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Should
Artists Keep Quiet?
5-29-2004
The following is an issue
that has been gnawing at my mind for a while. I have read and studied
and traveled enough in my lifetime to know I know very little about most
things and probably less than I think I know about the rest. Still,
I’ll wager I know some things that you don’t and visa-versa, so only
through expressing our opinions can we hope to piece the entire
puzzle together. Galileo once said, “I have never met a man so
ignorant that I cannot learn something from him.” My hope is that you
can look past the many ignorant statements history will inevitably
identify in what I say and learn something from the few ideas that spur
you to think about these important issues and make your own
determinations. If you would rather stick to the paintings, simply
don’t read this page
To speak out or not to
speak out, that is the question that I’ve heard raised on many levels
at some of the recent shows. I’ve heard many say that they think
political comments have no place in an art show and that it detracts
from the public’s enjoyment of the paintings, which should be what an
art show is about. Someone even mentioned that one collector was so
disgusted with an artist’s statement in a catalogue that it
made them want to discontinue collecting that particular artist.
I think collectors sometimes get the sense that realistic art is
simply “pretty pictures” devoid of any “message”; that only so
called “contemporary” art says anything controversial. There are
many ways to say the same thing. Artists devote their entire lives to
searching out the beauty of nature, studying it and acquiring the skills
with brush and paint that allows them to convey what they’ve learned
and felt to others. Just because many of us choose not to jump around
naked and burn effigies of
political figures in some sort of headline grabbing “performance
art”, doesn’t mean we’re not making just as powerful of a
statement with our paintings. I would argue that by showing people how
awesomely beautiful nature is, the realist landscape artist, for
example, is making a far more persuasive argument for it’s
preservation in the very way that many of our greatest artists from
Albert Bierdstadt to Maynard Dixon to Ansel Adams and countless others
did in their time. Much of the movement to create our National Parks
started with people seeing the paintings and photographs of these
artists and listening to the message behind them.
For myself, and many
others I know, every painting has an important truth or message to
convey; sometimes political, spiritual, whimsical, or even so subtle
that it defies a verbal expression. The fact that so many seemed shocked
by an artist's comment that such scenes as they’d portrayed
were being fast destroyed by the short-sighted policies of the
government, showed me that many simply were not understanding the
message behind the paintings. I find it especially ironic that a
collector who would pay thousands of dollars for such an inspiring
portrayal of nature’s beauty would be so angered that the artist who
painted it would speak out in an attempt to preserve the actual location
of the paintings!
”…you
don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone. They paved paradise and
put up a parking lot.” goes the Joni
Mitchell song. No doubt some simply dance to the rhythm and ignore
the lyrics, but there is something to learn from art of all kinds if you
just take the time to look and listen. To say that an art show is about
the paintings and nothing else ignores the fact that paintings
themselves are about people, the beauty of nature, joy, sorrow, beauty, birth,
death, and all of the world about us. Unchained from the nine to five
routine, an artist, be they a poet, photographer, singer, or painter,
has the freedom to travel, learn, and study the world in a way that few
ever will. It is through our chosen art that we share what we’ve
learned. This is not to say that the ordinary person doesn’t feel the
same things, but without the skill or the time to express them, they
search out an artist’s work that expresses their own feelings as
surrogate, and, by supporting their career, help amplify and take an
active role in conveying that message to others.
I don’t pretend to know
a fraction of what the full-time landscape painters I’ve met know
about the state of the environment or of the details of government
policies in this matter, which is why I sit up and listen when they say
something is going horribly wrong; as has been the case in the last
several years. It might be uncomfortable for me to question my previous
assumptions and the trust I’ve placed in elected officials, but that
is what responsible adults do; they seek out those who know more than
they and learn from them! The most crucial knowledge is knowing what you
do not know and constantly questioning even what you think you know.
That is why I found it disturbing that most all of the discussion
surrounding this issue has been about free speech and the
appropriateness of a political statement in an art catalogue or at a
show. I really thought we’d gotten that one behind us a couple hundred
years ago! How much more productive if we’d all just step up and
actually ask the artist making such a statement to share their insights
and the details of what they’ve observed. If you disagree with the
statement, then debate that head on and say why it’s wrong rather than
attacking the right or appropriateness to say it in the first place.
