I guess it has something to do with getting or older or something, but I find I’m having more and more discussions with friends about ‘why we are here’? (I do believe that psychologists divide several ‘personality development phases’ in human life and somewhere around thirty there is this ‘re-evaluation of values’ phase. Perhaps this is it…) To be clear, these are not discussions about the (non-) existence of a god, but about our purpose on earth. If you believe that there is a personal god, that does not give you a purpose for being here, it merely provides you with an answer about how you got here. Which is not the same thing.

Religious people however, usually have an answer to the big ‘why’question. We’re here to take care of god’s great earth. God, at the same time, has to watch of all of us to see how we do it. To me that doesn’t make sense. If there is an almighty god, why wouldn’t he/she/it manage the earth him/her/itself and cut out the middle men? If you want something done right you’ve got to do it yourself anyway and just think of all the profits you save…

But seriously. People tend to have a real problem with the idea that there might not be a reason for our existence in life. They confuse ‘reason’ with ‘value’; if our existence has no reason, it must be worthless. That, to me, seems to be utter nonsense. A rollercoaster ride has no purpose. But it most definitely has value. Thousands of people have good jobs in the ‘rollercoaster-industry’. Actually, the rollercoaster analogy is not a bad one at all. I think that are some pretty good similarities between a rollercoaster ride and a philosophy of life, besides both being useless but valuable.

In both cases, when you prepare yourself well at the start and develeop a strategy that suits you, you will enjoy the ride more. Furthermore; it is considered ‘bad manners’ to annoy other people that are enjoying their ride. Terminating other passengers’ ride, is criminal. The more poetic types amongst us would say that both life and ride go through several loops, falls and rises, around sharp bends and can turn you upside down. I myself find this bit of the analogy a bit weak, but still… there you have it. Quantum theory suggests that spacetime has no beginning nor an end. Instead, when you get to ‘the end’ you’re actually at ‘the beginning’, just like on earth the most eastern point you can ever reach is also the most western point (darn those circles). So without ever turning aruond a journey in one direction, as long as you travel far enough, will bring you back to where you came from. Such is also the case with a rollercoaster ride.

Life is beautiful. Even thought it might not be useful in ways we can think of with our human minds. Just ‘being’ might just be enough. Live and let live.

The museum of contemporary art Detroit (Michigan, USA) currently hosts the show ‘words fail me‘. A collection of works by (American) national and international artist that visually present ‘words’. It’s a show that, among other things, raises questions like ‘is playing around with words art-worthy?’ or ‘are words also interesting on a physical level?’. Mind you, I am not questioning art forms such as novels, poetry of song lyrics here; I am only concerned with words as a visual art form.

Is ‘using words’ not just; ‘taking a short cut’? If you want to, say, make a work about the influence of multinationals and commercial companies on our society and how the prey on our fears, isn’t it just taking the easy way if you present the word ‘terror’ in inflatable plastic party letters, like Dutch artist Marc Bijl did? And if you present the the sentence ‘Everything is going to be allright’ in neon letters, like Martin Creed did and you do that over and over again on different buildings; does that mean you’re making new installations, or just copying something that might just not be that clever in the first place. Are artists that merely write abusive words and phrases on walls to achieve an ‘emotional effect’ merely lazy? And really can we stand another work in neon that’s placed in a corner of two White walls?

One possible answer would be, “hey, at least they are making more of an effort than those darn minimalists… placing a light-tube in the corner of an empty room (Dan Flavin, ‘corner piece’, 1987), what the hell’s that about?” Another answer would be: “Have you ever SEEN a work by Bruce Nauman?” Who made a lot more fantastic works, but I’d consider his wordworks to be among the best visual art-pieces ever made. Which is one of the biggest problems with ‘words as visual’ right there. It has been done. And it has been done up to such an amazingly high level that it would take a lot of confidence or stupidity to try and add to that what is already there.

Kay Rosen is probably a thousand times the artist that I would ever hope to be and perhaps I am just too stupid to get it, but a work like ‘blurred’ to me, is just a visual pun. And even though a great artwork may sometimes be indistinguishable from an elaborate prank, this pun really isn’t that brilliant.“ Or how about the ‘people like you need to fuck people like me’ in neon by Tracey Emin? Again, an artist I have loads of respect for and who made great stuff (even involving words…) but I cannot see this in any other way than merely a bad Nauman cover. Just like Tauba Auerbach seemed to have done with a lot of her works like ‘Yes No Morph 1′. Not that there is shame in doing covers. Radiohead played a version of ‘Rhinestone cowboy’ once.

