Illustration by Andreas Hykade. Courtesy of Chris Robinson.

Monthly provocative, drunken, idiotic ramblings from the North...

"The Word proves those first hearing it as numb to understanding as the ones who have not heard. Yet all things follow from the word."

-- Heraclitus

"I am a scientist -- I seek to understand me"

-- "I Am A Scientist" Robert Pollard (Guided by Voices)

Okay bear with me. I'm a little behind with this whole Art thing. Everyone seems to know what art is; I hear the words thrown about with ease. I mean I always figured that there was a difference between For The Birds and Breakfast on the Grass. Seemed damn simple enough: one evokes emotions, the other challenges the mind. For me, art challenges the mind. Sensory perception is fine and dandy but it doesn't explain WHY. As Homer once said, "Why me laugh?"

Art for me is like a good dump. The natural release/reaction to what your system has experienced during the day. I like creative works that leave a stink, the natural breath of the creator. To smell is to be. Even if they stink, they're human (e.g. Ed Wood) and that makes them better than that other stuff we call Hollywood (which I use quite sweepingly here), which ain't nothin' but a manufactured piece of plastic poop. Can't smell nuttin' (hence no SENSE/CAUSE). Taint art. Pretty easy. Done. Finito. Ka.........PUT. And hey...to put the nail home, there's the client/self split. How can anything client driven be art? How can anything personal NOT be art?

So all's going along well in my head until I'm reading Homer's Iliad and discover that it's pretty much just a Hollywood action movie. A MASSIVE war starts because of a fight over a gal and then we encounter passage after passage of gruesome violence. So what's the difference between Homer and Homer? But back to me...why can I embrace the highfalutinESS of Faulkner and George Griffin and just as quickly run out and rent Booty Call or Big Daddy and then laugh my ass off at the stupid jokes?