From: scasterg@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Stuart M Castergine)
Subject: Re: support for the arts in the US
Organization: The Ohio State University
Date: Mon, 14 Dec 1992 05:33:15 GMT

In article <18443@mindlink.bc.ca> Crawford_Kilian@mindlink.bc.ca (Crawford Kilian) writes:

>The point of making money is to buy the time and freedom to do things that
>don't make money--the things that really interest you because they enable you
>to explore and express your real identity. (Unless, of course, you suffer
>from arrested deveopment and your identity is completely entangled in making
>money, period, for its own sake.) Art springs from expression of identity,
>and sometimes it also becomes a marketable commodity (just like Evel
>Knievel's stunts). That doesn't mean the only legitimate form of art *must*
>be marketable.
>
>Writers in particular should be aware that writing strictly for the market
>means, essentially, writing pornography; not much else sells strictly on its
>own merits. Even newspapers and magazines with current news must use their
>editorial contents to lure people to read the ads between the stories. (And
>in the case of newspapers, the ads are often for strip joints, "escort"
>services, and other forms of slightly less self-deceiving prostitution.)

Yes, and that is why I once was a reporter and now am a computer
systems analyst. Before, I was a hack, grinding out filler between the
ads ever day. Now I'm still a hack, but a happy one :-) I write a
little fiction every day, and I enjoy it. (I'm afraid to call it art
-- if they call it art after I am dead, fine.)

I did what I advise artists everywhere to do: "Get a job!"

I still have time to write, and I get to do what I want, instead of
what I was being paid to do when I wrote for a living. Daily reporting
took a lot of the energy for writing out of me.

Would we suffer greatly if "true artists" (government certified) did
not get that little extra boost from government grants? Nah, I do not
think so. I do not see any grants in my horoscope and I am not going
out looking for them. I get by, they can too. I hear Wal-Mart is
hiring.

Stop whining. Get a job. Turn your dining room into a studio. Make art
and don't whine when nobody wants to pay you for it -- it is art and
beyond monetary value, remember? Someday, when the landlord breaks
down the door of the filthy little apartment where you spent your last
days, coughing your lungs out because you could not afford your
medicine, he will find your life's work lovingly preserved on
pedestals and under tarpaulins. He will bring his friend the college
professor over to have a look. The professor will be amazed. Your work
will go on display at museums and galleries around the nation.
Journalists will start digging for facts about the life of the
pathetic hermit who created this beautiful art then died unknown and
penniless. It will be glorious. And that is all you really want, is it
not? Recognition for your art. Not money. Money would have been too
crude. Too superficial.


-- 
scasterg@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu -- Stuart M. Castergine
Fiver: "Oh, Hazel, look! The field! It's covered with blood!"
Hazel: "Don't be silly, it's only the light of the sunset." -- Watership Down
Newsgroups: misc.writing