Making Criminals

We are each guilty. As the Bible says “let him that is without sin cast the first stone”. Going through a red light as it changes from yellow. A few miles over the 15 mph speed limit. Fudging an application slightly from need or vanity .

Life isn’t fair. Being nice when accosted by the police sometimes gets you off with a warning (unless they’re too far behind on quota.) Sometimes they don’t like your looks. A fine or court appearance – it’s a free country except for time, hassle, and in some cases expenses for a lawyer. We won’t even mention bribes. 

But the point is, if somebody doesn’t like you – the police, the actual officer, the people controlling the police – you are going to be harassed as a criminal for something or other. Even if “proven innocent” later, the loss of reputation, not to mention loss of time and energy – can be significant. Often that’s the point of the whole thing .

Juries were supposed to be the backstop. And maybe they were in the slow old rural days. Now they can be as intimidated as anyone else, and the massive loss and time of a trial makes an awful lot of folks accept a plea deal just to get back to normal .

When the judicial system rots from above or within, well, we’ve seen the results in Stalinist Russia and a bunch of other places. Maybe coming soon to a courtroom near you .

Goals

Goals are one of our most fragile, useful, illusions. Although they may help focus our activities, they are subject to constant change and apt to be overruled any instant by some contradictory pursuit. Not to mention modified or severely disrupted by changes in environmental reality .

But, as noted, they are useful anyway. I like to work at making my art better – although exactly what that means is tenuous. Draw more accurately? Accent a personal style? Create something beautiful? Yes, well, okay …

There is usually a question of trade-offs – enjoy that donut or continue the diet? More seriously, how willing should we be to direct all our energies towards a relatively exclusive vision. Trying to be the “best” at something, if done to exclusion, may “work” but leave us damaged or unable to do much else .

I’ve learned to accept reevaluation of goals as a normal part of consciousness. No doubt aided by being older, when it is only prudent to find time scale shrinking and capabilities more limited. I no longer try to run fast, nor to walk 15 or so miles. I do adjust to walking “briskly” on hills, and I’m satisfied if I do a few miles or so .

Thus also with my artwork. And, honestly, an awful lot of my daily moments. Sad, I suppose, from the goal orientation of youth. Which has faded, as all illusions do .

Binocular

Old Dutch Master still lifes make you think you can lift flowers or bugs off the painted surface. Modern photographs have the same effect. Yet in a very real way, they do not match the reality we inhabit .

Two eyes let us see – especially nearby – in parallax to be able to judge depth. For distant objects, of course, we have other references like size and haze and perspective, but they can be quite deceptive. In the real world it has been important to us primates to be able to focus in this weird binocular manner to better use our hands for handling fruit and tools .

That is a long prologue to today’s rant about cults – religious, secular, or political. Cults have beliefs that are strictly monocular. They have little depth and allow by definition for no other viewpoint. The strictest cult outlooks don’t even let one move one’s head to get a better or different view – that’s the definition of “heresy” .

Current culture has unfortunately devolved into a set of cults. Perhaps a saving grace is that complex humans can believe in more than one cult – often contradictory – at the same time .

Binocular vision and its philosophic implications is a gift from the universe we should always acknowledge gratefully .

AI and Pride

Perhaps we have all turned into John Henry, pounding railroad spikes trying to beat a machine. Artists are confronted with the same situation as other intellectual occupations – what used to take skill, pride, thought, and time can now be done by any teenager in a dull moment. The internet is flooded with AI images, movies, stories. Work has similarly vanished. Some of us remain luddites, stubbornly sticking to brush and pencil. Why? A waste of time…

But is it ?

Climbing a mountain or hiking in a forest is not the same as viewing a YouTube video of the adventure (not even – as technology advances – an IMAX immersion). Things we do for ourselves have both an outer and an inner component .

Accomplishment of something difficult brings pride. Even if it is only pounding spikes. Or painting a canvas .

The key is that doing something you like to do, either for the activity itself or for recognition, is a kind of play. The same task forced on you (especially repetitively) is a chore or boring job. We should avoid confusing the two .

Mankind evolved with hand coordination. In spite of our big brains, we remain a physically oriented species. I think AI art robs both the creator and the audience of that heritage. Except for the brief thrill of novelty, pride and satisfaction are completely missing .

Appreciation

I believe the primary goal of art is to instill appreciation. That is true whether one is creating it or absorbing it. All the rest is detail. That outlook applies to all types of artistry. Cooking, dancing, painting, whatever. A warm flush of “wellness” if it works. In current jargon, a re-enchantment with the world .

I approach my current pastels and sketches in such a mood. Not to “capture” what I see – that is done ad nauseum by photographs and photorealistic artists. Not to create salable artifacts, nor even some phantom dream of inclusion in the universal “museum without walls” . Just to fully engage in and appreciate a moment, in my case more easily accomplished by my clumsy actions. 

Oh I admit it’s nice to have a tangible marker of having been alive. A kind of pride at having “done something” rather than just sitting on the couch. Like writing, a verifiable trail to the past .

Nice relaxed attitude, a child again. I don’t much care if what I do closely resembles whatever inspired me. The goal is more the trance of a vision enabled by concentrated action. When I wake out of this state, if successful, I am relaxed and content with everything .

Crude

I was raised in a fairly middling environment. Certainly not poverty nor even “salt of the Earth”, but not high end aristocratic. As I matured, I lost most ambitions of pretentiousness in my quotidian pleasures. I call it my crude peasant outlook .

For example, I enjoy a good steak. I do not go into purple prose ecstasy over exactly how wonderful it is – subtle flavors, tenderness, whatever. I find sauces and garnishes excessive. It’s just a good steak, another fine meal .

Most of the world I read about now seems to have passed me by. Pretentiousness reigns supreme. The “right things” are so much better. Handbags, salads, shoes, schools, cars, swimming pools … The internet sorts it all out for you to aid your expensive tastes .

I don’t pretend I like awful stuff. A dinner of peas and gruel is not enjoyable. Ratty clothes are terrible. But the level of relatively common, useful, and affordable stuff is quite high. And I try to appreciate it .

All in all, I find my crude peasant world a land of luxury and enchantment. I rarely envy all those others who mostly seem to scurry about hoping others will notice and envy them. That pretentiousness seems a terrible waste of our human gift of existence .