She Has Done a Beautiful Thing To Me

By Justin McRoberts • Dec 4th, 2008 • Category: Artists in Residence

The themes of the my last two blogs here at Soul-Audio have, in combination, taken on something of a different angle as I watch the economy tank over the past month and a half or so (must-see-tv, by the way.. just ask any of the major networks who seem to border on something closely akin to drunken joy at having something as interestingly tragic as the war to report on daily). Two posts ago, I wrote a piece entitled “The Urgency of Art” focused on the idea that art plays a redemptive rather than extraneous role in culture. I followed that up with a blog “from the archives” about fear and the need to avoid its control. Here is where those two ideas collide (begin singing Howie Day here).

A recent market report predicted that, in light of the recession, luxury industries would be hardest hit. Art was among those industries listed. Of course. When our financial foundations are threatened, we should rightly spend only on what is essential. For instance, diamonds… they last forever, and say to our loved ones exactly what we cannot, or at least aloud: “I’m pretty sure I can buy your love.”

Anne Lamott’s oft-quoted sentiment about music “I can’t imagine anything but music that could have brought about this alchemy…. it somehow lets us meet in places we couldn’t get to any other way” is a reflection she scribbled down after a frightening (and, because it was Lamott, comical) experience on a plane. As she was bounced around in violent turbulence, she thought back on social turbulence in her church congregation and a moment when music provided the stage for resolution and redemption. Such a time is now; when turbulence in the U.S. economy upsets the peace of our daily lives, dominates our conversations and leads us back into the kind of self-preservation and self-centeredness that is the foundation of our cultural woes in general…

So, can the world of art make a plea for it’s own necessity? Can we appeal to the world on our own behalf that art is not something merely superfluous but something deeply needed; maybe even that which is most needed? (Something about the damned Jonas Brothers tells me we can’t.)

Artists are not always very good at self-promotion, which is part of why we get such a bad name about it (that and the tendency promote music with the use of huge sunglasses and cleavage). We often have a hard time communicating what it is that makes what we do particularly special or “good” (in the philosophical sense of “good,” not the market sense, which is, on the whole, horse-puke). We end up highlighting the selling points of our work rather than pointing to the heart of our art; the things that make it essential and redemptively human and here is where my own fears set in.

I wonder if the real tragedy will be if we have lost ourselves in a sea of Fergaliciousity and no longer know that what we really have to offer is important. “Bro” you might say “why you gotta rip on Fergie like that, dawg?” Here is why… dawg: Because, while I think Fergie is talented, I think “Fergalicious” is a prime example of what makes art seem superfluous on the whole. Beginning with the video, which is an advert for the song, which is an advert for the artist who is advertising herself as “sellable” especially because she blow kisses that puts them boys on rock, rock, and they be lining down the block just to watch what she got. In other words, the message here is “buy this product, not so much because it is good, but because it is sellable.” Just another product. Just another thing we don’t need.

We need a better appeal than that.

It would be easy to read this as a plea from an indie artist who needs people to spend money on his art particularly in order that he can continue afford his mortgage and perhaps a pair of jeans his wife likes. And while I can’t exactly dismiss the effect the market trend has on my own life and work, I can honestly say that I don’t make art primarily to sell it. Before anything else, I create art for the same reason I enjoy art; because something about music really does move me to a place where I see clearly, where I am more whole, more hopeful, more generous… More human. I need art like Miley Cyrus needs a childhood. Perhaps a better image is this: culture needs art like Jesus needed that jar of oil poured over his head before his crucifixion; after the complaints of others in the room at the financial waste this sad and thankful woman had shown, Jesus simply said “She has done a beautiful thing to me.” That is a picture of the role of art in culture. That is the appeal we must make.

↓ 7 comments

#1 Mark on December 4th, 2008 at 5:21 pm

Profound. Justin, thank you. It is indeed a tragedy that our culture has lost the focus on its heart. We as artists need to be unashamed and truly honest with our art (an uncensored too) and nuture people back to the God given sensibilities that rest within us all to love, to long, to feel, and just to experience the heart. We as a culture need to come to an understanding that just because it has a beat, doesn’t mean its pumping blood.
Thanks again, you hit the nail on the head.

#2 Matthew on December 4th, 2008 at 8:23 pm

While I agree with most of what you’ve said, this article sort of begs the question, what are the “things we don’t need?” Is it just art that we don’t care for? Is it just Fergie? If it’s more than Fergie, then I’m not exactly sure what makes your music different than Fergie, other than taste. I don’t mean that as an insult, I’m just pointing out that it’s a qualitative difference. I like (and purchase) your music. I don’t care for and don’t support Fergie. Does that make Fergalicious any less of a work of art? Granted, I do not find Fergalicious all that appealing (truthfully I hadn’t heard the term until 2 minutes ago). But, if the purpose of her art is to entertain, and someone finds it entertaining, then what’s wrong with that? How is that not beautiful?

