06
Apr
The words in this photo are straight from my journal. (4.2.08, 12:00 AM to be exact) It has everything to do with confronting the stifling that is imposed upon me and the restrictions I place on myself.
As I look back through these postings I notice a thread piercing them and connecting them. I noticed that most of these “pieces” have a very melancholy tone. A tone of loss is probably an apt way to describe it. I guess I do feel a loss of direction and drive. But what is disturbing to me as a student of creative writing is that “melancholy” is the term most commonly thrown at the work of young writers and artists. I’m reminded of an episode of the “The L Word” when the writer character Jenny has her new memoir reviewed for a magazine by a writer she thought she had a connection with. When the article is published she describes Jenny as “self-indulgent” and characterizes her as another depressed mentally unstable young writer.
I do somewhat think this little project is self-indulgent but I suppose that on some level all art is. It takes indulgence with the self to get an idea, take time to cultivate it, and then gather the courage to put it out. It takes a vested self interest to, as Santogold says in L.E.S. Artistes, leave home and disappear. I have always thought that the solitude and sacrifice often required for one to write or create anything does require a certain kind of privilege (class namely, youth is another) in order to create the necessary space. Those not working within that privilege of youth, financial security and its subsequent free time are my heroes. Accidental artists, artists who originate from the fringes (for real, not the ones who pretend) are indulging and engaging with the self they are and the self they are forced to become. It may be that all of us are wrestling with that, privileged or otherwise.
