Friday, June 17, 2016

The Opinion Hipster.

I don't know if these ideas will make their (not there as ideas are individuals and have rights too) way into my Art but there is a tendency in life which I might be seeing and it may actually be relevant as an idea to discuss in an art context.

It is somehow to do with having our opinions of what other people in other parts of the world, even if it's next door, should be doing... in our opinion, and doing petitions and what not in the hope that our opinion becomes a legislative force which in turn makes laws of our opinions... but then we turn round and have more opinions about how these laws, we ourselves condoned are taking away our freedoms.

It's like it's becoming a reciprocal of our ability to change, through the laziest form of doing which opinion might actually be, the world is turning around and making the world less changeable and more restrictive... and again the opinion monster rears it's head and legislation compounds that error by making even more laws... and then we blame government, which again is merely an opinion, as we all should of course know that government have long been pragmatic forces who's sole objective is to, without ideals, just condone and adjust, without morality, to public opinion.

And now we seem to have the worst, though logical, extension of these ideas which is the opinion hipster where that person, without conscious knowledge, will align their sense of identity in the world with the opinions which they feel most serve their idea of what they might be, not as a consumer of things, but as a consumer of pre-packaged seemingly on the edge societal moralities.

Okay, we're in New Zealand and we have Nuclear free legislation and in no small part it is because when a nuclear powered warship arrived in our waters all those years ago hundreds and hundreds of people risked their lives taking whatever boat they could lay their hands on and went out into the harbour and 'lived and breathed' the reality of their 'opinion'.

Now the same legislation which we all seemingly hold dear to our national hearts is being possibly shifted away from this heartfelt rendition of our sovereignty have the sales of small boat plans and the buying of plywood, hand tools and glues gone through the roof in anticipation of real and valid actioned proof of our opinions? No, this clamouring to be heard is at most the form of petitions, facebook posts and the odd semi radical newspaper article.

So what it is now isn't that we go out and make life fit us but that we create the opinion of what we hope to be and then fight, through opinion, to make the world fit what we aren't even yet willing to challenge within ourselves to be.

So this means that the age of the activist to which we all lay claim to as creating a simile of the world we wanted has actually become the age of the actorist - the word act, that descriptive pronoun (and excuse me if it isn't but it just popped into my head... so I'll use it and wonder if anyone will even be bothered to take me to task, equated, of course to my value as a rival opinionist), still has act in it, but the presumptive text that supports it isn't at all what it used to be.

It is learned lines, worry shrouded waiting for the vaunted opinion of the critic, the weigher of our ability not in being what we are but in hope that we are what we have defined ourselves to be by the opinion we stand behind.

And the irony of it all, IMHO, is that the World doesn't become what we think it should be... it becomes what we are most afraid of being. That means that the opinion counts for nothing beside why we might have it. But that's only my opinion and whatever you chose to do or be has my consent... not because you need it but because it's absolutely none of my business.

Tuesday, June 14, 2016

Mohican Mauve. For sale on Felt.

This is where you might have been or where you might be going, it's about this.
I have this life style where I basically don't need much money at all to just survive and keep meandering about the property I'm on. Heres a recent vid from stuff (.co.nz) which kinda explains that statement of being almost retired.

And this life suits me fine but theres still one big set of things I wanna do but I've ended up almost unable to interact with the whole day to day striving in a capitalist economy, by choice or circumstance I'm unsure but it is what it is.

My car, that noble and trusty 21 year old Daihatsu Mira, sits forelorn in the driveway needing a water pump, some CV boots and a couple of front tires - then a WOF and some rego and Bob's your mother's brother and I'm back on the road and having adventures in possible consequence.

And I owe 900 bucks to family. My last money making thing was a sponsored trip to Great Barrier November last year where I kinda taught a few locals how to build walls outta hard rubbish... but since then, except when I suddenly needed some mechanical bit's and sold a coat I'd made for a pittance, but was entirely accepting of, to Caitlin Smith, the Brilliant Jazz singer (name dropping... oh, that's naughty) I've made no actually money for months and months... live cheap, it's an experiment that's working well.