Just a thought.

#3 Greg on December 7th, 2008 at 12:22 am

@ Matthew

I really appreciated your comment. I think it brings up the frivolity of subjective speculation when it comes to the semantics of what “is” and “is not” art. It would be reasonably hard for me to actually disprove that in the farthest reaches of self, Fergie penned her inner struggle in being desirable yet untouchable in Fergilicious. I just don’t know. However, I think this brings up the more important conversation – of how our world has made Art and Entertainment synonymous. Do you feel like something could be ‘market controlled’ yet still be an ‘extension of self’?

I (unfortunately) found this quote on a Starbucks cup once, and have used it as sort of a mental litmus test for me when trying to figure out the answer to that question. Hope you find it valuable.

“Is art entertainment?
Art teaches us about who we are.
Entertainment tells us who to be.
Art is a public service.
Entertainment is a private product.
Art opens our minds.
Entertainment thinks for you.
Art is publicly offered.
Entertainment is publicly traded.
Art is the words we wish to say, but lack the language to say it.”

#4 McWhatshisface on December 7th, 2008 at 5:16 am

Matthew,

While there isn’t anything terribly wrong with entertainment per se, I do think there is a line somewhere. This will seem an extreme example, but heroin is “entertaining” and not much else. In that case, the “entertainment” quality of heroin is greatly outweighed by the damage it does. Maybe better put, porn is strictly about entertainment, but I find it deeply damaging. (Now I’m directly comparing certain elements in Pop music to porn …you’ve driven me to such things.) I don’t know exactly where that line is (or even if calling it a “line” is helpful”) but I firmly believe there is a qualitative difference between what is permisable and what is beneficial.

In all honesty, some may say that there is no real difference between Fergie and myself and that, in fact, the ideologies I espouse are more damaging than even something like porn. Maybe that’s a clue.

#5 Matthew on December 9th, 2008 at 3:12 pm

Thanks for the responses.

I think we agree personally. I’m not personally making a case for the art of porn or heroin. It just seems to me that I’m not necessarily the litmus of what is or is not art in a global sense. I may make that decision for myself all the time, but who am I to tell someone else that their entertainment is not really art? If you and I agree that something is or is not artistic, then is it so?

About entertainment vs art. If art is the deliberate and creative arrangement of elements in a way that appeals to the senses and emotions (yes, I looked up the definition) then I would argue that all entertainment which is created by a person is art, but I would not say that all art is entertaining. For me, the entertainment category is much smaller than the art bin. I don’t see the word entertainment as a bad thing at all. Many of the “classic” works of art were commissioned pieces. Does that cheapen their artistic value? Of course not, even if they were created in exchange for money, with the intention of entertaining some rich guy… who, if he were alive today, would probably listen to Fergie.

#6 McWhatshisFizzle on December 9th, 2008 at 9:06 pm

Actually, I’m not altogether that hip on the Wiki definition of art. If that is the definition we are working with, then I agree that I wouldn’t have much ground to stand on differentiating between Mozart and Fergie. I think there is something more to art that the way elements are arranged.

As an artist myself, I’m not particularly good at boiling things down to definitions, so I’m afraid I end up leading this conversation towards more conversation rather than resolution. In the save spirit, Wagner wrote about art: “I believe in God, Mozart and Beethoven… I believe in the Holy Spirit and the truth of the one, indivisible Art… I believe that through this Art all men are saved adn therefore each may die of hunger for Her…”

It’s not concise, but that seems a bit more like it to me.

#7 Matthew on December 9th, 2008 at 9:43 pm

Funny, I thought you’d like the wiki definition better than reference.com:
“the quality, production, expression, or realm, according to aesthetic principles, of what is beautiful, appealing, or of more than ordinary significance.”

I think the value of the wiki definition is that elements are arranged to “intentionally appeal to the senses and emotions.” I think that’s in the vein of what you’re saying. But, your definition doesn’t show up in any of the 16 on the site so… I guess that makes you wrong

To oversimplify my point by using a cheap cliche, I guess what I’m saying is that one man’s trash is another man’s treasure. I think we had a conversation once where you claimed that all art is a reflection of God, or is inspired by God (something to that effect). If that is true, then it must also be true of the stuff that does not speak directly to me, that I do not recognize as art.

I remember watching “Queer as Folk” with my wife. I thought it was trash. I thought it was borderline gay porn wrapped with a pathetic plot. My wife quickly reminded me that it was never marketed to me. Is it still art if it does not speak to me?

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