In some ways “art is dead” in the sense that Art (with a capital A) is about celebrity—a singular Artist who paints on a canvas and creates a masterpiece. Van Gogh, Picasso, Mondrian, Da Vinci—they had something valid to share with the world, but so do countless other individuals of the past, present, and future.

We no longer live in a time of the lone genius tinkering away, hoping to create a masterpiece. The world has become too complex for meaningful work to be done in total isolation. Consider the computer animation company, Pixar, for example. Pixar is arguably one of the greatest mixed media “artists” of our time—a multiplier of many talented people working together to tell expressive stories. There is no amount of “creative genius” that can out-master that level of collaboration. And in this way, the Artist-as-sacrosanct mentality of the art world is perhaps irrelevant to modern life.

Individuals will always create. There is something very human about making and expressing what words cannot express. But the “Art World” as it stands today—the network of museums, auction houses, art schools, periodicals, and collectors—seems to be stodgy and outdated. It is yet another industry absorbed into the umbrella of “investing.”

As the internationally recognized street artist, Banksy, puts it:

Art is not like other culture because its success is not made by its audience. The public fill concert halls and cinemas every day, we read novels by the millions and buy records by the billions. ‘We the people’ affect the making and the quality of most of our culture, but not our art.

The art we look at is made by only a select few. A small group create, promote, purchase, exhibit, and decide the success of art. Only a few hundred people in the world have any real say. When you go to an art gallery you are simply a tourist looking at the trophy cabinet of a few millionaires.

Perhaps Art is the ultimate luxury—the final, superfluous status symbol of privilege. But then again, maybe I’m wrong; after all, it’s far easier to dismiss art completely than to recognize its nuance and complexity.

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art (with a lowercase ‘a’)

When you step back and look at it, art is simply a way of communicating. We are all trying to communicate something—who we are, what we see, how we think. We each have much more going on in our heads than we are capable of expressing. So we write stories, play music, dance, paint, act, or any number of creative pursuits. We try to communicate ourselves, our understanding of the world, our experiences—all the things that seem impossible to share with someone in casual conversation.

Children make art. Adults too. Professionals, amateurs, even “uncreatives” can make art. Art is not a mystery. It’s people sharing with one another—communicating (or at least trying to). And that’s what makes it is so valuable. Unfortunately, art is not always “Art.”

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Banksy. Wall and Piece. Mainaschaff: Publikat, 2005. (Amazon).

Catmull, Ed, and Amy Wallace. Creativity, Inc: Overcoming the Unseen Forces That Stand in the Way of True Inspiration. New York: Random House, 2014. (Amazon)

Conover, Adam. “Adam Ruins Fine Art.” Adam Ruins Everything. 08 August 2017. (Link)

Dear “Night Person,”

Your decision to start working on that nagging project late at night or your sudden interest down an obscure internet rabbit hole at 2 A.M. is not an innate proclivity. It’s not some natural predisposition that’s outside of your control. It’s your brain being selfish. It’s a mind unwilling to give up control to being unconscious—a tired toddler trying to stay engaged for as long as it can before falling asleep. It’s a form of mental FOMO (‘fear of missing out’). Recognize it. Acknowledge it. Go to bed.

Yours truly,

Sleepy

[T]he difference between wishing and deciding is important.

—Scott Adams, How to Fail At Almost Everything (2013)

There are different kinds of hope. There’s the empowered kind—the kind that Martin Luther King Jr. championed. Empowered hope is what allows people to face improbable odds and still carry on, knowing that what they are hopeful for is worth the fight. Empowered hope encourages us to do better and to be better. It’s what drives us forward. And then there’s disempowered hope—wishful thinking. This is the hope that buying a lottery ticket will make you a millionaire—all the rewards with none of the effort.

I’m hiding. Lots of people are. I write in my journals, draw in my notebooks, make notes on my phone as I walk to work. It’s a prolific exercise amounting to… well… nothing. I rarely share my work or discuss my ideas. Even my wife, the person who is closest to me, is exposed to only the tip of the iceberg. And why is this—why do we hide from people?

People intuitively understand that there is a common fear to express oneself, to be oneself. It’s a fear of what others might think or how we’ll be perceived or maybe a product of our own self-criticism—I don’t know what it is exactly. But there is a barrier for many of us. We just don’t want to give too much away. It feels safer to put on the mask and keep the real stuff out of sight.

Yet when we get brave and open up—those rare instances—the results can be surprising. Sharing can trigger others to share, and they often confirm our own experience. We hear about other people facing the same challenges that we face. We learn that we’re not alone in thinking crazy thoughts, or perhaps we are, but there are valid alternatives that would never have occurred to us. No matter how “good” we think we are, when we share, we allow other people to do the same.

There will always be better—better writers, better businesspeople, better artists, better communicators, better whatever. But so what? If you’re already doing the activity, then you might as well share it. I might as well share it. It’s time to stop hiding.