By Jonathan Shih
The year 1993 saw a crossroads in my life. That year was supposed to be the last year of my studying Fine Arts, which unfortunately, I didn’t able to finish, due to a few unavoidable circumstances. I eventually dropped out in the second semester of the second year of the course (the BFA I took was a two year course consisting of only Major Subjects).
After that not so difficult of a decision, I embarked to find myself employment. I will not elaborate every single job I took, for there were quite many, but I would rather talk about, are the different people that I had the chance to work with and met (but in my case, mind torturing chance). I took a course in Fine Arts, so naturally, I would seek a job related to that. Thankfully I did, ever since I quit school. Every job I had, was so called ‘Art related’.
Through the ensuing years, I’ve encountered many different individuals in every conceivable character and upbringing possible. As the old saying states, “Birds of the same feather flock together.”, it was natural for me to look for someone who has common interests, a kindred spirit so to speak. But that was not the case for me, every ’Artist’ I worked with and met was not what I expect an ’Artist’ to be, in thought, in deed, in contemplation, interaction and conversation.
I know that we all have individual traits and characters, but isn’t it quite natural that people of similar interests are drawn to each other in harmonious union of thought and spirit? That’s what I thought. The truth is, even way back in college, a majority of my classmates and schoolmates somehow don’t know what they want to do with their life. The first semester saw a jam packed class of around 40 students. By the first semester of the second year, the number dropped to to a least 20. Survival of the fittest, so it seems.
As a matter of fact. I heard through the grapevine that many of my classmates who graduated or at least reached the fourth year of the course, don’t hold jobs related to their chosen course. Talk about wasting your parent’s hard earned money. Anyway, going back to the ’Artists’ I worked with. Of course, I thought we were going to get along fine. But again, that’s what I thought. Many of them didn’t leave the school behind. Not the physical school, like the building and everything in it, but in the way that what they were mentally and intellectually in school, that’s what they still are in the real world.
Some can’t draw or paint. Some can’t make decent letterings. Many of them, all they talk about is basketball, movies, the latest showbiz news, computer games, bands, joining a band, forming a band, clubbing, partying, drinking beer, mountain climbing, beach hopping, the latest cellphones, the latest gadgets, the latest sexy starlet and other insignificant crap that has little or nothing to do at all with being an ’Artist’ and they call themselves ’Artists’. Some don’t know the different types of Artist’s brushes and to think they should know their own equipment. Some don’t know Leonardo da Vinci or any of the Old and Modern Masters of Art, and when they do heard me speak of them, they exclaim, “I didn’t know they were Artists?”, or “What’s his name again?”.
Some are numb founded when I mention about Art History and the Great Artists of history. They will ask in an irritating, ignorant fashion, “Who is that, is he an Artist?“, “What did he contribute to Art?”, “Tell me about him, is he a great artist?”. They call themselves ’Artists’, yet they don’t know squat about the Artists who lived before them and made the pages of Art History.
Some don’t know how to sharpen a pencil by hand. Some can’t make a decent drawing of an eye or face for that matter (so they resort to drawing Anime or they only limit themselves to nonfigurative subjects instead, as not to give the notion that they can’t draw or paint well or can‘t draw or paint at all).
Some are only ’Artists’ in the office or workplace. Where they work as in-house ‘artists’, graphic ‘artists’, layout ‘artists’, display ‘artists’, t-shirt ‘artists’, airbrush ‘artists’, sign ‘artists’, billboard ‘artists’, print ’artists’, drafting ‘artists‘, rendering ’artists’, video ‘artists’, nail ’artists’, poster ‘artists’, commercial ‘artists’, henna tattoo ‘artists’, tattoo ‘artists’, background ‘artists’, flash ‘artists’, animation ’artists’, creative ‘artists’, advertising ‘artists’, digital ‘artists’, computer ‘artists’, and every conceivable ‘Artist’ imaginable to the human mind. The only limitation is your imagination.
When they get home, they just watch TV, the PBA, the NBA, AXN, Pinoy Big Brother, The Buzz, Game Ka Na BA?, Deal Or No Deal?, Majika, Captain Barbell, Star In A Million, American Idol, the usual Anime, chat, play computer games, play video games, Playstation 1 and 2, X-box, Nintendo, billiards, pool, play Basketball, have a drink with friends and talk about crap, go to the Mall and straight to the arcade, read romance novels, and exchange text (SMS) and other irrelevant shit that has nothing at all to do with Art and in being an artist. Yet, they proclaim to the whole world that they are ’Artists’.
Not only the ’Artists’ that I worked with and met are like that. Also, their ’Artists’ friends that they introduce to me and I get to ask and know. So, it’s one big happy, ’Artistic’ family.
There is an English adage that states, “If you can’t leave them, join them.”
If your convictions are weak and your ideals are shallow. Might as well join the ’Artistic’ bandwagon. Forget about learning to draw and paint. Forget about acquiring knowledge regarding Art and Artists. Forget about Art. After all, we are all ’Artists’, we studied Fine Arts, so we are ’Artists’. So long as you can draw a little and give an impression that you are a ‘artistic’ person, you’re an ‘Artist’. We are all ’Artists’!
Some, I might add, didn’t even studied Fine Arts. Some of them took a course in Engineering but didn’t finish it. Others took courses as diverse as Electronics, Architecture, IT, Computer Science, Crash Courses and Short Courses on Design, Commercial Art, Fashion Design, ArchiCADD, AutoCad, Web Technology, Web Developing, HTML, JavaScript, Drafting Technology, Computer Graphics, Animation, and some of them only reached High School and never even went to college.
What a way to go, right? Anybody can be an ’Artist’. Just as long as you can scribble a few lines, and leave a mark on a piece of paper, create graphics on a computer, you’re an ’Artist’.
There’s a popular notion and I think that it’s only in the Philippines, wherein self proclaimed, self righteous, and narcissist individuals posing as ’artists’ say that anyone and everyone is an ’artist’, but is that the way it works? Is it that simple? Is it that uncomplicated a way to become an ’Artist’? Am I at a lost here? Have the laws of nature turned upside down?
No comments:
Post a Comment