on self-indulgence

true to journal form, I'm working out this thought as I write: I've been thinking about some of the more esoteric forms of art that I've experienced with this TBA festival. Now I'm listening to a cd of Henri Dutilleux, contemporary classical, a concerto for cello, another for violin- I don't really love it, at first half-listening. How is that different from the performance by Miguel Gutierrez which was-- a spoof? not exactly, on the ways of theater and the affected life- I was sitting there in the audience thinking that this might be the worst thing I'd paid to see in a while, and then it started to make a lot of sense and become totally brilliant at the end. And how does this jive with the performance by Meredith Monk that I saw as an punky little whipper-snapper of a college art student- there was this part with arm gestures and I didn't get it, told her so in the q+a session afterward. was it un-get-able? or was it me? My Mam didn't really get Miguel's piece, and I still don't get this thing by Dutilleux. someone actually walked out on Meg Stuart, and I could have wrung his neck. her piece was so subtle, aching, so painfully beautiful- well, he didn't get it. or maybe he got it so well that he couldn't stand it and had to leave.

so what makes esoteric? that's the word that I used to describe japanese tea ceremony at some point- esoteric, to me, is the point at which seemingly comprehensible action or ritual has passed into the realm of code. it is only for the initiated, it becomes secret in its mystery, and that is the sad paradox about some of these performances- the message is beautiful, brilliant, timely, prosaic, incomprehensible, because it is delivered in this code that is known to the artist and the initiates but not to those dear people who would perhaps also love to participate- and it's not that the artist is trying to exist in this rarefied word, it's just that when you move so thoroughly within the medium, it begins to eat you. wonderfully, but still.

. my medium possesses certain qualities to which I must tend. I work by the ton, for example. (bricks, clay, wood...). ceramics studios don't move very easily. but I have salt in my blood and ants in my pants. I see these dance performances like "crushed" by seattle-based locust, and I am JITTERY with energy- I can't sit still! that could be me! what have I done, enmeshing myself into a medium that demands stability?! I bike home, hardly aware of traffic, I collapse on the couch- an entire facet of my body's urges finds no outlet in my chosen medium. I resolve to find a way to do both, even as I know I am an over-ripe pear of a professional dancer. fool, it is too late- and I love my life anyway, why turn it upside down just to think I could do everything? (but there are other ways- collaborations, installations, audience-participations....)

so, about self-indulgence- that's really the wrong word for it, but I will persist, because it addresses some other issue that makes me uncomfortable: of course we artists are self-indulgent. I derive intense pleasure from caressing the porcelain. I would bet money that despite all the active messaging that Gutierrez brought to the stage, and all the voices in the head, he also just really wanted to make some post-modern look-at-me chaos, cuz it's intellectually hot. and there are many channels by which the human animal inputs information. Mam "got it", even if she didn't "understand" on a mental level. I venture to say that successful art that is also esoteric is when the mystery is unravelled in a way that the audience can glimpse its inner workings. no great shakes, that comment, but who's to judge?

the serrated edge of art: interpreting culture, integrating, relevant, of service, which requires a whole set of psychological skills in addition to technical ones. All the voices in the head become overwhelming sometimes and I turn to my wheel with watery gratitude- I can be all intellectual in creating installation art and feel my ego making its joyous noises. but here's a plate. it can represent Emptiness, have a Message, be Important, be a work created by Careen Stoll. or you can eat your morning eggs off it and drop it into the sink where it gets moldy a few days later and maybe the cat breaks it a few years down the road and you buy another one for thirty bucks. When my head starts overheating, I find comfort in that kind of anonymity... . . my private esoteric ritual of wedging, centering, shaping the clay.

ok, that being said! it's a big world out there and I'm off to the next show!

(posting this after the show- I got to talk to that hot hot dancer that I so admired in crushed the other night- chicka's shit is tiight- her name is Ellie Sandstrom, and she was so kind and encouraging to my tentative ideas of making some more intermedia work- she said "every day, do something that you're a little afraid of"- I was asking her about the exhibitionism rush of being on stage, finding the appropriate venue for the urges of wild body expression- a club isn't always the right space- on stage, you are controlling the gaze in a sense, setting up a designation between audience and performer, a space that is like condoned crazy space- she suggested that I maybe choreograph a phrase and perform it at the club, maybe just a few nights, a few friends- a special moment- I'm trying to imagine actually planning it- well, it was great to meet her)