THE REVOLUTION WILL NOT BE TELEVISED (2009)*

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The Revolution will not be sponsored by Bud Lite, Taco Bell, or Toyota. It will not be back after these important messages. It will not be out on Blu-ray and DVD next Tuesday available at Wal-Mart for $6.99 to be shown on high-definition TV. The Revolution will not be televised.

The Revolution will not have six-pack abs and Botox smiles and skin that looks ten years younger and have more taste and be less filling. It will not have whiter teeth and fresher breath and less calories and fewer polyunsaturates and it will not make you lose weight so you can have sex like a porn star. The Revolution will not be televised.

The Revolution will not be recommended by four out of five doctors. It will not get the Goodhousekeeping Seal of Approval. It will not be the choice of a new generation it will not go better with Coke and it will not be “the official Revolution of NASCAR and the New York Yankees”. It will not soon be made into a major motion picture starring Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie coming soon to a theater near you because the Revolution will not be televised, brother.

The Revolution will not be up ten points on the Dow Jones it will not make Wall Street rich and famous it will not have its picture taken with Dick Cheney and Bill Clinton and have stock in Halliburton and send more troops to Afghanistan and Iraq. The Revolution will not tap our phones invade our homes spy on us at work know what library books we read monitor our every movement with computer chips satellite surveillance and nosey neighbors and call it “patriotism”. The Revolution will not be televised.

It will not lock up habeas corpus and throw away the key and give us euphemisms for torture like “rendition” and “enhanced interrogation techniques”. It will not treat the Third World like a cash cow to be milked to the last drop or as a supply of lab rats for Big Pharma’s assembly line of legalized drugs. And it will not stop unions and free speech and turn the workers of the world into slaves of the global-plantation as the global-bank counts its money (which used to be our money) to the last Euro-penny. If you wanna know about any of this then don’t look on TV cuz the Revolution, my friend, will not be televised.

The Revolution will just say no to ChaseVisa, it will not do a commercial for American Express, it will not buy now with no interest till 2012! It will not want to be a billionaire (or a millionaire even) and it may just want to live simply again so that others might simply live because all of this, sister, will not be televised.

There will be no theme song by Britney Spears or Madonna no fund-raiser by NPR no tie-ins to Burger King and McDonalds and the words that are said won’t be trademarked or copyrighted or used as a catch phrase on Saturday Night Live because, my friends, the Revolution will not be televised.

There will be no reality shows or virtual games of the Revolution on Myspace or on Facebook because the Revolution is real, my friends, it’s three-dimensional, it exists right now in every action that comes from an idea that says no to globalization and corporatization, to monopolization and homogenization (which might be good for milk but it ain’t right for human beings, ya hear?). It says yes to any action that comes from an idea like those crazy ones that say we might all be able to live in peace, that we should treat others as we want to be treated ourselves, that nobody should go hungry, that diversity is what it’s about, that our differences are what make us unique, that religion serves to separate us from our brothers and sisters, that we should watch out for any god who tells us to kill in his name, and that most of mankind exists for something more than just to make a handful of people really fucking rich. This Revolution will most definitely not be televised.

The Revolution does not exist on a piece of paper in a book or in a fortune cookie. There is no recipe for this Revolution. It is not in the history books or the newsreel footage or in some politician’s mouth but it exists in our minds when we know when somethin’ just ain’t right, when the words and the actions don’t match up. When they keep us busy with a million distractions (like mice on a treadmill) so we can’t see what’s goin’ on right in front of us. When it’s easier to go back to sleep and turn on the TV, and this is why the Revolution will not be televised.

Because the Revolution is real. It’s the program we join already in progress with no commercial interruptions complete and unedited. It’s what we see in living color when we reclaim our own minds when we think for ourselves when our ideas become action. And then, when enough of us do this the world will begin to change. This is the Revolution. The Revolution will not be televised. The Revolution is live, it’s happening right now, it’s already begun.
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*It's been 40 years since the original protest poem/song was written, and I figured it was due for an update. So here's my version written the other day. Imagine a band behind it with a jazzy soul groove as the words are spoken, or perhaps a solo upright bass...
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THREE SECONDS BEFORE THE LIBERMAN

The painting itself is spare. Abstract. Black and white. From ten feet away the composition becomes clear, what looks like a charcoal eye staring out from the center behind a milky cloud of gauze, the paint itself tenuous, as if the white and black are filmy ephemera vanishing and emerging with the play of light. And then, the bold strokes of black scratched across a window pane to further obscure the eye. Like calligraphy—India ink flashed on rice paper in an improvisatory testament to immediacy and of going forward beyond thinking. Lines of another language, cryptic and old, and there’s the feeling of happening upon something most intimate. A close-up of an emotion itself, but what does it mean? What does this say? The lines dance as if blown by a forgotten wind and yet they are immutable as a cave painting on ancient rock.

From four feet away the texture is revealed. The canvas with swirls of paint in contradictory motion; huge slashes through plaster through cement through rock as if the unstable surface itself was scraped and gouged with a chisel before it had a chance to solidify. This had been alive once—liquidy and hot, captured in the first moments after it began to cool. Moving closer there are ridges like mountain ranges, raised fingerprints, scars. Thick paint of white and gray in web-like counterpoint to the black which seems deeper now, almost sinister in its blackness. The closer you get the eye disappears.

