The Artist and Society

My thesis, is that contemporary society and the artist don't mix well. There are many reasons for this. The penultimate cause is that contemporary education is in existence to stifle creative impulses - not to encourage them.

Education teaches that 2 + 2 = 4.

If you say it’s 5, you won't get out of the first grade. If you would like to say that earth is flat - then you will be fine - so long as you are living in the 10th century.

Every discipline has it’s axioms and rules. Schooling exists to teach you both rules about knowledge, and rules about what society values. Art in the schools is not only non-existent – when it does exist it is there to help socialize you as well.

The school marching band is the perfect example. Play the right notes at the right time and march in step with the other members. Remember, you are a part of a group. You are not going to get a solo. You are not going to have the chance to express yourself as an individual. You are there to learn how to be a part of something larger than yourself.

If schools wanted to encourage kids to be musicians, they’be be forming rock-and-roll bands and handing out electric guitars.

Children in western society as far as art goes find their own way.

As far as painting goes - the last time you had creative freedom was in kindergarten when you spashed paint with your fingers, and your parents told you how beautiful it was and stuck it up on the fridge. It's all downhill after that.

In my younger years, I taught photography to 15 year old kids at a summer camp. With digital photography - you could lower the age to about seven.

Education - once you get through the first grade - exists to discourage you from such fun. The purpose of schooling is to help society flourish - not for the individual. And the way to make sure that we are all acting in unison is to embed us with rules. Rules, rules, rules. This is right and this is wrong. That's all you need to know. If you do spit back what you've been told - then you are rewarded. First in school, later in the real world.

What sort of society would this be if everyone was thinking for themselves.

And one day you find yourself telling your own children the things you think you learned.

Each generation passing the rules on to the next generation and the list of rules changing, getting longer – but always with you for guidance. You live with an entity - let's call him Mr. Ruleman (because it is a male sort of authority figure) - who watches over every creative impulse.

* * *

Back to the 2 + 2 example.

Once you know the answer is 4, no need to go any further. This is how you spell broken using the English language. There is no other way to spell broken. If you spell broken correctly, you will do well on our tests. If you do well on our tests you will do well in school. Better schools for you young man. And at the end – a better job and after that an even better retirement.

But we all come to life with a creative spark. It lies dormant in most of us while we learn to follow the correct path.

This Creative Spark isn’t useful in school because it doesn’t care about right and wrong. Creative Spark is hungry – but not for correct answers. Instead it wants and hungers for mysterious answers. Absurd answers. It wants to sing and dance. But you entomb Creative Spark in the marching band – maybe in the tuba player who is dying to step out and take a solo. But Creative Spark will have to lie dormant a while longer.

So Creative Spark sleeps in the corners. Curls up in the mental structure you've built to hold it at bay. Oh, it comes out once in a while – maybe gets to sing in the shower. Or dabble with horticulture. And everything is fine until one day, in one person – maybe it’s you – Creative Spark becomes more powerful and breaks through. (The breakthrough of Creative Spark is further explored in Chapter Nine). In the meantime, society must punish the Creative Spark and make sure it cannot thrive. This is easy enough. Lot’s of rejection usually works. But if it lingers on – you can starve Creative Spark into submission. After all – what would become of us with a world of poets and dancers? We’d vanish from the face of the earth. Where would our food come from? Our housing? It's not that Creative Spark is a bad influence - but left to its own devices - you are looking at the complete collapse of civilization.

But there are solutions: allow the individual to partake in the life of the artist by identifying with them. This usually begins when the hild is pre-teen and the walls become plastered with rock stars and athletes.

Society fills the air-waves and every possible outlet with stories about movie stars and rock-stars. We have award shows in an inverse ratio to our own creativity as a society.

Oh - but one day - usually in your middle decade of life, that time when Mr. Ruleman's hold over you begins to weaken. The time when you look back and wonder what it's all about. That gives Creative Spark a chance to burst into flame! You've flown south for the winter and find yourself sitting on the beach writing poetry,or sketching waves.

And once it’s burning – it flourishes on your sensory impressions, on your original thoughts. Unlike Mr. Ruleman, Creative Fire spews forth all the gob that's been holding it down: bad books, bad sketches, awful music - and it doesn't care. It just wants a chance to live in the spotlight for a while. And after the detritus is gone - Creative Flame - instead of being a nobody in your soul - it burns like a torch. You follow.

Yes. It this really is the time to work on my painting. I used to enjoy it so much. Why did I stop? Oh that’s right. Mr. Ruleman didn’t think much of it. But you did enjoy it.

II

When Creative Flame bursts forth, Mr. Ruleman doesn't take this sitting down. However great you become - Ruleman will be your enemy. Telling you that what you are doing is no good. That it's been done before. That you'll never make any money at it. That you will be scorned.

Mr. Ruleman will inform you that there are children to be put through college and a mortgage to pay. But you are working in your spare time – in the den – on your novel about World War II. This is going to be better than even the Greatest Generation. They’re going to make it into a movie if you’re lucky. It’s going to make you famous. Creative Flame is a tremendous liar. Creative Flame will use all it's tricks now that it is alive - to stay alive. Creative Spark will mimic Ruleman and use his own tricks against him.

He now appropriates Ruleman's phrases: rich and famous How fine it would be to have the best of both worlds. Wealthy and artistic. Original and recognized for same. Make everyone happy.

III

You've become an artist. The Creative Flame burns steadily.

First problem: you’re not used to working without the Ruleman's structure. You no longer know what's right and what's wrong. There doesn't seem to be an analogy to "2+2=4" in this world.

In short: have you written a good novel or not?

You look at your creation and you can’t figure out whether it equals 4 or 5. Worse yet - who is the authority? Who can tell you whether your creative output is good or bad. Right or wrong? The Creative Flame doesn’t care. It just wants to keep going. But Ruleman cares. You want Ruleman to be happy as well.

The horror is that no one can give you the absolute stamp of approval. These so-called judges are like the death penalty – they get it right most of the time. But the jury isn’t always right. And if you are doing something truly different – they are likely to get it wrong.

And so that is what you struggle with. You have so many decades of inculcation by the Ruleman – who offers a simple path to happiness. And you just don’t have any confidence in this Creative Spark that seems to come and go as it pleases. That doesn’t owe allegiance to any school, teaching or country. It doesn’t care a hoot about philosophy or how the stock exchange is doing. It doesn’t care about money in your pocket. It doesn’t care about anything but having a chance to burn brightly. And when Creative Flame comes up against Mr. Ruleman – it is a monumental battle for your soul.

We will study this conflict with the cases of Anna A. and Justin L. in the following chapter.

- 2005