I would like to come to good decisive conclusion on this subject, but, especially not in a blogpost, I can’t. I feel it’s an academic discussion anyway. As with any other medium artists use there are great examples of wordworks and there are some poor ones, just like there are great paintings and some that are ‘not-so-good, Lucy’. A lot of times words may be a shortcut to an effect that could also have been achieved by other means but words, like brand-names, logos and icons are also a sign of the times that artists should work with. Because they’re familiar to us, because words have meaning beyond meaning and because sometimes it’s just a fucking good idea to do so. And the other wordwork stuff? Well, everyone is entitled to his or her lesser moments. Even me.

Travelling from home to work takes me about an hour. Since I am a smart person, I don’t commute by car, but I take the comfortable, quick and reliable train. Add all those ingredients together and you get a good recipe for ‘time to read and think’. I usually get my best ideas in the morning, when I’m not yet fully awake. Sometimes I just ponder about trivialities or ‘deep philosophical questions’… Anyway, this morning I was thinking about the following:

“Most people think it is very funny and naive when certain cultural groups believe they can bring the rain upon performing a rain-dance. Or they can have a successful harvesting when offering rice to a stone-statue. Or they can have a male child when they run around an old oak-tree in their naked bum when the moon is full.
However; we tend to take people seriously that believe they can improve the health of an ill person they do not know by praying to a personal god that listens to all prayers and acts upon them. They believe so, even when all scientific research ever conducted has proved that this has no effect at all (not for the ill person anyway).”

So, why do we take one, erm… ‘outlook on eternity’ seriously and make fun of others? And not even the people that are deeply religious themselves, but so called non-believers or ‘infidels‘ as well. Why do we have more respect for -say- ‘christians’ than for people who claim to believe in the flying spaghetti monster? (there is no doubt in my mind that there are some Pastafarians that take their religion seriously by now… otherwise; how did scientology start?).

And if we agree that we should treat all religions alike, no matter how obscure, should we take all religions seriously or should we all make fun of one another? ‘Making fun’ would get my vote. If, however extraordinarily unlikely, there should be a god ‘up there’ somewhere, I am sure he/she/it has a great sense of humour (again: How else can you explain Scientology?).

With new found arrogance I once again proclaim myself to be an artist. But an artist who sometimes unleashes the geek inside. That may mean, reading popular science books on quantum mechanics, or hooking up my PSP to the WWW, but it sometimes means I run out and buy myself a copy of Wired Magazine. Goody! Sometimes it can be thoroughly fulfilling to read about which earplugs for my mp3 player I should buy (I just use the ones that camewith the iPod, or how an oilrig drills the ocean (even though I am totally against that, save the environment people!). The january 2008 copy of Wired was even more fulfiling than others. Not only did it include an article about French cinema genius Michel Gondry (Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind among others) it also featured a small article about an artist I had never heard of before; Scott Listfield.

My first thought was: why, o, why can’t I remember seeing his stuff in Flash Art, Frieze Art, Modern Painters or whereever? Beacuse his works are brilliant. Totally in line with what I wrote in my two ‘Love the paint’ postings. Lushly painted, energetic sceneries that suck you in and then surprise you with all those things you didn’t see at first. Which is very, very clever. Because his compositions are actually very well balanced. Never too much information that would just give you a headache. They would actually be very comforting in the background of a waiting room for a doctor or dentist. Only at that second glance -and he will get that second glance- can his paintings give you that nagging feeling of discomfort I admire so much in paintings. Others don’t make you feel uneasy at all, but have a wonderous air. A bit like watching a Michel Gondry film or video.

Scott Listfield’s paintings have a message, but my personal bet is that is not a message of doom and anger, but amazement over he world that surrounds us. Hence the astronaut that pops up in all paintings. In Wired the compared this with the -kidnapped- garden gnome some backpackers take along to take pictures of durin their travels. Scott Listfield admist feeling like that astronaut every once in a while. An out of place spectator in a world dominated by bizarre little things like Starbucks, Blackberries and primary elections. I april he’s got a show opening up at ArtCenter/ South Florida in Miami Beach. I don’t think I will be around for that one, but I am truly jealous if you’re able to go see it. For those of us that can’t… there’s always the possibility to buy a giclee print of one of his works online.

