themselves and their technique in the process. If they put in the hard yards and it shapes who they are as a person, then I have no problem calling them an artist.
It's also worth mentioning that the only reason this conversation is seen as ridiculous for anyone over 20 is precisely because the word 'artist' has become so devalued.
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It's just a job, you know?
Or is it?
Me? Again, dunno. Seems to me that here in the Embarrasment of Riches we live in, we're so overwhelmed with leisuretime so that everyone consumes everything. Art itself has undergone a change in the value we assign to it.
You know longer save up for five years through plauge, Draculas attacking, Anti-popes and drought to go see some hot Glokenspiel playing motherfucker. You turn on the telly, art. You go to the movies, art. You buy a comic. Art. You read a novel. Art. Play a computer game. Art.
So perhaps we should redefine what 'creative' people do. If the word 'creative' send a judder of bonedeep hatred through me like a bell.
Then you get the high-culture lads who think that anything generic can never rise up to art, to muddy the waters. But I think we both disdain that thinking.
I'm trying to remember something - some SF writer had a 'fuck art' manifesto. Let me try and recall.
Tell me something, though - if it's work and focus and technique you admire (and I pretty much wholly agree) shouldn't someone with massive powers in, I dunno, real estate development or stock marketing or banking or some other white collar job be admired the same way?
Do forgive me for going on. You know this shit fascinates.
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Yes and no. Yes merchants saw art as a commodity, but that's what merchants are for. And yes there was a similar sort of wheeling and dealing that we see today when it comes to vying for lucrative contracts - and all the backstabbing that can entail. The difference is that art was seen by many as the salvation of the world and the glorification of something great both within us and above us. It lifted our eyes. It was respected. Just because there existed in the same world, the same business, great names paying the rent by doing vanity portraits of patrons as Wise Men and Greek gods doesn't take anything away from that.
Hell, those renaissance fuckers used to wear their lords gang-colours. You got apprenticed, did your journeyman stuff, then went your own way, looking for patronage in whatever form it took.
I give you Clarion. I give you my experience with Dmetri Kakmi. I give you three-book deals. All those things still occur in some fashion, sure.
It's just a job, you know? Or is it?
I may not be able to tell you what an artist is, but I can tell you what an artist/writer/businessman/astronaut isn't, and that's someone who says "I really should be working but I just couldn't be arsed," or "I'm waiting for my muse to strike."
Stephen King writes every single day of the year. He's a writer. I know someone who has written seven novels and never published a word. He's also a writer. That guy in the office 'with a book in him', isn't.
Anyway, this isn't meant to be a conversation about semantics. My point was that what we consider important changes reality. We live in a world in which Paris Hilton's chihuahua is important, and two-thousand years of philosophy is for 'fags.'
You know longer save up for five years through plauge, Draculas attacking, Anti-popes and drought to go see some hot Glokenspiel playing motherfucker. You turn on the telly, art. You go to the movies, art. You buy a comic. Art. You read a novel. Art. Play a computer game. Art.
I totally agree. It's quantity over quality. So you're saying this is a way in which our respect for artists is abraded? I'd agree with that. In fact, I'll go one better and cite this:
Something you posted once. So if you want an example of something that's made the very concept of art worthless - no, worse than worthless: embarrassing - that's not a bad summation. (continued)
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But why does it? Are you ashamed of it? Embarrassed? Is it what you do or isn't it? Why do we need to redefine anything - to make ourselves feel comfortable under the gaze of others? I make stuff and I work at it - I fail to see the problem.
Tell me something, though - if it's work and focus and technique you admire (and I pretty much wholly agree) shouldn't someone with massive powers in, I dunno, real estate development or stock marketing or banking or some other white collar job be admired the same way?
