Ben's Blog Pt1-A Response to Mike's topic on why artists don't seem to be aware!!

Ok Since I wasn't allowed to participate in this conversation I feel it necessary to point out a few things and correct a few things.
 
One, artists can be hero's, sure but many are not and putting them onto that pedestal is just sheer craziness.
 
Lennon as my hero is not a hero per sa, how could he be?? he did some really good things but he also did some really dumb things.
 
So I hope I have cleared that up, I have put up his good deeds as arguments but I haven't ever used the word hero unless it was, he was my hero.
 
Now a couple of people brought up the idea of myths, now we are getting closer to the truth.
 
The artist as hero is wrong but the artist as myth is correct.
 
Here is what Robert Fripp said and it explains the confusion somewhat:
 
1) Third division. Artistic research and development, a "civilized" style of life, and little or no financial remuneration.  Where ideas and art exist and experimented with for their own sake.
 
Most on this forum would identify with the third division.
 
2) Second division.  Gainful employment as a working professional musician; respectability and a certain level of commercial success, but little impact on mass culture: "You won't change the world".
 
So we could call the Danny's and he who shall remain nameless 2nd division.
3) First division.  Exposure at the level of the mass media, with all it's rewards and risks.  For better or worse, you become a mythical figure on the screen of contemporary consciousness.  Access to the best musician's and to all current ideas, musical trends, and technologies.
"Total commitment of belief, energy, life-style and time".
 
That final line is interesting because that is what the artist who understands the mythological play that is going on around them aims for, some for whatever reason and some brought up Pete Doherty and Amy Winehouse, these two were thrust into this mythological play and because they lacked awareness were chewed up and spat out.  Almost like a Loki (the trickster god in Norse mythology) figure threw these two into the lions den for his own amusement.
 
What is interesting is Robert Fripp wrote this 32 years ago and social media is blurring the line between the 2nd and 3rd division.
 
I myself am stuck in the 2nd division but I have made many play's for the 3rd division and unlike the two aforementioned Pete and Amy am completely aware of the risks involved in playing in the mythological landscape of the 3rd division.
 
I hope that clears a few things up!!
 
Neb

Bub


Ben ... the elevator doesn't stop here anymore.

You should have got off two floors up.

Bub.

Can you please explain Bub??
 
I'm a bit slow on this one!
 
I'm just trying to interject some discourse into a discusion that I felt that only a few people got and I missed out on.
 
If you are meaning I am not welcome, well it's a free forum, you can particpate or not.
 
Once again it's about interacting with the mythology behind the art!!!
 
Neb

WB Ben.

Hi,

Btw ... mostly Robert Fripp is re-wording Gurdgieff ... so I was curious why you are not checking out the source.

It was a very English thing to do at the time, and even the Royal Shakespeare Company had a director that went out and did "Meetings with Remarkable Men" about him. And his exercises on stage rehearsal and his work was totally "experimental" in almost the same way that Robert went on to rehearse and work his band ... with mixed results!

I have tried to translate a lot of these stage exercises with music in mind and posted some of it in here, but folks are too stuck on their Sonar Ashes or other DAW's, to consider trying a few experiments here and there. It might get some results. It might not. But you will never regret having tried it and one day you will say ... that was cool ... and I learned this and that from it! Why? ... because it is different ... and it allows you inner space to learn something different for yourself.

But there is no trust and understanding on the meaning of the words themselves, so you have an idea what it is I am saying, or Robert was saying, or Peter Brook was saying (and showing) ...

YOU decide!

John T


Maybe it's just me, but I don't understand a word of the last couple of posts here.

That's when you know someone's willingness to decide a hero for them ... you can't read it to figure it out for yourself?
 
It is easier to be told, I agree!
 
And that would show right there ... you're not an artist! You don't have an idea or opinion on your own ... you have to find it somewhere else!
 
Sorry if this comes off rude, but it is not meant to at all. I have no illusions about hero'ship, or fame, or fortune, or any kind of bs that is used out there to help make me famous. If, in my time, folks accept me for an artist with my words, I will be ahppy. If not I will also be happy. But one thing you can not accuse me of, is not studying and knowing very well what Robert is saying, that I am not sure you understand. It's not hard, but it does require a serious look in the mirror, as did all these acting exercises ... some of which were called "the empty space" and "the open door" ... and these were exercises to help you get rid of everything you "know" and see if you can find something else ... but anyone saying that here, it's like they are a bunch of merdeheads, because you have no idea what is being said? You know that's wrong!

I understand what Robert Fripp is saying, that's not what I was talking about.

I'll tell you what I think about whether someone is an artist or not (including myself): I don't think about it, at all. It strikes me as not worth agonising over. You create what you create. It will mean something to some other people, or it won't. All the navel-gazing in the world will have no impact on either of those things.

Starise
Moskiae in attempting to be non conformist you seem to be making your own brand of conformity.

 
You know, that is my greatest fear?
 
I'm not really a creature of habit, and even get so bored sometimes that I have to take a different street on the drive home!
 
Listening to music might be the one thing I'm comforming to the most ... and the number of things I listen to from the weirdest to the worst to the ones from Mars, Venus and New Zealand, and Finland, and North Pole -- no kidding! -- is about the only thing that prevents me from abdicating my throne of merde to any idea of what music is or might be, or what writing and literature is all about.
 
I have no definitions. None whatsoever. But I can tell YOU, my experience. AND my thoughts on my experience!
 