My blog is more and more about myself, which is not a good development…. I should dedicate my life to the greater good of art and not try to glorify myself, dammit! But, perhaps a couple of more personal posts will also help some other artists out there. “Well, I may be bad, but at least I’m not as bad as him…” that sort of thing. False modesty is modesty too.

Anyway; I’m actually beginning to believe that positive things happen to people with a positive attitude. (that’s ‘the secret’… or actually: that’s a quantum physics theory) Today I got an e-mail from the nice, fantastic, wonderful, creative people at Gawker.com that from today I am officiallya Gawker artist! And that really also feels like a bit of extra appreciation. And that’s what we artists want: not wealth, but recognition. (well, a bit of wealth wouldn’t be bad either actually) And yesterday afternoon the canvasses I ordered arrived, a week to soon.

Things are running smoothly this month. So much so, that I might not even get round to either finish reading that Stephen Hawking book ‘The universe in a nutshell’ (bit of namedropping there) or celebrate my birthday. Hopefully all this won’t mean that I’ll start making crap happy art now.

How things can change overnight. Wow, that would be a beautiful pay-off for those UPS or Fed-Ex guys wouldn’t it? Perhaps I should try selling it to them. But I am sure that you are not here to read about how I would like to sell my soul to the devil. Just before my poetically beautiful post about ‘female midgets’ I wrote about artists block, the arty equivalent of writers block. Life as an artists sucks when you’ve got artists block. You get used to the feelings of doubt about the qualtiy of your work, the necessity of your creations, the briliance o your ideas, but when you’ve got artists block, you’re actually proving yourself right. You must be the worst artist since…. <please fill in ou own most despised artist>.

But, as I said, things can change dramatically overnight. It started when the gallerist with whom I had a show rang the doorbell. Even though my show was no big commercial success, his gallery would like to keep on representing me as an artist. Hurrah. After that, I got a few paying assignments writing the copy for some websites. Not my big dream (copywriting), but it will certainly help in paying for canvasses and extra paint. At the midweek job, there was a mice infestation. The stench of mouseshit and -piss was intolerable. But, they’re sorting that one out today and for the rest, things seemed to have gine well during the days I have been ill, so things are looking up over there as well.

Which leaves the most important bit: the actual creation of glorious, humbling art works. For the first time since a couple of weeks I have loads of ideas again. My fingers actualy start tingling when I think about painting. When I’m at work I can actually daydream about picking up a can of pain and giving it a good cuddle… okay; that’s sick, but you get the general idea. I can safely say that the artist block has gone. Artworld: beware.

I love this feature in WordPress where you can see what people were searching for, upon opening one of the posts you wrote. Yesterday, not once but twice (yes: twice in one single day), someone typed the words ‘FEMALE MIDGETS’ (yes, in capitals) and ended up one of my posts.

Haven’t got a clue why. Haven’t got a clue which one. I’m actually dying to read it myself now. If you are the one that searched for female midgets, Could you please let me know if you found what you were looking for on my blog? I won’t judge. I really won’t…. (as to be expected: the number of readers looking for information on ‘(single) female midgets’ has increased dramatically since two days… well, I welcome all readers…)

Anyway; no knowledge is useless (or: al knowledge is useful). And because the two fine people that ended up in my little corner on the internet, today I have also learned something knew; a female midget is called; a ‘gidget’ . Thank you wikipedia.

On wikipedia I also found out that, apparently, there is this big (mind the pun) thing in the world about ‘midgets wrestling’ . Wrestling legend ‘André the Giant‘ is rumoured to have wresteld no less than six midget wrestlers (if there were ande gidgets present, wikipedia does not say) at the same time. And I did write a piece aboput streetart hero Shepard Fairey once. And Shepard Fairey has posted stickers with Andrés face all over the world. Could that perhaps complete the circle? We just might never know….

Warning: ego-documentation. My life as a contemporary artist.
Must be the equivalent of writers block: artists block. Every year I go through a couple of those phases when I just cannot seem to get anything done. No paintings get finished, no projects worked on, no new ideas generated, no stuff written… and at those times you get more and more convinced that you are a crap artist. All the work you have previously done, sucks completely. Every project you’re working on is crap.

