I WAS AN ART SCHOOL REFUGEE
I drank the art school Kool-Aid, swallowing blind assumptions like Travis in the desert*. Please stop me if you have heard any of this before. 1.“Real artists are starving artists.” 2. “If you schmooze, and promote yourself shamelessly then you are a sell-out.” 3. “Great artists are misunderstood.” 4. “Great artists live in obscurity.” Yes, I honestly believed it all back then, and much more. If all of this sounds familiar, then you know what it led to. We lived out Van Gogh’s legacy, crazy and lonely and lost in our own bullshit.
There was a moment early in my career when I was offered a meeting with an actor in the original production of Rent, to talk about developing a screenplay for them, even directing it. I had nothing but disdain for this play (which of course I had not seen). I was convinced that the story was trite, a piss-poor copy of La Boheme. I believed that the only reason this (theoretically lame) show was a success was because of the publicity bump it stumbled upon when its creator Jonathan Larson died suddenly the night before its premiere. When the call came for me to walk a total of three blocks from my rent-stabilized East Village apartment to the New York Theater Workshop I dismissed it. I remember thinking, “WHAT A BUNCH OF BLIND-LUCK, OPPORTUNISTIC COMMERCIAL BULLSHIT.” So, I went back to writing my masterpiece and never gave it a second thought. That actor I never met? He went on to do great things. I was too busy carrying my little authentic artist flag to see the forest for the trees. Access to talented people like him is very hard to come by.
Sabotage comes in countless forms, and many career obstacles trace back to the same art-myths. For example, are great (or even just “good”) artists drunk and on drugs a lot of the time? Look at the examples that history provides! In fact, try to think of a successful, well-adjusted, responsible, sober 19th or 20th century artist that did NOT suffer from depression, and had no substance issues. Can you separate Keith Richards or Salinger, Plath or Warhol from their lives and their choices? Chances are, if you went to art school, you are a refugee, struggling against this same poisoned mindset. Of course, you can live a healthy, happy life — but how making art coexists with that, well — the roadmap is hard to come by. To create work that is a result of a deep, personal commitment — to create work that takes risks and has something to say — that is a tall order. Digging deep, and taking a profound emotional, spiritual and personal stake in your work takes its toll over time. We measure humiliation, defeat and success in a number of ways, and no artist follows a formula to arrive at their destination. It has to be invented from scratch, from raw experience and technique, opportunity and sensibility. The only way to pull this off in our day and age is to clear the decks, and wipe the slate clean. I went to a kickass art school, and what I learned still rolls around in my head some 30 years later, the time-tested building blocks of solid work. But — AND THIS IS A BIG ONE — what I was taught about life, and career, what I was brainwashed into by my heroes, society, and the media, by my friends, hell, even my enemies — IT ALL HAD TO GO. To be a writer, do I need to write the great American novel? No, I do not. To be a filmmaker, do I need to make a feature? No, I do not. Did I need to learn how to promote myself without shame or hesitation? Yes, I did. Did I need to build a stable home life, no matter how complicated that makes my days? Yes, I did.
Thanks to some blind luck and an unexpected life-detour to Moscow, I found myself in a long overdue de-bullshitting experience. I cut out the noise. I found a way to stop second-guessing and apologizing. Now, I create with intent and purpose, not from a position of art-myth, or some fantasy about what an artist is and does — but from a clear-eyed perspective. I do not need to starve, or be drunk, or be obtuse in order to create. I just cut out the noise. I throw the tv out the window. I play with my kids. I make dinner. I talk with my wife late at night about anything and everything, and then I write books, and make films, take pictures. I pick up a guitar and I don’t look back.
I wish the very same for you, fellow refugee.
f any of this sounds familiar, the solution is far simpler than you think. A person can wander for decades in dark rooms looking for that light switch, but it only takes a second to turn it on. You don’t need a journal assignment, or 10 fancy steps to solve this. Just take a good hard look at your heroes and your influences. Take a few steps back from your creative goals and ask yourself — is this something I think I am supposed to do based on an assumption? Where does your pain and disappointment originate from? Answer these, and the lights come on today.
* The reason I went to film school Paris, Texas (1984)
