“There was such a high level of connoisseurship, of everything. That made the culture better. A very discerning audience...is as important to the culture as artists. It’s exactly as important.”

I am most happy when I feel myself exist beyond any fixed identity or role. I am most happy when I feel lost in the things I create and love. I’m no longer me, but part of something great and unstoppable. The power of that loss is always striking when it occurs, and it happens again and again when I stop thinking about myself so much, and just... See more

Artists are pressured to do whatever possible to be seen and heard, not their best work out of love.

The problem is not that everyone wants to be an artist, it’s that enjoying art with other people for the simple, loving pleasure of it all has become devalued. If that’s the case, what are we even doing all this for? Why be an artist at all if we can’t enjoy the things we create?

Walter Benjamin writes that “the distracted mass absorbs the work of art.”

“the distracted mass absorbs the work of art.”

Participation in the creations of others, for so many of us, has been made to feel like a means to an end. We read books to become better writers, or so we can seem well-read. We listen to music to sharpen our influences and find our “target audience.”

Another definite reason so many people seek the troubled social status of “creative” these days is because it’s easier than ever to become one. The democratization of this pursuit is, on one hand, a beautiful thing.

“There was such a high level of connoisseurship, of everything. That made the culture better. A very discerning audience...is as important to the culture as artists. It’s exactly as important.”

If everyone’s a DJ but no one dances or earnestly cares about the music, everything has to be broader, more conspicuous. Artists are pressured to do whatever... See more