This time, the block was put up somewhere in December. I had been doing quite a lot of (extra) work in the month before for a show I was participating in and since that also gave me a lot of energy, I had also managed to do a lot of extra stuff for this blog and the cultblender site. At the ‘regular-pay’ job there were also several nice, creative projects going on, so there was creative energy everywhere. Then, from December, the creative power-line was cut. The presentation of my work at the show was rather disappointing. I had a bad case of the flu. I noticed that a couple of postings on my blog attracted loads of extra visitors, which was good, but also annoying, because, well, you don’t want to see those numbers drop again, so you sort of feel obligated to write more stuff, which just means: ‘more work’. Then you get all those ‘holiday activities’ which are all very nice, but really tend to get in the way of your creative work. During that time I also found out that a lot of friends and family respect me, think I’m very talented, but do not take my ‘being an artist’ very serious. Most of the creative projects at the dayjob turned out to be a nightmare since they all involved commercial partners who are all very much interested up to the moment where they actually have to do something, when they start being complete and utter bastards. And on top of all that, our dear bunny James turned out to be a couple of years older than what they estimated at the rabbit rescue where we adopted him from a couple of years ago. He died of old age, covered in a blanket, with me and my girlfriend lying beside him. We miss him.

Well… apart from James dying, all the other stuff is just a spoiled brat moaning about ‘how difficult his life is. It’s not. My life is absolutely brilliant. I have food, shelter, health, love and television (hurrah), and a case of ‘artists block’. So, I may just be second rate artist, writing second rate postings to promote a first class artists site have ou seen the interviews with Kendrick Mar and Joey Monsoon yet? Whoa!); I can live with that. I’ll just have to keep on trying my best. And there is light at the end of the tunnel. Yesterday I managed to get some sketches on paper which will be first studies for the two other parts of an ‘Essen’ tryptich.  Cheerz.

• Is beer better than a sausage role?
• Where are my keys?
• Money is a more objective standard for measuring than ‘happiness’. Does that mean it is a better standard for expressing wealth?
• How many animals can you kill to save one human life?
• Are objective standards better than subjective ones?
• Can you drink through your nose?
• How many ugly animals can you kill to save one cute and cudly baby seal?
• Do things that take no effort worthless?
• What was the last time you laughed uncontrollably?
• Would you kill?
• Is ‘extremly bad’ worse than ‘extremely average’?
• When is something extremely average?
• Art or religion?
• What’s the use of answers that do not lead to new questions?
• What would nothing be like?
• Does the idea of people having sex shock you?
• What is your IP?

Hello reader, do you have internet access at your work? Then you are probably a thief. A couple of weeks ago (yes this is old news, but hey: I have a life too…) the very creative accountants at Ernst & Young calculated that the average employee spends five and a half hour per week on all sorts of personal stuff during work hours. I only know for sure that this information applies to the Netherlands, but we’re usually not much worse than the rest of world. And since you’re probably reading this posting at work yourself… who are you to judge, right?

E&Y has a VP for ‘ICT Leadership‘ (that guy must be AMAZING at excel sheets, the music on their website is pretty cool too) a mr. J. Verschuur and I say him on the news saying that ‘workers that do personal stuff while at work are thieves’. Working at a large accountancy firm I think it is safe to assume that he knows a thing or two about theft. So, what should we do know, corporate monkeys? I say; block all and every site that resembles anything like ‘gmail’, ‘myspace’, ‘wordpress’ (yes, that one too) and let’s all start staring at those excel sheets again, for eight hours a day.

Or, in case you have missed the irony, we can conclude that E&Y are idiots and mr. Verschuur a bit thick. I am not always this cool and talented blogging, visual artist. Three days a week I have a regular job (at an NGO, I’m still credible…) and my employer seems to be very happy. I do what is asked of me -and a little extra-, I don’t mind to be called during my ‘days off’ for a quick question, and I have become very handy at working with computers. Which is good, since at our offices we don’t have an IT person, and I can solve a lot of problems for my colleagues. Last weekend I was thinking about my NGO-job for almost two entire days because some nitwit at a conference we were supposed to be attending f-ed up and I wanted to solve things.

I would like to welcome E&Y to the twenty-first century. A lot of employees nowadays, especially the ones that have creative or communicative jobs (so perhaps not accountants) have a very thin line between work and their private life. Those couple of hours during the week I spend on last.fm, flickr.com or imdb.com I easily make up for during the days that I’m painting or blogging.

Oh, and in case my boss is reading this as well… it’s my day off today.
And in case you’re an E&Y employee; stop losing those laptops…