While I’ve heard some
say they aren’t taking issue with these statements themselves but only
with the venue in which they’re expressed, I’m a bit skeptical since
I’ve seen numerous religious and patriotic comments in many of the
show catalogues without so much as a raised eyebrow. No, I have a
feeling that the objections are really to do with the actual content. To
my mind, one of the most patriotic things anyone can do is pointing out
that the beauty of our country’s natural environment is not only meant
for us to enjoy and exploit, but should also be preserved for future
generations of Americans.
Maybe there are some who
are completely contented to see the forests leveled, unrestrained
development gobble up our deserts, streams, wetlands and the very air
around us until they will support nothing more than our machines and
concrete structures. We all have a right to our opinions and if that is
the majority’s view, that is what will happen in a democracy. Those
with that point-of-view are also free to express their ideas with
paintings, or magazine columns, poems, songs, or websites; but when I
walk through galleries I notice that there are far more paintings of
pristine mountain streams than strip malls or clear-cut forests so I
wonder why someone would be so excited to buy an artist’s paintings
for tens of thousands of dollars but not value the actual place at least
as much?
If you disagree with my
views on the environment then speak up as well since that is what this
country is all about. In my opinion silence in the face of something you
know is wrong is the only real crime. I’m not so arrogant to think
I’m always right and believe in the greater wisdom of the many over
one so will abide by the decision of the majority even when it goes
against my own preference. But if I don’t at least speak out and say
what I strongly believe in, both with paint and word, as a few others
have bravely done, then I will have failed in my responsibility both as
an artist and an American, not to mention a citizen of the planet as a
whole.
When our monuments and
skyscrapers have crumbled, rusted, or been blown away by bombs dropped
for forgotten affronts; when the distant children of our descendents
look back on our age, they will think not of what we built, painted, or
written as our greatest achievement so much as what we preserved of the
natural world, and look in sadness and incomprehension at what wonders
we allowed to pass forever into dust and extinction through mere greed
and carelessness. I am a great advocate of science and progress and eagerly await all that the future holds from genetic
advances, to understanding our origins, to colonizing other planets; but
I also know that progress means doing so in a thoughtful manner so that
in gaining some new wonder we don't loose the marvels already in our
possession. This means working together as a whole to moderate the
impact we have on the environment; to think long term in order to create
a sustainable world economy; to find ways to keep our population from
spiraling upward to the point that a collapse becomes inevitable.
These problems are not new
to societies, and throughout history some societies have made the right
decisions and survived and others have ignored the problems and
destroyed themselves. The only difference now is that we are playing
this game not in isolated pockets, but on a global scale. For more on
this topic, I'd strongly recommend a book by one of my favorite authors, Jared Diamond,
who wrote the Pulitzer prize winning, "Guns, Germs, and Steel". His
new book, Collapse:
How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed, looks at a dozen or so
societies both modern and ancient and thoroughly explores the effects of
ignoring the environment and how overexploiting it can lead to a society's
collapse. There's examples of societies that recognized the danger
and acted before it was too late and other examples of places like Easter
Island, where the various tribes got so caught up in the competition to build
bigger and bigger stone figures that they cut down every last tree on the island
in the process and had none left to build the boats their livelihood depended
upon. The author takes you across the world and through time in such an
entertaining manner that you rarely feel like you're reading a book about
science. The extremists on both sides of this issue should beware, since
you will probably find some of your most cherished beliefs crumbling
away in the face of the thorough examination from all sides. If you
don't think you could live without your belief that any tree should ever
be cut down or any government regulation ever passed to limit business's
use of the environment, then you should definitely steer clear of this
book!
For those interested in
doing something about the environment, here's a link to the Sierra
Club's website where you can find out much more about what to do. http://sierraclub.org/
A good book that details some of the recent attacks on the environment
is "Strategic
Ignorance", by Carl Pope and Paul Rauber. Most importantly, though, this should not be an issue exclusive to any
one political party. There are good people in both of the political
camps, they just need to be supported and encouraged with your votes and
letters. This is a matter that benefits all of us and it's dangerous to
become identified with one party since environmental policy needs to be
an agreed-upon matter that will be consistently applied no matter which
side is currently ascendant. It only takes one shortsighted
administration to break the chain of preservation and render restoration
of a species or forest an impossibility.
Ok, I'll shut up now.
Scott (-:
5-29-2004
Trust for Public Land
www.tpl.org
Project for Public Spaces www.pps.org
The Conservation Fund
www.conservationfund.org
Land Trust Alliance
www.lta.org
The Urban Open Space
Foundation http://www.uosf.org/
Sierra
Club http://sierraclub.org/
The
Piedmont Land Conservancy http://www.piedmontland.org/
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