Do international trolls fanning the embers of paranoia in the survivalist community create the chaos, or are those dark imaginings just the organic result of social media, and does it really matter? Probably not. The trolls didn’t invent paranoia, they just poke it through the bars of its cage, amping up non-specific petty resentments into white-hot hysteria, attempting to push the conspiracy-minded adrift on their own armed island of insanity. Mad scientists direct the show and tell the trolls what to say, just technicians after all, it’s like their day job.
These scientists are busy molding the world for others from inside their heads, pumping out little pleasure bumps for just the right answers, scaring them to get their attention and then making them mad, steering chunks of the population like sheep into separate penned enclosures. From the outside we can just watch it happen, and if some superhero from the comics doesn’t intervene soon, save the day, we’re all getting marched right back to the middle ages, only this time with wall to wall surveillance and machine gun towers. Where are the lines of resistance? Who stands against these big-number mass-manipulators, and how does the individual keep their feet when the swirling digital whirlpool is dissolving the floor?
Painters fight a rear-guard action, keeping open the gate to three dimensional spatial awareness, the so-called ‘real world,’ by expanding unique moments and freezing the flow of sensation in an act of total attention, the proof embodied in its artifact, the work of art. At this point I feel obligated to acknowledge there are others who define art differently, well ok, everybody else, but time seems short, and while not ready to panic, it might be time to reconsider painting as the visual art form it was back before it became ‘anything at all.’ Painting as a technology doesn’t just record reality, even when it tries -- it alters it. Consider how malleable reality is for online vermin with their flickering outrage videos and insane accusations, and then imagine the power, over time, of a painting that never changes, that absorbs and collects memories, and that somehow has you constantly noticing stuff for the first time.
Can’t take it lightly. People travel far, leap out of airplanes, splash through rough canyons, try exotic desserts, all in the hope of feeling something, a reminder of being alive, each day of the week so dull and boring. It’s like an epidemic. Take a shortcut, buy some art. Occasionally consider the talent and time it took to make it and the personality and human feeling put into it, although the art should be whispering this to you all the time on its own. Better art says it louder, that’s how you can tell. The reason to own and live with art is to establish your own little garden at home, a nice non-digital place to sit down, and to access the upper floors of your perception when out in the world, a better view than endless streaming video has to offer. Art is a concentrate, the distilled essence of what’s been left out of modern life. Art on the wall is a seasoning for the bland porridge of everyday existence, a wedge to hold open the doors of perception, and an antidote for the toxicity of strident talking heads on the telly every evening.
These scientists are busy molding the world for others from inside their heads, pumping out little pleasure bumps for just the right answers, scaring them to get their attention and then making them mad, steering chunks of the population like sheep into separate penned enclosures. From the outside we can just watch it happen, and if some superhero from the comics doesn’t intervene soon, save the day, we’re all getting marched right back to the middle ages, only this time with wall to wall surveillance and machine gun towers. Where are the lines of resistance? Who stands against these big-number mass-manipulators, and how does the individual keep their feet when the swirling digital whirlpool is dissolving the floor?
Painters fight a rear-guard action, keeping open the gate to three dimensional spatial awareness, the so-called ‘real world,’ by expanding unique moments and freezing the flow of sensation in an act of total attention, the proof embodied in its artifact, the work of art. At this point I feel obligated to acknowledge there are others who define art differently, well ok, everybody else, but time seems short, and while not ready to panic, it might be time to reconsider painting as the visual art form it was back before it became ‘anything at all.’ Painting as a technology doesn’t just record reality, even when it tries -- it alters it. Consider how malleable reality is for online vermin with their flickering outrage videos and insane accusations, and then imagine the power, over time, of a painting that never changes, that absorbs and collects memories, and that somehow has you constantly noticing stuff for the first time.
Can’t take it lightly. People travel far, leap out of airplanes, splash through rough canyons, try exotic desserts, all in the hope of feeling something, a reminder of being alive, each day of the week so dull and boring. It’s like an epidemic. Take a shortcut, buy some art. Occasionally consider the talent and time it took to make it and the personality and human feeling put into it, although the art should be whispering this to you all the time on its own. Better art says it louder, that’s how you can tell. The reason to own and live with art is to establish your own little garden at home, a nice non-digital place to sit down, and to access the upper floors of your perception when out in the world, a better view than endless streaming video has to offer. Art is a concentrate, the distilled essence of what’s been left out of modern life. Art on the wall is a seasoning for the bland porridge of everyday existence, a wedge to hold open the doors of perception, and an antidote for the toxicity of strident talking heads on the telly every evening.
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