And this dream thing, this final foray into art, it's about building AF (absolutely fabulous) art cars and motorcycles and I've got all the bit's and almost have the space, well I do have the space and the materials but I need to actually build this massive 6mtr by 3mtr covered space on the driveway... Should be done by this coming summer.

Art cars and motorcycles? Many reasons, culmination of all the reasons possibly.

1. The reason I even kinda went to art school was it was all I had left. I'd tried various like proper shit, landscaping, music shops and some other stuff too, and kept failing... just never had the backup or even the knowledge to be middle class... something like that anyways, so I had this idea that if I did what I'd always done anyways, which was draw (and since I was 1 1/2 years old) I might be able to get a foothold in the middle classes then be able to bring through all my clever mates from the working class who were always ultra capable and even artistic in a kind of bogon way here and there... and allow us all to enjoy a sense of culture and being which is always, nowadays especially, under threat of getting eaten up as the middle class and above divert all their short attention spans towards the empty and guileless media selling life from containers.

2.'Cause vehicles are fucking dangerous! And I wanted to see those with big pockets shell out and buy these super duper opulent jewels... then have to risk their fucking lives doing what the things are, and will be, intended to do. Art on walls and sitting all still like, and even moving a bit... oh, how clever, is just decoration especially when our society is so topsy turvy with wealth and I decided ages and ages ago I ain't here to polish shit for Rich Folks.. I'm here, if anything, to remind them of their responsibilities gettin' so damn rich in the first place that trifles like art take precedence over every body being sheltered, fed and clothed.

3. The car, the vehicle of any persons private transportation, has basically become an ego gratification device which weights about a fucking tonne as everybody hauls their significance about and actually thinks it means something except this is my greed in full blown splendour and that is inconceivably stupid and naive for a society that thinks it's actually successful in some way. So making these personnal transportation devices into artworks appeals to me.

Therefore if you buy this couch you may have the couch, and good on you for your exquisite taste, but for me it's all about funding my last ditch attempt to make people think about that stupidity of so much resource going into things that basically just move you from place to place... but if we are going to keep doing it, and doubtless we will, why not use the whole thing to create fun and silliness, which we seriously need a lot more of, and put resource into that and not into pre-packaged non bio-degradable totally imported stupidity?

Yup, and I'll do it and it'll be of interest for about a day and a half until some new outrage done thousands of miles away winds up our opinion hipster handle and we''ll all be out there arguing again about what isn't even relevant.

Thankyou for your time and have a nice day.

Oh, and heres a close up of the fabric itself and the little metal buttons that both pleat it and form the ties to hold it to the frame.
Isn't it lovely... so luscious and sumptuous! And this is how it's tied onto the frame which isn't the best but it'll do.

Monday, June 13, 2016

Can I help you?

I get up quite early, around 5.30 most days, then I'm back in bed by 9 at night and that's pretty backwards but it seems to be going somewhere in the sense of preparing for the new day instead of reviewing the old day.

So I sat here this morning and it's like all this stuff I do around the house, as in sorting it all out so one day others can come in a make use of this privilege I've created, it's all going to take a long time yet to come into being and off to the side, that fairly recent set of ideas about getting money to sponsor this, but came to nothing, suddenly came up again as in to do what I'm doing here needs money and people helping... 'cause me doing it all by myself is simply going to take years.

Then it suddenly occurred to me that if I want money and people working with me then I should offer, free of charge, what I have to others... so that's what I'm here for.

I guess a day a week could quite easily be put aside where whatever your idea is that you think needs done then I might be able to help in some way.

I have quite considerable access to materials which I've collected and stored and are basically sitting here doing nothing and my real talents tend towards prototyping so if both me and my resources can help in some way then, at the very least, send me a message, and we'll see if we can figure something out.

I suppose what it comes down to is an obligation of sorts that if I hope that others would support what I'm hoping to do then it's fairly obvious I should offer exactly the same help myself.

So if you look across  all you think I might be capable of and what resources that might also imply then think about some of your own ideas of things and stuff and what you might like to do and if theres a crossover in their somewhere then by all means let me know what that might be and we'll figure out how I can help... free of any charges, except if I need to come to you that might require a little gas money.