Especially in the last year, most of the thoughts that occupy my mind are the ones I have been working on. As I am guided by the endeavours I take the time to do and enjoy, I feel the need to question their quality. “How good am I at what I am doing?”
For a few days now, my friends and I have been discussing contemporary art. This is the name given to works of art and craft that are considered to be the best representatives of modernity. At least that's the logic behind it, but for some reason it doesn't usually feel that way.
Of course, as human beings we can become good at something after working on it for many years and present it to the public (to everyone who encounters the work) with what we have learnt. In my opinion, contemporary art fails a little in this respect. Because I think it is presented in a more one-dimensional and superficial way than people think. This is not true of all of it.
Every work should have both logical and emotional permeability in the audience. What I write should both visualise scenes with flow in the mind and impress with rational and correct execution. If I fail to achieve even a little of this, I cannot consider myself a complete success.
To be honest, I don't really care about your opinions or criticisms, and I don't mean that in a bad way, so don't jump on me. If we are constantly dependent on someone's good or bad judgement and criticism, we forget to return to our essence, to create as we come from within. After that, even your comments, which had value before, are meaningless, because I am no longer myself.
In short, it is necessary to be selfless. But I also think that people (especially when they have been working on it for years) reject criticism completely (I think they are not as much themselves as they think they are, a proper criticism can be a blessing) and secondly (especially when it comes to contemporary artworks) they see it as a precursor to other goals and act accordingly.
I have such an opinion: “Creating a work in the modern sense also means opening the doors for such people to gain fame or make money in a short time.” Unfortunately, I am sure that I am not the only one who thinks this way. As I said, it would be wrong to generalise. On the other hand, the fact that this group of people is familiar with the factors I have mentioned does not prevent us from thinking this way.
Photo by Birmingham Museums Trust on Unsplash
Before writing my article, I came across a short video which I compared to the philosophical passages of Alan Watts. Not exactly, but similar phrases were used in the video: “In 100 years, nothing you own, no one will be alive, and you may not even exist. Even if it does, it will not belong to you or be known to belong to you. It will be a witness to other lives in another place. It will not be associated with you, you may never have existed.”
What is said is true, we have a shorter life than we think and a voracious appetite that goes against that. Although this may change according to what time brings, what is in human nature is permanent. Haven't people always wanted to be famous, rich, famous, mysterious, wise, eloquent, influential, known? Who did what and why, thousands of lives we do not know as well as those we do have come and gone.
In all the pages of history, we have always wanted to be at the top, in the farthest corner, at the most extreme point, in the front row, in the headlines. But these should not be confused with the pictures that cavemen left on the wall; they were just storytellers who needed to tell parts of their lives.
Now I go back to the beginning, to what I have been thinking about for the last year. When I was little I thought I was a chosen one like everyone else, which is a bit human, a bit naive, a bit selfish. Maybe it's a bit of cartoon and Hollywood influence, who knows? But as we get older, as logic gets closer to emotion, we start to realise that the world is not what we thought it was. For those with the kind of characteristics I mentioned, that either comes later or maybe never.
During that period when I was writing hard, I wasn't thinking about anything else. My mind was just on reading, taking notes and writing. And it still is, to be honest. I have no idea how long it will last, and I have no intention of changing it for now. This is the way I want to live my life: Not caring who says what, taking into account the comments I think are of high quality, writing the kind of articles I like, not adopting behaviour that is not virtuous, making fun of those fraudsters who think they are creating works of art.
When human beings, as we have just mentioned, have to leave the historical arena and are replaced by new generations who are ignorant of the past, none of us may be of any significance. Most of us will disappear altogether. Being aware of this thought, I sometimes answer my questions like “Will I be good? What is necessary for me to be good?”, which I sometimes ask in sorrow. Whatever I write, as long as I do it right, there is no way it can backfire. And whatever I write, people can always find a way to judge me. This world is even beyond Dostoyevsky and Tolstoy. Their mortal bodies have passed away, but their thoughts have never been erased. What is immortality if not that? To be recognised for what you have done (preferably good or thought-provoking) is to live in the future.
If you pay attention, most successful writers were not able to be the people of their time. We only realised their value later. Or maybe we didn't want to pay much attention to them. This is not an article that says, “I don't belong to this period, my significance will be realised when I die”, and even if I did, I wouldn't have any way of knowing. But I always felt that I was living my life for the future. Not for my future, but for the future. For those in the future. As we are specks in the universe, we are atoms in time. So we do our part and we leave. Instead of doing our best sincerely, weaponising the deceptions of time and selling people false hopes is the lowest point we can be.
I think that doing only what you love, as much as you can, lovingly and willingly, without any ulterior motives, first for yourself and then for everyone else, is both the greatest luxury and the most important feature in the world. That's why I do my best to fictionalise and write. In this respect, I like to be someone who leaves it to the next generations, no matter how good or bad they are.
When I edit the articles in which I add my personal thoughts of this kind, I think: “Perhaps I should have made a series of articles in which I convey my thoughts to the future.”
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