i have been thinking about the people that already value art-the people who spend their lives making it or teaching it or supporting it whole-heartedly. i have been thinking about those people who want everyone to come downtown to be surrounded by art, simply because it is important to be surrounded by art.

i have been thinking about how we need to find a way  to get those people to help others see what they do.

help us see why beauty is so damned important.

.

and then today, steve jobs died. i was eating an apple, surfing the web and listening to music on my macbook, and i read that steve jobs died.

steve, who said

“Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don’t lose faith. I’m convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You’ve got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don’t settle…Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart…Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”

and i realized something stunningly crystal clear:

i am those people.

i am those people who understand the value of art and beauty in everyone’s lives. i am those people who understand the importance of having patrons of the arts-and all the varying ways that a person can be a patron. i am those people that knows that it’s important to patronize the arts not just so that artists are supported but because of what society gets in return when artists have that space to create. it is just as important for the non-artists that artists are able to sustain a livelihood doing what they were created to do. it is important for all of us. it affects all of our society if art is not valued. it deeply, significantly, life-changingly affects our entire culture when it stops understanding the importance of beauty, expression and creation.

because beauty is so damned important.

.

i am those people.

and so today, i am going to listen to steve jobs when he tells me to “avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.” i am going to start by sharing what it is am supposed to be saying-out loud, in public, and not just in confidence with those i trust. i am going to stand up speak out, and hopefully start a conversation and get some people thinking.

i am going to start by telling you, begging you, urging you with every fiber of my being:

patronize the arts.

it will not be only the artists who benefit.

.

.

.

taken in The Spot, 29 Pearl

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this seems to happen when you’re surrounded by art and creation enough. it starts to seep into you and affect the way you see the world.

walking around ArtPrize, if you take it in small regular bites instead of trying to cram it all into one day, you get to make these little discoveries, notice the quiet details that speak more eloquently than the popular big statements. the corner of stephen knapp’s “castled void” suddenly became electric for me when i saw the way his work played with the corner of the room.

you start to see the little corners of beauty.

do that often enough, like ArtPrize’s 2 1/2 weeks allows, and it can transform the way you see the regular details of your own life. you start to see things differently.

you start to see like an artist: finding beauty where you hadn’t noticed it before; becoming fascinated by tiny details that glisten.

and that is a benefit of ArtPrize that is hard to quantify, but is perhaps one of my favorite: the chance to ignite an artist’s eye in so many of us who have stopped seeing the beauty in the details.

Stephen Knapp's "Castled Void" can be found at Frederick Meijer Gardens

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maybe it’s the fact that they posted their progress day by day, and i got to see their process as artists.

maybe it was meeting the charming artists on the opening night of artprize, comparing bits of the work to guston, learning to talk about something having SWAG (or being swag? i don’t know. sorry guys.), finding out that most of the artists had art degrees and the one that didn’t was currently studying printmaking and so was including carving into the work, as if making a block to be used to print images.

maybe it was the idea of working with a group of artists on a large project that won my heart.

maybe it was learning that most of the artists would not call themselves graffiti artists.

maybe it was that i could keep looking, and discovering more. i wanted to spend more time with it.

.

but i did, indeed, get charmed by screwed rapids.

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it was the building, not the competition, that inspired him to come. it was the fact that the owner of the building would let him put a hole through the roof in order to create his vision. only after he and his gallery had become excited about the context of the building did they google the context of the competition.

it was then they realized what they had gotten him into.

“i will go home and have my reputation intact,” he said. the concerns we talked about were how to ensure that ArtPrize itself could create its own reputation of merit. it was probably some of the best, most honest conversation about the realities of the art world that i’ve had in a while. no pretention, no illusions of grandeur, and no -thank god- michigan nice. i think we had both had enough of that for the evening.

…

i went back today to visit spire again. i really started to understand his “preoccupation with environment and light.” the best part of the work, for me, was peeking up through the clean new wood structure (in the middle of all this crumbling concrete and peeling remains of earlier use) as it busted through the ceiling and let light pour in.

it made me think about the chances we have here, in our old run-down sad place that art has been relegated in popular society. we can bring new thoughts, new light, fresh insight. we can build again.

