Art & Life

I've written about poetry having the potential for abstraction in its free form structure to describe something of the essence of life, how words need not line up in order to evoke an idea or emotion - how rhyme can restrict, while free verse can get at the intangible and place it in the very form and structure of a poem. I didn't mention any other styles of artistic expression though, which was a mistake.

Today I read Making Comics by Scott McCloud; it is his 3rd book on comics as an art form, with the 1st one being perhaps the most popular and well-known, Understanding Comics. I bring it up because lately I've been having what I call a "Kiki-dilemma," the name being stolen from the title character of Miyazaki's Kiki's Delivery Service. At one point in the movie she begins to lose her powers because she has no real motivation or inspiration to even use them. Her main ability is flying, but she sees it only as a means of traveling and getting business. With writing these days, though I've still had the ability to get words on the paper in my typical fashion, there wasn't much heart behind it all. It didn't exhilirate me like it used to, and I began to grow worried about what would happen if I lost the will to write. I still wrote, but mostly out of an obligation to myself.

Reading Making Comics reminded me a lot about the beauty I see in art, and the potential in it that I want to take advantage, that I believe should be taken advantage of. Going through the various styles of comics and what's been done with them, I realized part of the reason why I enjoy them so much...or rather, I was reminded of that reason. It's because of the nature of drawing in itself, a sort of abstraction from reality. He discusses it much more in Understanding Comics, how on one end of the spectrum you have reality, and on the other you have absolute abstraction, which is language or text, because the image used to represent a concept no longer even looks like the concept. A drawing of a tree is an image of that tree, and it can grow more and more abstract in its depiction but nothing more so than actual just writing "tree."

I enjoy this part of drawing because it made me think about art again. I'm always at war with myself (about everything really), and with art, for me, that constant question has always been whether I want to approach realism or some form of abstraction, even if it's so minor as to simply be magical realism. In short, do I want to describe the actual world we live in, or do I want to look beyond it, at the way each and every one of us individually conceives of it, with our various histories and beliefs and ideologies. On the one hand, I am a strong advocate of the idea that even the simplest, most common place feature of life has some beauty, and if an artist can see it then he can bring it out and show others. In this sense, life should be taken as it is, as our normal conception of perception (sorry for the strange repetition there) interacts with things. In drawing, this would involve sitting in front of a tree and drawing it, molecule by molecule (not so extreme but you get the idea). On the other hand, I don't believe life is so simple as what we see on the surface. Teeming behind our eyes are a million thoughts, dreams, ideas, hopes, fears, and what have you, not to mention countless seconds spent having all of these things! A tree is not exactly a tree - a tree is senior year in a park, cuddled with a girlfriend, or stories of my cousin climbing one and breaking his arm. A tree does not merely rustle, it sings, and each leaf falling off tinkles like Christmas bells, or stands with its roots in the very blood of history, rooted fiercely, desperately. You see, a tree can be anything that you feel it is, and abstraction in art allows for that - free verse poetry, abstract drawing, even free form and experimental music (in music my tastes are more grounded but I won't rule out something abstract in any form).

The beauty of art is that it can capture so much of life no matter how you tell it. I can draw a hand, and sketch the thinest details into it, every single wrinkle produced from thousands of days of work. Or I can draw just an outline, perhaps not even a hand, perhaps a claw, or the tiniest little fingers. Conveying life: that is what I want to do! McCloud even has a category for such desires in an artist: iconoclast. Because life, even at its darkest, has something heavenly about it. As I like to say, even a tragedy is beautiful. Our very existence is miraculous! And here we are, everyday interacting with this world, never once thinking about the brush of a shoulder or the hundredth time we've walked into a particular building. I try to, at least once every time I ride the bus to and from school, look out the window as we're passing by an avenue, and watch it stretch out, see the buildings in the distance stand so majestically. I'm mesmorized by clouds, dazzled by pidgeons. There is a silence to life, underlying everything, and I'd like to sing it.

Life can never be fully conveyed, of course. Hell, I even wrote a poem about that very idea! But then, life can never be fully understood either - one always learns, always. I take my lessons with interest and a smile, but I've learned the most through friendships, through experience, through taking moments to look at the ocean and sigh. The main purpose of art, at its deepest core, is expression of...something. An idea, an emotion, an idealogy, anything that needs to be expressed. I see it as an opportunity - what can I express to you that you haven't thought of before? They say we're telling the same stories over and over again, fine, but how can the way I tell it affect you? I'll necessarily add perhaps a tinge of despair to a sunny day, some rain to your smile, my entire middle school experience to a discussion of post-colonial literature, and what will you feel then? I think the thing that us high-aspiration type artists strive for is simply showing you an image, a life, a place, a thing that you haven't thought about before, even if it's just a change in perspective. What did Hamlet look like to Ophelia? Ah, a much different story comes about! The artist says, "hey, life is out there, have you seen it? I'm sure you have, but have you seen what I've seen?" And every once in a while, you read something or see something or hear something, some piece of artistic expression, and you open your eyes and your heart swells up, and whisper an "ah" of discovery. I live for those moments, and I only hope to give them to someone else someday...