On
the unofficial anti-holiday known as Tax Day, my wife and I anti-celebrated by
taking in the 2012 blockbuster film "Hunger games"—along with one of
my oldest friends and music associates (and his wife). At that time, HG was
about to reach its fourth consecutive weekend at number one. At a time pre-dating current super
widespread international and domestic piracy threats, four weeks would equal maybe ten weeks. Just a little
less recently to our movie date, I was quasi reticent to even spend the money
on that particular movie because of the subject matter—namely the ostensibly
hackneyed premise where humans are being hunted by privileged humans for the
sport enjoyed by a ruling sect. There is a popular expression: "I've seen that
movie". Based on its trailer, I felt this way about the much ballyhooed
"HG". The first of this story of the genre I can remember is
"The Most Dangerous Game", bonus-beloved by me for (my interpreting)
its use of "Game" as double entendre. Much later last century, along
came Da pre-governating Tohminator,
along with Hogan's Heroic Feud-meister (the late Richard Dawson); they begat
"Running Man"—that incidentally begat an annoying dance move that
shows up at times on Saturday Night Live when former Nicklodian'ian Keenan
Thompson asks the musical question, "Whazzup with That". This
rendition was great. Contrary to my misgivings and to my pleasant surprise,
what I saw instead was a new work that did use an overused premise but created
something new. Therein is today's object lesson brought to us by Tinseltown.
It
doesn't always take reinventing the wheel for ones efforts to be genuinely
effectively creative…or deemed as such. Perhaps this fact has been lost or at
least muddled in the muddling trans-terming of musician, singer, and/or
singer/songwriter as so-called "artists". The term educes in the
aforementioned group a self-inflicted onus to be Picasso's as opposed to being
deemed Kinkade's or Keane's. Margaret Keane is famous for her surrealistic
paintings of cute things with hyperbolically large irises—picture those
Puss-in-Boots' sad eyes in the "Shrek" films. Thomas Kinkade—at the
time of his death, ten days prior to this writing—was renowned as the greatest
selling living American painter as the king of kitsch. "…the king of kitsch, there's no one higher,
sucker ar-teest gotta call him sire." …more on this comparison later. When we were kings…of singing God's
praises, entertaining audiences, casting beautiful benign love dreams in
malleable adolescent minds, and generally griot/minstrels at large, our
"art" had more to do with preparation for skillful presentation,
than—as Rez Band's Glenn Kaiser once so aptly phrased it—juggling and spitting nickels. Which is to say the art was the
idiom, the craft was what made the show, and the sacrifices made in preparation
developed and refined the craft. For a craftsman, it's all about building the
best product to please the client. While for (too) many an artist, it is about
building themselves to build their cult following of pleasers pleased to
indiscriminately accept every lauded offering as a work of genius.
Nowadays,
"The next big thing" and "Flavor of the week" are phrases
that have come to qualify new things as necessarily better things.
Unfortunately, so many credited with new creations have created only
recreations. Lady Gaga is something new if one ignores her predecessors, namely
the likes of Madonna and Bette Midler. In this regard, she seems but a
portmanteau of the two. We often read about rappers who are lauded for their
genius innovative utilization of live instrumental background music as opposed
to the standard sampled loops and drum machines, while live bands get
comparatively little acclaim. Groups who hone traditional band skills are
classified as "Neo-" or "throwback". It's a way to
rationalize the current acts as being cutting edge for their dearth of
traditional skills, while softly marginalizing skilled players and arrangers as
old-fashioned. Sadly, style is so often the root excuse for those who're
predisposed to skip up in line rather than enduring the long journey of
artistic self-discovery. Hopefully, this will be discovered in time…in time.
As
to the Kinkade comparison mentioned early, his works were the type of artwork
that usually hangs (some might say "…dang well should hang.") in
motels and family restaurants—bucolic exterior scenes. Though they're not the
pieces that garner high critical praise, they are what his many consumers
greatly treasure, and for his efforts, or lack thereof to cater to the former,
his became an industry unto himself. I am a graphic artist as well; it was my
first artistic manifestation, shown in mid-single digits. At the suggestion of
my son, my wife and I have begun uploading my works on tumblr.com.
On this website, there a many fascinating works displayed by extremely talented
and imaginative artists. I haven't seen anything there like Kinkade's work; and
in fairness, I doubt if any of us will see the phenomenal success seen and
"enjoyed" by Kinkade. According to reports, he was an alcoholic and
(not necessarily because of it) committed suicide. That said, what he will be
best known for is the success he made creating quotidian works that pleased
multitudes. Technically he was an artist. Fundamentally he was a business
success. Many of us are "starving artists" figuratively drawing up
plans for a new wheel. There are enough of us out there chomping at the bit to
roll on something new, and perhaps for this, we will be doubly blessed. But in
most cases, those we see as successful “artists” are those who work from
established templates that garner fame and fortune…at least while they are
alive still to enjoy that.
This is SIDney Howard reporting
to you from bucolic Obscuritania.
SIDizzzouttt!!!
*[By American Niggling-Annoyance Standards]
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