Art - a word dogs know and use all the time.

This is what I think art is: art is communing with the mystical world.  No wait, don’t scoff, I’m serious.  Art is mysticism.  Art is the work that certain people do that brings other people into a communal spiritual place that is a broader form of communication in one way or another than the day to day.  It’s spiritual.  So if you can get your audience to step out of their own shoes for a moment, and they don’t just sit there wondering why they are not in their shoes, then you have made good art.

You are still scoffing.

Seriously, I mean, I’ve gotten to a point in which I am pompous enough to go to an art gallery and get insulted by the way that a curator presents an exceedingly pessimistic view of reality, or the way that certain art galleries are filled with people who don’t look at the art.  The worst to me, however, the thing that ticks me off the worst, is when nobody responds to the art.  I mean, I am a pompous, self-diagnosed artist.  But can’t people react to the stuff in front of them?  I mean, half of the art today is so controversial, so overtly provocative, that it takes an act of will to stymie a reaction.  At least for me.

Okay, let’s face it, that’s probably just me.  And I don’t generally stymie my urges to respond, unless some dude in a black jacket tells me to shut up or get out.

But still, somebody has to be out there that says, well, conventions be what they are, I am sufficiently concerned about this video of children having sex that I will try to consider why the artist did this.  I guess its someone like me who just starts talking to the people around him about what the work means and how it makes me feel.  Other people just don’t presuppose anything about the other people milling about in the gallery.  Its just me and the old folks, and occasionally a really strange guy who will continue to follow you around long after the conversation has run its course and you are running away.

Okay, so I can see how this can get weird.  I can see that.  I admit that there is a weirdo factor going on, but I posit that the weirdos will become a less prominent feature of the gallery discussions circuit once it takes off.

Now, I know what you’re thinking, you’re thinking: Robusto, listen, if everybody started talking at a gallery, then it would be impossible to concentrate.  Especially at a place like MoMA (the newly re-opened Museum of Modern Art in Manhattan – worth several looks [take it a floor at a time – that will be six visits at $20 a visit.  {On second thought, just become a member for $70}]).  My response to you is this: I just want you to react to the art.  Let the art become a communication rather than simply a force of nature.  You know, the artist is interpreting the spirit world, they are not the biggest experts on the subject, and if they get you talking, then you stand a chance of getting something out of the experience and sharing it with those around you, which is rarely a bad thing.

Okay, except when you start talking confrontationally to a very large businessman who begins grinding his teeth when you stand next to him, or a woman who has her arms crossed forbiddingly in front of her and a thirty pound handbag dangling from her wrist like a mace.  These are tell-tale signs.

But yeah, just remind yourself that art is spiritual and that it is showing you how to detach yourself from the real world in an interesting new way.  In the case of African art, it often communicates the exact opposite effect, but most of us wouldn’t know that because it is meant for a very specific audience.  So just be amazed by the spooky faces and outlandish masks, and don’t concern yourself with the rituals that give meaning to that artifice.  But wait, isn’t going to the gallery a ritual of sorts?

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm…

Yeah, I guess, but white walls, people in black jackets and a crowd of distracted strangers don’t get you into the moment quite as much as rhythmic chanting, elaborate masquerades and scarification.

Just some thoughts.