They are. Like morgan303 said, I make dinner for me and my partner but I don't call myself a chef. I do my own taxes, but I don't call myself an accountant. I do write a lot, and work very hard at it. I call myself a writer. If I sell stocks, I'm a broker. If I sell land I'm an agent. No-one blinks an eye when a person introduces themselves as such. But introduce yourself as an artist and see how much cred you start the conversation with.
Another thing is - and I'm citing morgan303 again - when a person calls themselves 'artist' or 'writer' or 'musician' they are immediately standing themselves beside the greats of their field - not as an equal necessarily, but you're putting yourself in the company of legends. It took me (and she) a very, very long time before feeling comfortable and confident enough in our achievements to do that. Truth be told I'm still antsy about it, but I've had to get over it because being unnecessarily and constantly self-deprecating about one's life's pursuit does no-one any favours.
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It's not that I'm embarrased of the word creative, it's just that I have two singular problems with that word.
1)Creativity is the least part of being an artist. (For the record, it's not a word I use a lot but sure I consider myself an artist.) People who do macrame and post weird pictures of C.S Friedman characters pashing off with Soul Reaver can say they're being creative.
It's a word that seems to go hand in hand with relentless amateurism. Which is good. Everyone should be able to access their creativity, be that seashell paintings, knitting or writing stories about Captain fucking Kirk. But I don't know any person with a serious body of work who rates the creativity that highly. So I tend to keep away from it.
I'd wager shiny tuppence that you'd partially agree with the proposition that coming up with ideas is the easy part.
Work is what makes you an artist. Working and by my personal defintion, being read is what crosses that invisible and possibly arbitrary line from hobby to not-hobby.
2) I see the word 'creativity' co-opted by corporate culture. You might remember that I posted a link a while back where some meatpuppet salaryman was talking about 'creative class'. When in fact, he was talking about 'thinking'.
But yeah, you're right. We're drifting towards semantics.
You know - I've been published since 95 and pretty much continually since 99. (Not artistic stuff always, however) And when I introduce myself as a writer, I'm still ask 'Oh, are you published?'
Because I'm a horrible person with the personality of a meathook, I have long since stopped being antsy over it. I'm proud of my work (when I'm not extravagantly embarrased by it)and I still feel that little surge of pride when I say 'Hi, I'm a writer.' Perhaps that is a sick thing but there it is.
If I can't take my work seriously* then who else is?
But I must say, those last are very good points.
*Not boorish, I should hope!
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Someone once told me it's possible to recite the phone book and make it interesting. A friend of mine knew a guy who drew nothing but zombies - had BINDERS full of them - and they were truly excellent zombies. The guy was an artist, no mistake. A very, very focused and possibly deranged artist, but an artist nonetheless. And if I came across a guy doing etchings of CS Lewis/Soul Reaver slash, and they were good I dont see the problem in admitting it, even if the subject isn't to my taste. They've worked at a skill, spurred by their particular passion, and have become a technically and compositionally excellent artist as a result.
I think it was The Rite of Spring, when first performed, resulted in a theatre being demolished by rioting patrons. in the aftermath this was considered a success because it had provoked such passion in the audience. I reckon the sight of a lovingly-rendered Topsy and Cottontail having their molars scoured by an engorged revenant may also have a powerful effect on me. Does that make it art? How much time do we have?
I'd wager shiny tuppence that you'd partially agree with the proposition that coming up with ideas is the easy part.
Yes and no. I have a bunch of ideas I think would make great RPG modules, say, but if I'm going to spend 6-12 months writing a novel I want it to be something that I think has a chance of adding something to someone's life, even just a little bit. So yes and no: it's not a cakewalk, but it's certainly easier than then doing a book on the subject.
2) I see the word 'creativity' co-opted by corporate culture.
That I get. Actually, it squicks me for the same reason. Leaves me feeling bought, actually.
But yeah, you're right. We're drifting towards semantics.
It's not my strong point, and I'd rather get shouty.
If I can't take my work seriously* then who else is?
That's what matters first and last I think. But this conversation is still one worth having.
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