Open Letter to the City of Ventura

Respected members of the council,

In regards to city planning, funding, and recent developments in the arts funding of the city of Ventura:

The city of Ventura currently faces a major economic and fiscal crisis of unprecedented proportions- in large part brought on by a declining tax base as real estate values and retail sales nose dive, not to mention the $10 million in bad investments and bungling on the part of the city. So what is it proposing to do? Cut back on the one engine capable of accelerating the recovery of the city- that is, her arts.

A lot has been invested in creating a "New Art City" in Ventura. New blood and talent has moved into Ventura in the past year or two. Cutting this growth toward a critical mass at this vulnerable time may be a long-term mistake difficult to correct later. Once it gets out that you've cut off the New Arts City track, it will be very difficult to resurrect. Short-changing the arts now could do permanent and long-term damage.

But have the arts in Ventura been that well-supported even up to now? As the North Avenue Developmet project, a project for a part of the city central to a lot of its current and future arts growth and rejunenation, several years after its inception languishes without a designer or serious support within the city machinery, having missed many of its intermediary goals, is now still number four on the priority list, the Auto Center development project sits as the number one priority.

The Auto center - wouldn't that have saved us in this economy!!

The Mid-town corridor, another critical area, isn't even on the planning list. Concurrently, the city sits poised to throw its cultural plan out the window. We see a pattern here- of short-sighted misjudgement compromising solid long-term thinking.

We probably should be asking why the arts are and have not been receiving MORE support. Instead we are debating whether the arts will continue at the level of their past, inadequate priority and support. And it is just not arts issues that are ill-thought-out. Raising sales taxes in down times, when there is a shortage of buyers, only drives sales elsewhere.

Then there's the kids. If you've ever seen the excited, joyous faces of the kids that rush into the Bell Arts kids art classes- the younger sisters and brothers of the teenagers selling drugs on the street only blocks away, you'll realize how much the arts mean for our future and these kid's future.

Remember, any vote by the council or move against the arts today is a vote against the future: it is a vote against the economic future of Ventura, it is a vote against our kids, and their future. Strangely, there are those who believe that cutting a buck from the arts today actually saves them a buck tomorrow. In reality, every buck cut from the arts today costs us many times that tomorrow.

Upperware Parties

The new thing - women getting together to sell their jewels at Upperware parties. Trade stories about all the ex-whatevers who gave you the goods and sell them to a buyer for cash on the spot. Clear the air, that ring from the old asshole is your next paycheck. No guilt or having to go to a pawn shop to hawk the family jewels. Do it discreetly in the privacy of your hostess's home.

Abstraction

Abstraction is inherently emotionally distancing. Twenty-first century abstraction in painting often seeks, like Klee, some sort of personal or internally generated iconic mapping back to personal events and feelings, frequently veiled by obtuse references.

There is a great misconception in visual art today, a misconception that believes that great art, or at least the next great new thing, is somehow inherently impossible to understand; but as Dave Hickey points out, the techniques and means to achieve this have become almost universal, so that we have thousands of people cranking out shit that no one can understand.

The original impetus toward abstraction was to create images that were universally understood--independent of one's cultural filters. This brought out an unprecedented level of technical invention. Today this has been turned on its head: everyone seeks to be completely opaque and incomprehensible while technical invention has hit a new low, technique has almost disappeared.

Similar things have happened before--in all Mannerist epochs. History tends to judge harshly, with subsequent generations (except for a handful of specialists) often forgeting entire generations. A generation forgets quality and meaning at the risk of being dismissed. The weakness that fears making a judgement, a determination of quality, which used to be the hallmark of a critical facility, is a weakness that leads to oblivion, that generates forgettable "art". We've just passed a generation where anything goes. This is good, but after a certain point, in the end, when anything goes, everything goes, and nothing remains of interest. The confusion and ennui of a "late" mileau overcomes itself, like all empires, with its own garbage.

Realism

Realism is a nineteenth century invention. It had to overcome Aristotle's observation that it was a fairly poor artist who merely copied nature. Aristotle's mimesis originally was about achieving a certain emotional veracity in a stage production. In other words, he is the first to point out that over-acting bleeds a dramatic performance of a certain natural emotional truth and power. It took another couple of millennia before Grotowski and the Method, respectively, created the polar foundations of modern theatre. Grotowski, through stripped-down staging and an intensely artificial technique achieved a heightened sense of emotional truth, very unlike "reality TV", which uses real people to produce an incredibly artificial surface effect; an artificiality with its own queasy addictive quality--like bad chocolate.

Beyond Einstein

Scientific American March 2009 issue has article on how Einstein theory of special relativity might be wrong. Not quite fair title, I mean Bell's Theorem was published long after. It's not that Einstein was so wrong, as that folks have gone beyond him. Ah well, entanglement roars again. All the paranormal coach-philosophers will have another field day. Which is good. A lot more interesting than bank statements and foreclosures. Check it out.

Putting up (with) a blog

OK. Finally posting a blog to my site after, what? Four years of pressure from friends and enemies. So here it is. Still trying to figure out how to do a slideshow of recent paintings. Not going to happen today.