Let the artist be

When I was a little girl, I watched this one movie together with my mom: There was a group of artists in a recording studio playing their own instruments. One moment, the manager stops the artists and walks to one of them.

“It doesn’t sound good at all! Don’t play the flute like that,” the manager said and took the flute from the artist’s hand. He was trying to play it in a way that made me laugh. But, when the camera focused at the artist’s face, I froze. His eyes were piercing, as if wishing to cut the manager’s soul into small pieces. Pure anger washed his face.

The manager happily hands the flute to the artist’s hand. Even the other artist’s were looking at the manager with a hatred that made my small heart beat so fast. Then, they stood up and walked away.

“What happened mom?” I asked, confused of their reaction and this scene that is still engraved in my mind.

My mother didn’t even look at me and said in a way as if telling a well-known universal law:

“You do not take the instrument of the artist’s hands.”

~☆~

Art is not made to be consumed, but to be felt. No one has ownership over any story, any piece of art. Even the artist feels it, like their creations are living creatures. And the artists are those that honour their work’s individuality and respect it. They don’t control it, but rather give it shape so for the art to tell its story, as a raw diamond been given form: the essence doesn’t change, after all a diamond is still a diamond. But its beauty is translated by the shape given. because art is to be discussed: to love, but not blindly. To also hate, but not blindly. Yet, people have become so polarised that they feel their mere existence useless if they dont worship in the darkness.

Many people who read a book, watch a tv series, listen to music, look at a painting or whatever art form there is think not as a human, but a consumer. And art for them is a product.

The consumers believe that they own things once they pay for it, for money is their currency to get access to art. And when they own something, they believe their words have a saying into how art should be, not as a suggestion, but as a command.

Because consumers are the center of the market and the entire universe: if they care, then that art matters and if the consumers dont care, that art is unimportant. Nothing but a speck of dust.

We can see this behaviour in the booktok community for instance. I dont think that it is unhealthy at all to share your opinion about a certain book or your desire for a book to finish some way or another. And such desire has also made fans of books write about their version of the same story, which is very interesting and creative.

But, it is disgusting to threaten an author if the book doesn’t finish the fan’s way. And what i have noticed is that small authors who want their work to be known are willing to also change the stories structure just to please the readers, because the latter are not willing to read something other than what they want. To give the pen to an audience that doesn’t care about the story.

The consumers want to be listened and their demands to be accomplished. So they take the flute of off the musician’s hands, because they are not playing the mainstream sound that drives them crazy on tik tok. And art made for the masses becomes a reflection of the masses, not of the artist, not of the human soul.

Because in this society art is nothing if it isnt a product. Everyone knows the price Oscar Wilde once said, yet not the value. For the value is felt.

Art is about allowing yourself to be free, but people have been taught that happiness means to control others and the nature and whatever enters or exits this world, that it is hard for them to not let themselves be. It is hard for them to let the artist be.

When an idea blooms in the mind, it haunts you to tell its story. The artist is not doing service to anyone’s desires, but to that story that wants shape. And they need to have a blank canvas to pour their soul, because it is burdened. And i respect artists, for they are people who let life flow, let people be, because they are taught to let their works be.

Yet, for new artists perfectionism is imposed on them: their works needs to be just perfect. Needs to be structured since in the beginning, the language needs to be precise and the words fit since in the first try. Creativity, Albert Einstein had said, is intelligence having fun. And where is the fun in the rigid structures that we as new artists{even i am guilty of this} impose? Yes, we need guidance to where the story is going, because we can get lost, but sometimes it is better to let yourself be lost in the Forest. Because when you allow peace within yourself, that is where creativity blooms.

But why artists have the urge to chase perfection…

Personally, i have learned ever since i was little to never call a work of art perfect, because it isnt. The most beautiful comment you can ever say is that it is alive. And being alive isnt perfect. I dont even know what perfect means. Perfect on the eyes of a society? Society, that preaches about innovation and believes it is only a coated performance, with vibrant colours that dont make any sense, but you haven’t seen before, so it must be unique. And every new artist is in search of uniqueness. The title should be unique, the story should be unique, the characters should be out of this world, there should also be unique words. There should be out of this world combination of colour and the reference should be like nothing ever seen before. And everything becomes a performance.

Every story needs a performance, because the performance gives the best of the work into light. But, we cannot just focus on the perfectly uniqueness of the performance if the story isnt yet alive. Because is it alive? What makes the story alive?

The consumers want perfection catered to their tastes. And the authors want their works to not be judged or criticised. I honestly dont blame them, because polarising views are more vibrant than ever before and people want either a yes or a no. Yet, this also has its own shadow to address…

The consumers would do everything for their opinion to be the only right one. Nuance is outside the vocabulary and it has been outside for some time and it will be, unless we allow it to.

No one can appreciate art because no one is open to nuance. The best skill a human can have is to accept plenty of realities within themselves and not being restless about it. They cannot accept more than one reality, that is why many people dont read. That is why anti-intellectualism is on the rise.

No one wants to discover, explore, connect, understand. They just want their desires to be petted in order to survive comfortably. Because art is useless if it isnt for them.

And this behaviour leaks in the art process and for an artist it is frustrating that they are not understood because they are not creating for the market. They are creating for that dammit idea in their head that makes it even harder to breathe. They are creating for the human inside all of us.

Right now there is an overwhelm of information, so much so we cannot distinguish each individual art piece. Our brains are fried and our attention span shortened to the point of concern for our health. And this produces the rush. Running and running from one shiny thing to another. And when people rush, who is there to look at art and wait to listen to it patiently?

And the artist, the one who has to take it all: the crossroad between following their dream or letting the world dictate it. The artist, who is pouring their soul online in hope that maybe someone will stop and appreciate them, even if they don’t understand the work or the words. Even if they criticise, yet not hate with a blind passion.

Artists are called different because they are humans in an inhuman society. And when artists have been taught all over again that they don’t belong, what is the use of sharing their art? I remember the moment i learned that Frank Kafka wanted his work burned. I firstly couldn’t believed it. But now I understand…

Artists should start believing their own version of reality, because the are going to be consumed by the consumers. They are going to hand the flute voluntarily for fear they are not good enough, that their voice doesn’t matter.

But what if in the lines of those we call consumers, there are people who experience art as humans too? And perhaps artists can produce a work of art, yet cannot bear criticism…what if the artist has just given themself the title, just because it makes them feel above everyone else…

( P.S: This is originally a substack post. I thought I wouldn’t share one of my substack posts, but here I am…)