part one- attempting to weave and unravel art history, religion, art theory, contemporary society, and A Clockwork Orange...

one thing i've been thinking about a lot lately in terms of art (in general) and my practice as i continue to wrestle with contemporary theory, is the assertion that original thought is impossible (The Death of the Author) which i don't (at this point) disagree with at all. in fact, i'm very comfortable (and comforted by) the lineage of artistic enterprise. there's a lot to learn and build upon and struggle with/against/for.

but the idea of "genius" is not one of them. at least not for me and what i'd like my work to accomplish.

the problem i have with this notion of the impossibility of original thought or "newness" in art or thinking, is that the idea itself claims to be new. and it isn't. "There is nothing new under the sun" is a biblical quote and contemporary art theory unveils the religious lineage of art by making this assertion. which is only strange due to the fact that most intellectuals (and that includes a great deal of theorists, artists, writers, psychologists, philosophers, etc) will tell you God is dead. more specifically, the judeo-christian God is dead and that morality is a governmental device intended to control human behavior and impulse. basically, it is brainwashing mechanism, government stamped and approved (as religion is, historically, government), to eliminate free-will.

power-structures of greed and dominion are at the root of this and also the common man's struggle for personal liberty. freedom, in this context, is what contemporary art signifies no matter what a person's subject happens to be. artists are no longer in the service of the church, painting murals for popes and members of the nobility. or are they? could contemporary theory be descibed as a Pope? has the pope's hat merely become invisible? and is currently being shuffled around, worn by different heads? would not a rose by any other name still smell as sweetly? (thanks, bard!) especially when that sweet smell emanates from wealth and the power wealth affords (the umbilical cord of gold: the avant-guard does not actually exist)? today, based on Guy Debord's work The Society of The Spectacle, the invisible Pope Hat would be dominant culture itself. the masses who have accepted Images as reality. status symbols. surrogates for the truth rather than the truth itself. if i look rich, people believe i am rich. if i am perceived as successful, i am successful. if i am titled "good", i am good.

which takes us in to A Clockwork Orange, a subject i'll be returning to a lot as i think it is a very important work that i, individually within my practice and thinking, need to wrestle with.

this idea of goodness... what it is and how to create it.

aversion therapy as a means of controlling behavior, of presenting a painful consequence for desire. any desire that is deemed problematic.

violence is definitely problematic as humans are social creatures that must find a way to work together in order to simply not extinguish ourselves. compromise is a necessity. but i find it very interesting that the violent actions of the narrator of the film is juxtaposed with signifiers of youth and innocence: drinking milk and rhyming speech. Alex DeLarge refers to his meal as eggie-wegs and steaky-wakes. a very sing-song slang that, at first glance, heightens the creep factor of the story for sure, but the more i think about it i begin to wonder... is Burgess and Kubrick saying that acts of violence are childish behaviors? a signifier of being spoiled rotten? because violence itself is a form of greed, a take-what-you-can-grab (as evidenced by rape and theft in the story) and but-i-want-it-and-i-deserve-it toddler-esque mentality. yes- i am saying violent people are over-grown, ill-behaved children. but the critique this film performs is to say that contemporary western society itself is pretty much a stunted adolescent, enamoured with sex and power. any method of displaying power or acquiring sex is a-okay: violence: the taking of something by brute force. and this is juxtaposed also in the film by the fact that Alex is shown as being more than capable of receiving sex from a willing participant. he picks up, not one but two, girls and has a threesome- the scene itself, sped up to a blur of hundreds of images too fast to keep up with, is actually quite funny and playful. this highlights common psychological knowledge about rape as actually not being motivated by a sexual impulse whatsoever, but is rather a desire for power. dominion. a person to person mirroring of The State. a microcosm. very much an act of imperialism when it comes right down to it. "might makes right" and all that. again, the take-what-you-can-grab philosophy hard at work.

in this way, Alex is an "every man". a poster child. common. the unavoidable end of living within a society that champions power and aggression. it's like Reagan-omics but with violence instead of money. shit rolls down hill. if your leaders are corrupt, and the masses are so dazzled by Images of status and wealth as to be blind to that fact, the masses in turn will seek for themselves the same level of power and corruption. if you are raised by a burglar, chances are you know how to pick a lock. you've seen it done too many times not to have the steps memorized. and that is called indoctrination. nurture. Alex's droogs even try to attain (take) the level of power he enjoys in the group. an uprising. and Alex puts the kibosh to that with fast violence. pretty much the same thing (again) that the state does to those who challenge its power.

more later. i must jog.

horrible, possibly inexcusable, artist confession #1

i have never seen A Clockwork Orange.

the reason for this is when i was 14 and very interested in watching it, i was told that Alex is a big ol' rapist. and at that tender age, already a budding feminist but also still very much consumed by the torturous wasteland of Bad Body Image and related fears about men, this horrified me. not to mention i am incredibly sensitive to portrayals of pain, especially rape, on film. because rape isn't a fictional event in this world, in fact its exceedingly common, the fact some one is "acting" a rape doesn't really make a difference. it rips my heart apart. the image itself is brutal. i turn the channel when the shower scene in American History X happens. and pulp fiction ends for me right after Bruce Willis' fight. and i couldn't even stay in the room recently when i tried to watch Blindness. i'm very squeamish about all this.

but more and more, Kubrick's work has been coming up in certain art spheres and conversations and he's the man responsible for 2 of my favorite movies ever: The Shining and Full Metal Jacket. and so... can i overcome my "ethics" as it were, and get myself educated in order to participate in the discussion??? i hope so. who says art has to be comfortable? and since i haven't seen the movie, i'm really in no position to critique its functions anyway.

besides, from an art historical stand point, i'm entirely without excuse. i must submit to having my feathers ruffled and yanked out by art. i must engage before i can claim to know. and to know anything.

so there it is: my dirty little artist secret. an example of self-sheltering that must be overcome.