art and self expression

With our new success in business, in a profession, what have we got? There’s more money, and that certainly can be convenient. There’s a better car and a bigger house or apartment, but does that satisfy? The opportunity to grow as an individual doesn’t come to everyone, and finding the authentic self, living life to the fullest, is the real reason we’ve been working so hard. There are shortcuts.

Art is not about the self-expression of the artist, one of many myths concerning art. Art, in the home, in the office, is about the self-expression of the owner, the person who pays. If that sounds peculiar, it’s only the world turned right side up. A home with seven or eight pieces of original art, in different styles, from different places and times, helps us to know the person, and helps that person know themselves.

Personal taste – it’s a process

First look at a lot of art, maybe meet an artist or two, and finally buy a piece of art. Sad but true, to make this method work best you have to spend a little too much, whatever that means for you. From that point on, art won’t be meaningless anymore. Anything you notice in an exhibit or gallery, in an office or home, will be compared with what you have already, and from there you find your way. 

empty calories

Fast food is bad for you. Politicians are preparing legislation – no more toys in happy meals in California, fewer sugary drinks in the vending machines. The franchises, themselves, are upgrading their menus. People are beginning to notice what they put in their mouths. They demand more nutrition, less fillers, a more profound food experience. A new health-consciousness blossoms in the community mind, and everything changes. Quality improves. The food is better and people are healthier, presumably happier, and we wonder how we could have poisoned ourselves for so long. Still, these same people, us, will look at anything.

Food is physical, has weight and texture, while visual images are only mental, ephemeral, easily manipulated and supposedly private. Seeing is conditioned by expectation and experience, which means we see what we’ve seen before, and not much else. If our visual diet is rush hour traffic twice a day and crime drama on TV at night, our ability to get much out of leaning over the rail at the grand canyon will be limited. Art is about visual nutrition, vitamins for the senses. The reason to own and live with art is to open the mind to real-life experiences, situations, decisions that have to be made.

Does it work? Probably wouldn’t fit on a scale or graph, but listen to the testimony of ordinary people who have made sacrifices to own art. They’re not willing to trade back because of tangible differences they feel in broader areas of their lives. Digital reality is a long strip mall of empty calories, enough to live on but insubstantial and fleeting – the thumbnail Picasso no different than the thumbnail moon landing. An actual work of art direct from the hand of an artist has more juice in it than all the virtual tours of all the museums in the world, and it’s never consumed – it just gets stronger, more vital, more healing.

paying attention

“I think, therefore I am”, is a famous quote, spare and efficient, positive and weighty. Nevertheless, just existing is becoming an ever more tenuous concept, and just by itself doesn’t count for that much. It would be better to say, “I’m paying attention, therefore I am here.” That’s a concept with traction, the first stone on a path that leads somewhere. As living organisms it’s what we were made to do, but it isn’t always easy. Babies resist sleep, some do, as near as we can tell because they don’t want the lights to go out. We’d pay attention all the time, ourselves, if it wasn’t all so boring.

Our dilemma is fairly simple. We’ve inherited a survival program hard-wired – an antiquated operating system balking at modern applications. It’s primary feature, so-called habituation, dictates that any information which doesn’t lead directly to eating, fornication, or our possible immediate demise is constantly pushed toward the back of the line in our heads. We become civilized when we learn how to work around it, in varying degrees. We sublimate and substitute, but it never goes away. Repetitive anything without tangible reward or punishment on the spot tends to lose focus, colors fade, other thoughts crowd in – it’s hard to pay attention.

Just the same, we like paying attention. It gives us pleasure. Bored people around the planet fill up their leisure flirting with danger, just to “feel alive”. Returnees from the world’s combat zones suffer rueful nostalgia for the smell of anything in the morning like over there. Closer to home, many of us enjoy travel, mainly because seeing something never seen before offers the simple joy of using the equipment we came with. Still, there's only so much we can do. Louder gadgets just seem to amplify the problem, pounding evolution's finely-tuned senses back into our heads, as next morning bleakness attests.

Art is about paying attention. There are more elaborate theories, but this one rules them all. Whatever style or school, whatever time period, art’s main function is to focus and condition the attention of the viewer. As every other possession begins to fade with familiarity, a successful work of art compels attention, becoming more of a presence in a room, in a home, in a lifetime, the longer it’s owned. Beyond that, owning and living with original art also makes the blue of the morning sky more pronounced, the sound of birds more distinct, and makes good food taste better – all that comes with just paying attention.

authenticity

We believe the primary function of art is to be owned and lived with, but that isn’t all we mean by owning art. About the middle of the last century vast amounts of public money began to influence what art was taught in colleges, what art received public recognition, and which artists were granted public support. The inborn imperatives of bureaucratic careerism has led us to an art that is obtuse and distant, a hothouse variety unable to support itself on the local level, and most usually associated with charities and non-profit activities.

We assert that decisions made with out of pocket money, with an intention of long-term ownership, leads to a different art, one that embodies the values and aspirations of our culture more authentically. When the community truly begins to support working artists by buying and owning their work, sophistication and taste, along with the quality of the art produced, can gain ground rapidly together.

reasons to own art

There was a time not long ago when our every possession bore the imprint of its maker, yet these days nothing we own was made by human hands. Everything is extruded or stamped, designed by computer on some other continent, issued in hundreds of thousands, and we get one. Not only is nothing we own really personal, it’s about to be superseded by even newer technologies. A work of art, now more than ever, is the distillation of what’s been left out – it’s the tincture of humanity that makes houses livable, makes work environments more humane, that helps us find our better selves.

In the workplace, original art sets an example that can inspire more conscientious work in the shop and sanction more creative thinking in front offices. Art in reception areas and conference rooms projects a serious maturity that is noticed by customers, vendors, and even the competition. At home, works of art become old friends, reflecting the personality of their owner, while recalling the past more vividly than a drawer full of photos. They move from place to place with their owner, claiming each new dwelling as familiar territory, a personal sanctuary in a world of impermanence and change. Finally, works of art endure, so that even after generations, when everything else has been discarded and replaced, over and over, they will look the same, although the world might find them more valuable.