Untitled by Thomas

For however legitimate, together, forthright and special a person is, it is all too possible that person is just as fake, discombobulated, withdrawn and ordinary.

For years I used the spoken model of living, reaction, and good will my mother imparted on an hourly basis to us as my creed for human interaction. I gradually realized that entire chapters of my mother's treatise on life were inconsistent, biased and illogical. I began to reject them, generating my own tools, my own methods, but I continued to defend her ideologies. Eventually, I could not do that anymore. I had to break away entirely. I could not continue with this. There was not anything I could do. It did not work anymore.

Similarly, I looked up to my father as a role model. That continued until I was approximately 8 or 9. I rejected his manners, his disregard, his violence. He became sick beyond my own comprehension. Following his death, I began to respect him once more, looking to things he had discussed with me when I was a boy of 5 or 6 as wisdom I could apply to my burgeoning twenties, looking to him as a father figure of sorts. Now, I do not know how to take things.

As I once told a person I used to know, "What has happened, or the fact that it is gone, or that past versions of ourselves did not interact as they could have, does not matter; we are all much cooler than we used to be. Every one of us, you, me, that guy sitting over there, we're all a lot cooler than we used to be. This is our time. The past is silly in comparison."

Acceptance takes time. Realizing a truth or an openness we have not yet adopted can take days of conversation, weeks of contemplation, and years of life. When I think about the amount of time it took me to accept certain aspects of manhood, sexuality, ideas, art, emotion and communication, I am baffled at how people who do not obsess as much as I do (I cycle in my brain almost too much) ever reach such conclusions. It took me 3 years to accept something as trivial as gay marriage, let alone the open-endedness of sex. It took me until I was 16 to realize real beauty in visual arts, and until I was 20 to figure out meaning.

About the situation you and I spoke about, I just have to say that I hate hypocrites, but not as much as I dislike people who just let shit happen.

We are all different now. Your interactions with your mother are never ever going to be the same. You are never going to connect the same way you used to. You aren't as innocent, naive as you may have been and she is certainly less hopeful. But this is not a bad thing. It is, as I constantly put it, a natural progression. You can find a new way to connect, a new way to communicate. Just because she has "chosen her path" does not mean that it is set. It may take time, it may take energy, but some kind of connection is possible. However, the downside is that it may not be worth it to you. In which case you have to be real about your choices. None of the things people say like, "I would spend my entire life with you if it were not for these dirty dishes." That would not be true.

If you are not being proactive, I have no idea what you are doing. You are asking all the right questions. If you think I am being proactive, ehh. . ok. To ask these questions, why not N.O.? Why not here, there, her, him? These are the questions you should be asking. And yeah, you do your work for a reason, and that's what you should do. You should not worry about anything else. If you do what makes you happy, you'll make everyone around you a heck of a lot happier than if you do what you think would make the world better. Work for an artist, shack up at a coop, sell the plastic cups.

Oh, and your compound idea is tremendous. It is worthwhile, noble, beautiful, even fun. However, you can never make everything ok again. You know this, and my typing is probably making things too ridiculous, but that is why I am so happy with the earth. In no way can things be made ok, perfect, etc. We always have an extra step to go, an extra moment to evaluate. Things can always be made better. We are all cooler than we used to be.

Untitled by Walker

I sit in front of my computer at 12:35am today.  I am tired, and I am realizing that I must trust my suspicions more, since my gut instinct has a good track record, as it turns out.

What I must continually remind myself of is that I must accept both sides, both histories of my family.  My grandfather is an emblem of an impossible idea and plateau of existence.  As humble as he can act, he also can act with much severity and misguided emotion.  He holds grudges, though he made a bad decision for an earnest and good reason his behavior in regards to this decision are inappropriate.  Those I saw as weak are strong.  Those in my family that I saw as true and honest and direct are not.  The vices in my family's history are great and what we've done is truly sad.  What is kept from one another.  My grandfather should know about his father.  It will hurt, but it is absolutely necessary.  My mother is losing herself slowly, especially since I left for college and especially since I stopped spending summers here. 

Meanwhile I miss her.  Am I taking on too many of her qualities?  Do I take on too many qualities of too many other people?  How do I connect once more to my mother like I did so many years ago.  I think that is lost and that she has chosen her path.  She has inherited a vice from my grandfather, by my grandfather has the tolerance.  

All this as I look at the fall and debate whether I should sell my untitled flag piece or rather to whom should I sell it?  Can I take a chance and do it, and if it is a mistake, it will just be a hurtle for me to deal with later in life?  Do I try to always maintain my ground in an effort to strive to become the symbol my grandfather has been for me?  Do I work for an artist?  Which one?  Or do I work with an artist who has their feet both in the art world and in reality?  I am referring to Ken, Julianne's husband.  Or perhaps the art world truly isn't so troublesome--I sometimes hope in vain if I were to enter that atmosphere I could change it by example.  And as Thomas says (to paraphrase), "maybe no one gives a shit and it is a status signifier."  I can't help but look at Rodin or Duchamp (not Nauman) and just think it was compulsion alone that drove them.  Why am I making things?  I do it so I can hash out who I want to be.  To demonstrate raw work ethic--that is one without functional value.  Yet, if I have a particular functional skill set, why am I not doing what I love to do: help people.  What am I doing thinking about an MFA?  Why didn't I go to New Orleans years ago?  Then I was insecure.  But why don't I go now?  And what about her.  Or him?  I'd like to be around at least one of them.  I am making my next decision based on the outcome of decisions they are making now.  Which is to say that I am not making any pro-active decisions.  And I hate that.

This all takes me back to Synesthesia and other ideals I've had (I have always wanted to have all those I love and care for live on my property here, with a farm, where we'd all work--both the farm and our individual creative or academic projects.  And when a disaster hit, we'd all travel together in an effort to make it all okay again--whatever that is).  Synesthesia was another manifestation of a similar feeling.  It was a social act, a way to try to better something.  A form of thinking to broaden our senses, thoughts.  And now I am at the point where I could do this, somehow.  But I don't know where to start, logistically.  This is what I would love the most though.  Just decency.

Is All That has Been Done Lost?

by Thomas

I am about to get the second signature on my thesis before I go to turn it in. Walker has finished, and I am about to. As we attempt to foil our own departures to something new, we ask the question, what does this mean?

I should feel completely relieved. I should be satisfied and happy, and I am undoubtedly getting there, but I can't help but imagine that there is no such thing as a break from this. I wrote one paper today, I will write another tomorrow. I am not even good at writing papers.

As for Walker, 2.0 is underway as we speak. He probably paused more than he usually does, but it's not about the singular achievement, it's about what is behind those achievements. The same may go for this project. We may not be able to boil down modern day art into the simple "s'all screwed up" mission statement. We may need to go farther.

We are about finished (by that I mean Walker is done and I have a few days to go), but does it matter? Southwest; Northeast. Are we trapped? Is art going to become a pseudo-modern day Chinaredcapitalist phenomenon? Is Damien Hirst (and by DH, I mean crap) going to become the one and only artist people care about. Do people care about art at all, or do they care about it because it is a status symbol, a thing people can point to and say, "they are wealthy/intellectual/snooty enough to care about art,"? I know people care. Do you?

Do we believe in this? Are things out there? Is all that has been done lost?