Artist or Creative, a distinction
- We are all creative.
- We are all artists potentially, but clearly not everyone is an artist.
- Artists are no ‘better’ than creatives, but they have a great privilege
- Artists are no worse, but they bear a huge responsibility
- Creatives can get away with just expression, creative energy if you like
- Artists add value with craft and unique expression.
- Artists are not subject to creatives (more on this in weeks to come), but they must render subjects creatively. A “Fresh look, and a fresh listen’ was how Frost put it.
- Creatives and would-be artists ought not to make [inflated] subjects of artists, to quote Oscar Wilde, “Be Yourself, because everyone else is taken’
Thats my attempt at a distinction, what do you reckon?
Gigs that bleed integrity
I just finished working on an intensive week-long project with poet, Sh’maya, called Nabokov’s Present Tense. It was a great sell-out show and a dope collaboration process. You can read the text from our set here.
It reminded me of why I write and perform, and why I choose not to play every gig that gets thrown my way. Sometimes I say I’m busy, which–whilst true, is not always my motivation for declining. Let me explain– actually better still — if you listen to Michael Port’s audio stream at thinkbigrevolution.com, “You Are Like You market” , you’ll understand why.
Nabokov are ebulient and daring promoters with artistic integrity; it’s a shame that they are something of a rarity in the local london arts scene. In my experience most are, to use our vernacular, ‘on a hype ting‘. The down-to-earthness (humanity) of so many gigs, in so many scenes, is sucked out in favour of an unrealistic, unwarranted, don’t-miss-this hype. Nobody is fooled, and the scenes reflects that.
What makes a show is the people who come. If all the people stay at home, they will still be people. If only the artists show up, it will be a rehearsal. The people make the show. Why the human-factor, community aspect is ignored or downplayed in so much local gig marketing is beyond me, surely it’s the collective soul the very show ought to embody?
I haven’t given up hope, I know there are some great promoters out there, and I hope to connect with over the next few months. If your one of them, holler – lets talk… lets grow a show.
Picture by hurting bombz
Lock and key, Part 1
Last week, as part of my other life as a part- time technologist/school teacher, I’m working late grading my students mid-term reports in my computer lab. I don’t notice that the janitors are locking the entire joint up for the night. Clearly they hadn’t noticed me either. It’s not ’til I’m leaving that I discover I’ve been locked in. I try some corridor door handles, once just casually, then again with the slight urgency and confoundment you see in horror flicks, the old rattle-the-handle-and-look-over-your- shoulder-quickly routine.
I stopped short of the ‘now look here, open this door I tell you’ melodrama, not ’cause it wouldn’t be funny, but because when the only way out is locked and you don’t have a mobile phone, you quickly realise that there’ll be plenty of time for audience-of-1 humourif you don’t think fast.
By some sweet mercy I had, earlier that very day, picked up a skeleton key from the janitors office (you couldn’t make this stuff up, honestly). That got me through a couple of doors only to come up against a huge Hogwart-style oak door requiring some old skool key. A bit of a caper ensued: fumbling into the staff room, finding a phone, calling up a colleague, getting directions, groping ’round some more in the dark, unlocking then locking doors behind me, and stumbling through an obscure fire escape that locked behind me, trapping me in a locked courtyard–all the while unable to shake the feeling that I was somehow breaking the law! By this point I’d had enough I threw the keys in the bag, scaled the school gates and whistled off into the night.
Considering I had been reflecting on the question ‘What is School for?’, and that I am paid to draw out the potential of students, there seemed something funny/symbolic about being literally locked in the building myself.
Uncluttering
Just read this article on clutter, and realised that clutter of any kind has, unwittingly, been my sworn enemy for too long. It has frustrated , obstructed and sometimes thwarted everything purposeful in my life, within and without for far too long. It often resorts in what has become known as Yak Shaving. To quote Seth Godin, ‘Yak Shaving is the last step of a series of steps that occurs when you find something you need to do’. What’s more is I’ve had enough. Earlier on this year I thought I had left my Facebook profile because of the clutter it imposed on me from without. I know better know: I deleted what was merely a reflection of my world within.
I just thought of a line from the movie Changing Lanes that made me shudder,
“You know, booze isn’t really your drug of choice anyway. You’re addicted to chaos. For some of us, it’s coke. For some of us, it’s bourbon. But you? You got hooked on disaster.” – Sponsor
Time to throw some stuff out.
PS- This is not my desk… mine is much worse.
If we spoke
If we spoke
of revolution
it’s because you were our hub.
Why reinvent the wheel
when there’s momentum from your love.