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this is a call to action, without apology, to the arts community in grand rapids, michigan.

two nights ago, our artprize top ten for the third year was announced. i don’t know why we’re not allowed to say this publicly, but the majority of the choices were …simply… abysmal.

now granted, i understand that people are perhaps not voting with selecting the very best in mind. many are, like i did that first year, so excited that they’re hitting “thumbs up” for anything they are enjoying. and granted, our arts education and arts appreciation in the good ol’ us-of-a is slim if not anorexic. it’s just not a regular part of our days. understanding and learning about art is not something that our school systems and our family lives put as a priority on a regular basis.

but even understanding those caveats, thursday night i found myself absolutely deflated.

i woke up the next day, somehow inexplicably hopeful.

and this is where my call to action comes in. i have seen, over the last three years, a wider divide spreading between the “General Public” and the “Art Elite” (terms I hear from others, so we’ll just use them here as a means of having a common language). i’ve seen the local press jump in on one side or another of this dividing line. Serba’s mockery of basic terminology used when discussing art did nothing to help people to understand and everything to pin the art professionals as those frustrating alienating doctors who won’t speak to you in “plain language” so you can understand how to heal. local art activists sat behind their computer screens watching their countdown clock, just hiding out until the damn thing was over and the crowds left their avenue.

there’s no reason for either of you to be acting this way. grow up, settle down, and see ArtPrize as an opportunity that you have never had and may never again.

listen. people are interested in art. thousands of people who would never set foot in a gallery or purchase art are walking around in a giant, albeit often poorly curated, GALLERY. many of them are making purchases, thinking about the creative impulse, wondering how you do what you do and why.

and you’re pissing it all away because they just don’t get it, and you assume they aren’t capable of ever getting there.

listen. you complain about the soul-crushing day job or the lack of money or the fact that no one understands you. but when the consumer-driven society that is not making it possible for you to make a living at what you were made to do… when they want to see what you do-when they’re interested- you can’t make a little effort to hold their hand and explain a few things so they can enjoy what you do? so they can appreciate it? so they can understand the importance of art and beauty and visual expression in their own lives?

this is my call to action: artists, in grand rapids and its surrounding areas, artists on the coasts talking about this crazy “social experiment” called artprize, i want you to seriously consider doing the following:

i want you to consider the huge opportunity you have right now to get the culture around you to care about, understand, and want more of what you do. i want you to welcome these throngs-interested though uninformed-and appreciate that they are taking time out of their regular lives to see this other world that you live in and they never encounter. take this opportunity to help them understand it a little bit. consider the benefits you have had from your education and experience and use it to help people. do some educating, build some inspiration, open the door to making art a part of people’s lives.

don’t shut them out, shut yourself away from the spectacle, mock and deride.

for the love of all that is beautiful and moving, do not act like a spoiled child and ruin this chance. if you do, and then later see me on the street and you complain about not having time to make your work, not being able to find buyers or patrons or supporters… if you’re still stuck with your small crowd of fellow artists that can’t afford to purchase your work, much as they’d like to… i’m not going to find much sympathy for your situation.

your surrounding culture is opening a door to your world. Are you going to let them in and show them around and let them get excited enough to be a part of the community? or are you going to shut them out and continue to watch the walls crumble around you because you can’t afford the repairs?

sure there are things that could be better. there always are. that doesn’t mean we just walk away altogether from possibly the largest opportunity we’ll have in our lifetime to make our livelihoods sustainable.

this is a call to let go of  anger, bitterness, and petty temper tantrums. this is a call to grab hold of this opportunity and help the culture start to embrace art, start to embrace what you do, by just extending a welcome and being willing to help them understand. this is a call to honor the people now curious and turn that curiosity into appreciation. it can be done. i have seen it and i know it is possible. 

this is a call to action. 

photo taken of suzanne cohan-lange’s Little Black Dress, showing at frederick meijer gardens.

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unbelievable.

and so gorgeous, for such a simple material. unlike the bemoaned “look it’s a big thing made out of small things!” theme, this artist completely transforms his material into a lush organic space. the fact that his material was chosen to speak about his creation as an artist also elevates this work above the category mentioned: there is thoughtful choice behind the material here. it just really does not compare.

i had seen brilliant’s work before in pictures, but this year he has added these forms made out of the coffee cup sleeves (you know, to keep your hands from getting too hot?) and once again utilized an unassuming object and turned it into something other-worldly.

so glad to see brilliant’s work in ArtPrize this year. hoping others are noticing him too.

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Often when there are show calls for entries to competitive shows, there are so many details that I have a hard time fulfilling. In this case, with ArtPrize, it was very free -as people can tell by walking around town, there’s a wide wide range of stuff that you could call art- and yet mine is still pretty conventional because it’s still pretty much an “object.”

-Kurt Kaiser, artist at CODA gallery at 44 Division Ave S

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