Great topic.
My goals as an artist are manifold. Short answer: I want to create things that I don’t already see in the world. Ideally, I would like to raise questions and make statements that can’t be expressed in words. Ideally, I would like those questions and statements to address some aspect of the human condition, filtered through my own experience. But I do not want to be overt or didactic. Art needs to be open to interpretation, otherwise it’s just escapist entertainment.
To expand on the idea of creating things that don’t already exist… this can embrace pure abstraction, representation, or various forms of collage and appropriation. So much can be expressed via semiotic association, reframing, montage, etc. Taking things that already exist and turning them into something novel and unexpected is really the core of the creative process. There’s nothing new under the sun. Nothing can come from nothing; creativity is not a process of spontaneous generation of the universe ex nihilo. Everything has source material, even if that material is a universal phenomenon such as a mathematical construct like a sine wave. More complex source material, such as pre-existing creative works, allows more complex statements to be made. It’s kind of hard to address questions like “What are the parallels between biological reproduction and technological design?” using pure abstraction. The risk with appropriation, of course, is the perception of creative dishonesty / theft. Derivative works must take their source material in new directions and invest them with new meanings in order to be truly “creative”.
But I digress.
Regarding finding an audience, I have always struggled with this. The difficult nature of my work, combined with my essentially antisocial personality, means my opportunities are few and far between. The art world is a social phenomenon. This applies to fine art, performing art, commercial art, all of it. I learned this in elitist art school, where I saw quite clearly that the teachers did not teach technique. AT ALL. It didn’t matter what department one was in. Painting, video, music, it didn’t matter. Students who found success after graduation were the ones who were good at networking. At the time, I railed against this, and even now it is difficult to accept. But the reality is that the quality of the work, the profound questions it raises, the aesthetic value invested within it… don’t matter in terms of finding an audience. That is an entirely different process of social networking.
Practically speaking, I would be content with merely getting short video pieces screened at experimental film festivals. In the past, I have had limited success with this. Currently I am experiencing zero success. But I know that my work is difficult, sometimes physically painful to watch. But that is necessary to convey the questions and statements I’m trying to explore. Sometimes I wonder if my (fair) use of mainstream film and TV raises questions of liability. But more likely, the super harsh chaotic flicker is just too much for people to bear, even in experimental circles. Video synthesis gives me the ability to push this beyond what the structural filmmakers like Paul Sharits could accomplish with optical printing.
Regarding the economics of avant-garde motion pictures: my advice is to choose your parents wisely. These media are notorious for being endless money sinks. The costs of production are always far, far greater than the possible economic rewards. There are very few exceptions, such as Matthew Barney, but generally it’s impossible to break even. The problem is much less acute than in the pre-digital age. We have SO MANY relatively inexpensive options. Sure, it’s easy to spend tens of thousands of dollars on video hardware, but in the bad old days one could simply spend tens of thousands of dollars on rentals, lab fees and video post.
And yet, even though production costs have diminished by at least an order of magnitude in the past 30 years, it’s still essentially impossible to recoup those costs. There’s just no market for this stuff. People don’t want it. They want traditional cinematic narrative, end of story. Europeans are more open-minded about this than Americans, but only to the extent that their governments are willing to fund the avant-garde, at a loss to taxpayers. I can’t speak to Asia, except to say that in most places there are much more pressing issues than supporting the arts.
Bottom line, art is the playground of the rich. So if you are independently wealthy, or exceptionally charismatic, or just super lucky, you might have a shot at recognition. But even that is no guarantee of financial success. I can’t help but invoke the ghost of Stan Brakhage. Here was an artist who was greatly talented, a visionary in every sense. Completely unable to support himself with his groundbreaking genius, he took a teaching position. Then he got cancer. Thanks to the medical-industrial complex in the USA, he had to move to Canada to die. After his death, he was acknowledged by the Academy at the Oscar ceremony’s In Memoriam montage. Fat lot of good that did him, or anyone.
So my best case scenario is that after I’m dead, someone might dig up my work from the Internet Archive, and maybe a few thousand people around the world might appreciate it. Until then, I am resigned to toiling in obscurity, stoking the fires of the alchemical crucible, and writing long-ass polysyllabic essays on Internet forums.
Regarding online platforms, YouTube is incredibly super evil. It will inject ads into your work, totally non-consensually and without paying you a penny. I’ve put my work my own website, and on Vimeo. Hosting expenses and Vimeo Pro subscription add up to $1300 per year and rising. But I just cannot allow Google, or any other agent of darkness and misery, to hold the keys to my little kingdom.
Thank you for coming to my TED talk.