And you forget one thing ... ideas are something that we can have tea and/or a beer with ... and the rest is not important. But, the tone and comments that sometimes show up here are so defensive they are not funny. 
 
I'm so weird at "comformity" that I can not even eat the same thing in the morning ... and have to change all the time. About the only thing I conform to? I don't drink alcohol at all and live on water alone!  I don't listen to Lady Gaga ... somehow that make up would make the sex so ugly, nasty and bad tasting, I simply can not have a fantasy about her!
 
And yeah ... I'm looking for a music teacher that will not come here to teach me how to play or do Chuck Berry!  But somehow the one teacher a talked to last week, freaked out ... she hung up! Sounds like the Coffee House to me!

Starise, I think you've got a good point here.  There are different kinds of artists.  Some creative mediums require different types and degrees of discipline in order to function within that particular form of art.  Some artists must work for many years to develop the technique and precision to fully realize their artisitic visions.  Others may work in an art form which does not require the same level of technical precision.

Some works of art display beauty in their structure and form.  Some regard their content as more important than their form.  Some are more logical while others are more emotional.  Just as there are different types of intelligence, there are different types of art.  Personally, we may value one form over another, but our values are not universal.  What one person regards as beautiful another may view as ugly.  Some value an intelligent, thoughtful, deliberate expression of an idea.  Others value an emotional, gut-wrenching, chaotic expression of a feeling.  Some want a mixture of those.

As a society, we are entitled to our preferences.  We won't agree.  Within music, we won't agree on what constitutes "Good Music". 

Certain musical genres are defined in part by their structural format.  While there are variations on the Blues, you can't abandon the structure and still play Blues.  Some instruments require years (if not decades) of intense practice to master their technique.  Music played with these instruments is usually played with technical precision rather than mindless abandon for this reason.

For many people, Art is not Art if there's no intellect involved in its creation.  When a horse "paints" by flicking paint with its tail, these folks would not consider that "Art".  By the same token, there are some people who believe Art is not Art if there's any intelligence involved.  Art must be purely emotional, without the constraints of an intelligence to reign it in.

For this reason, an attempt to define one person as an Artist while at the same time declaring that someone else is not an Artist is biased at best.  At worst, it is an insult. 

I think we would do well to remember that our opinions about what constitutes good Art are purely our opinions and not absolute fact.

Yeah, it really cannot be defined ...

To me, Joseph Beuys is an artist...someone else might see him as not so much....

There are No More Heroes (anymore). I know 'cos my heroes "The Stranglers" told me.

trimph1


Yeah, it really cannot be defined ...

To me, Jon Bouy is an artist...someone else might see him as not so much....

Fixed.

Ok some excellent discourse,

Moshkiae first, don't forget I was talking about hero's as myths, John Lennon as my hero is more intellectual, he introduced me to different music, different ways of thinking and of course maybe some more salient things.  But he is a myth, Lennon is a myth.

Without him I would never have arrived at Fripp's list which I understand is Gurdjieff's idea and to a lesser extent his disciple, Bennet. 

What we are talking about is quasi mysticism and we can include Alistar Crowly into the mix and if we believe Don Juan was a man, or his disciple Carlos Castanda invented him: Don Juan.

I follow my own path Moshkiae, because of my readings, I am also a keen numeroligist, have used and understand Tarot and various other forms of understanding Archatypes.

For myself, I like discipline, something a few around here haven't got.  So in that I follow the Don Juan concept.

In ritual and discipline is majik!!

For me my days start at dawn, breakfast, read paper, social network, shop, then creativity, if I so choose, then what ever I need to get me through the night.  Something this forum hasn't quite got.  The day is a series of patterns and rituals.

I tried the Kaos path and it didn't work for me, I never got anything done, as soon as I found discipline I found my mojo.

Doesn't mean I don't let the inner demons out for a walk every now and then, it's good for, it keeps you healthy!!!.

As for John T you've missed the point, you taken the list as an insult rather than a compliment.  The first and second division is where all the work is done, these are the craftsman and the artisan without the craftsman and the artistsan there would be no third division because those who work in the third division use the ideas and the techniques of the first and second division.

Art is subjective, it doesn't matter if you are in any of the division, you make art, how can a beautiful chair not be a peice of art, it was crafted by an artisan and craftsman but it can still be art.  Same with buildings, so do you understand no.

The list is just a concept and a way to organzine exsistance and life, not a path to conformity or as insult just a way to to see through the Kaos and go I identify here and with this. 

When you get here awareness comes, then calm, not happiness but calm because you understand your journey better.\

Now I sound quasi mystical.

As for getting back to music, I am building a new rig which will allow me to use Sonar's non linear sequencer properties, I am also dabbling in video art and am hoping to move somewhat left of field a into fine arts degree.

I've done everything I can with song structure, I mean listen to my tunes I have experimented my butt off and have I have started drifting into classical.  I have had my 2nd teir success but I also play in the third teir, I may not be famous but I am infamous and I am still a work in progress.  Hence the change in direction, Fine Art is where I can cause the most trouble and be lauded for it.

So do we understand the artist is not a hero, he or she is first a craftsman, secondly a artisan and thirdly myth.

Neb  

Ben, I don't take your list as an insult at all. I just think its got nothing to do with art. And as I say, and as your clarification above confirms, is just more of your constant obsession with status. I'd have to buy into that to be offended or complimented by it, and I don't buy into it. 

Speaking for daryl1968 (regarding the entire thread):

arse


= I kid



= I think I'm funny

= I think I'm an artist



= I'm blushing because Mooch thinks I'm a hero.