Dedicated to all my listeners on Saturday 17th Jan '09 [v]s
Grateful new year
Today I met Mikey, a labourer originally from the north side of Chicago. He was selling maps, and tea candles in a subway. But he seemed neither lost or in need of the light encouragement passers by in Elephant and Castle sometimes offer. I listened as he told his story, it was tough and gritty, and he gestured emphatically to tell it with hands of a matching description in spite of the freezing London air. “I’m not on drugs, and I’ll have a job by next week”, he insisted, and I think he’s right. “I’d rather do it myself” he added, when asked him about staying at a hostel. I understood and agreed that I would probably do the same, and then I read this amazing letter on gratitude by Kevin Kelly and now I’m not so sure. Reading has aleady began to change the complexion of ‘09 for me, and for both of these encounters I am grateful.
Photo by bartmaguire; creative commons license
“We are at the receiving end of a huge gift simply by being alive. It does not matter how you calculate it, our time here is unearned. Maybe you figure your existence is the result of a billion unlikely accidents, and nothing more; then certainly your life is an unexpected and undeserved surprise” – Taken from Kevin Kelly’s letter on gratitude.
Change the subject
The more I write or even observe stuff, the more I’m convinced that it’s not the subject you choose, but how you render it. Take this pic of yours truly for example, shot by Phil Sharp. Phil is (understandably) widely celebrated as a bit of a genius, interstingly all his topics (read subjects) are different, and so are their (millions) of facial expressions. Sounds like the best of both worlds…
Quote me happy!
I Don’t know about you, but the right quote at the right moment, can make my day. Here are my current favs right now, enjoy!
“The fakes keep frontin’ but I just dont care / wearing forces is the only time I put on airs.” – Shad
“We pilot the prototype for success, most labels with open arms dont know their right from their left” – Mr J.
“Even if you persuade me, you won’t persuade me” – Aristophanes
The cure for boredom is curiosity. There is no cure for curiosity - Ellen Parr
“I want a Claire Huxtable!” – Shad
So long, FB Profile
That’s right, I’ve deleted my profile on Facebook, at least I tried my best to. Only my Facebook artist page remains
Some of you are probably wondering why? What about the hundreds of friends, the endless event invites, the self absorbed updates that masquerade as meaningful messages, the noise and the sheep throwing. What have I done!
In short, I value messages, I think they are important, potentially life changing arrangements of words. But then there is the counterfeit currency that pretends to be this, flooding the facebook economy, and devaluing everything, even the connectedness it claims to enable. All the time I spent on it, was time taken out of making a dent in the world; too often I found myself asking, what the hell am I doing here? more specifically I was thinking, if goldfish had limbs that were large enough, wouldn’t they climb out of their bowls? Of course fish don’t have limbs, and I am nothing like a fish, but for the record, the answer is no, they wouldn’t climb out- in fact, being goldfish, they will have forgotten why they are there, and why they should escape. Guess I’m more like fish than I like to… remember.
“There is not enough room!”
If I had a pound for every place I heard that, I could buy all of them, knock down a few walls, build and extension and make even more room.
Today on the platform, it happened again: a train pulls into LDN bridge, opens it’s doors and quickly fills with commuters who won’t move down the carriage, all with the unspoken but rallying cry typical of London, “There is not enough room!”. They just stood there entrenched in silent agreement as if the very suggestion of moving down to occupy the aisles was a sign of weakness.
I know because I’ve been part of this mob before; the lie we tell ourselves is simple but effective: “I am getting off in one or two stops, if I move down I will have to fight my way of this thing (read, raise my voice) – ain’t happenin.” Sound familiar?
Ironically this story is the same one that keeps passengers on the platform from saying anything
that could get them on to the train: “I don’t want to have to raise my voice and tell them to move down, especially where there is such a strong agreement of silence. What if it doesn’t work? Argh heck, maybe I’ll just wait for the next one.” I know because this is the lie I told myself today, when usually I relish the chance to project my loudest, most gravelly, cockney bellow: “Move roight daaan, insiiiiide the carriages pleaze” – works everytime.
There is always room, but it must be contended for. Sometimes that means fighting (not recommended in this case), but often it means just asking.
I have something to ask you today; you can listen to my request here. Remember, there is always enough room, but you have to create it.
-
Who/what is [verb]swish?
A type of word + a sound, in a noun? a lyricist; a name, a style, a purpose, a privilege
-
A lyricist from South London, a collector of swishisms, someone.who.is.still.hoping
-
Search this site
Links
-
Recently Written
-
Categories