From two feet away there is a rip of white in the upper left corner. A wound showing the paper-like skin in its fragility. Small stones are embedded in the paint, the surface a slice of rock a sixteenth of an inch thick, this weathered paper which seems at once still wet and older than papyrus. There are colors now, the whites give way to grays to the color of sand to a shadow of blue to the blacks like bamboo reeds obscured by mist, blending into the thick viscous air. Another glance, a gaze at the eye which seems now to be an opening through trees, a dense snow-covered forest. A step closer, the cold can almost be felt.


There are people now. The museum’s piercing stillness is now the blank canvas to footsteps on thick carpeted floors. Four people walk as in procession. Their words are as spare as the paintings: “Hmm...” “Look at that...” Closer they get as they continue their pilgrimage around the walls. A Frankenthaler, a Cárdenas, and then the Liberman, no more than three seconds before each until they pass to David Smith and continue on.

“Hmm...” they say. “Look at that.”

...

THE ONE THAT GOT AWAY

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The other day I thought of an old flame. In third grade we were childhood sweethearts. We sat next to each other in class, we walked home from school together, we sat side by side on the bus during our class trip to Turtle Back Zoo. We were the two smartest kids in class, smitten with puppy love, and everyone assumed we'd eventually get married and have a brilliant future. But then in fourth grade she moved away and I never saw her again, and years later I ended up as an artist and ne'er-do-well. Wondering what became of her I Googled her name and was surprised at what I found. She had recently been named by one of the top investment banks in the world as its chief of European mergers and acquisitions, the only woman to head a mergers business at a bulge-bracket investment bank (whatever that is)*1. Obviously quite the muckety-muck, rolling in dough, elbow-rubbing with the rich and super-rich. Which got me to thinking about the paths that people take, the callings that summon us.

I would never recommend being an artist to anyone. First of all, the hours are terrible, being constantly on call to the Muse who oft times wakes you in the middle of the night with an inspiration that must be heeded. On top of that the pay generally sucks, which forces you to have a second job (one that actually pays the bills). You don't get much recognition, and if you diverge from the marketable and refuse to "brand" yourself, then there's a good chance of everlasting anonymity. In addition, this working all the time for little or no pay and recognition is not that great for the morale. For some, depression is as much of a companion as the Muse. For others, it's addictions (and other self-destructive behaviors). For others, suicide (be it fast or slow). And needless to say, relationships are a challenge--the instability of the artist's life an impediment to all but the most steadfast. And a life spent as an artist is at times like being a building on the edge of the ocean, understanding erosion on a daily basis as the tide ebbs and flows, as one's foundation is undermined. So why does one do it? The poet Robert Bly says that someone who spends 20, 30 years in their art "goes down to the countryside of grief"*2 where they become a friend to sadness. And this somehow sustains. I think of what the Brazilians call "the sadness that is beauty"--an intuition of the very nature of things that is all-encompassing, between nothingness and eternity; a glimpse into our humanity and the maddening transience of our existence. For someone who has spent a lifetime in their art this feeling is the drug, the high, the reason--at times almost godlike.

So what of someone whose calling is to make money? Personally, I have as much insight into this as a rock would have into doing the breast-stroke. I am sure there is a passion to it, in amassing great wealth, but I wonder if there is humanity? I think back to the article about my third grade girlfriend's success. The very next paragraph began with an announcement, about her bank laying off 300 people, accounting for 15% of its investment bankers. I wonder where the humanity is in this.


*1. Her latest success is being named recently in Forbes as one of the 100 most powerful women in world finance, routinely brokering billion-dollar deals.

*2. "When anyone seriously pursues an art--painting, poetry, sculpture, composing--over twenty or thirty years, the sustained discipline carries the artist down to the countryside of grief; and that descent, resisted so long, proves invigorating. As I've gotten older I find I am able to be nourished more by sorrow, and to distinguish it from depression."
--Robert Bly

THE TREE FALLS... (Part 2)

T.S. Eliot said “the artist is heterodox while everyone else is orthodox.”*1 The problem though with being on the outside is the seemingly inescapable longing one has to one day fit in. Kierkegaard maintained that the minority is stronger than the majority because the minority is made up of those who think for themselves and actually have an opinion**2, whereas the majority is oft times the product of monolithic thinking. But the paradox of the minority is that it is born from the majority—the majority’s orphan child, its unwanted bastard. Throughout history, in art as well as in politics, the minority has struggled for acceptance, which ultimately has meant to be allowed back in to the majority. They (the minority) want what the majority has and what they (the minority) are subsequently denied, and this is human nature, this craving for acceptance. Few want to be rejected. Few want to be outcast. The slave wants freedom. The woman the vote. The writer the publisher. The artist the gallery. Think of the Impressionists—rejected by the Academy they got together and put on their own shows. Think of the punk rockers. In a world of rock stars with castles and private jets they had three chords and borrowed (sometimes stolen) equipment, and with this they revolutionized music. And for a time these rebels exist in a charmed space defined by their own passion and conviction (and the rejection of the world at large). But then comes the ever-encroaching entropy of the majority. The majority may be stupid but it’s no dummy. Eventually it sees what’s going on in that seedy club, in that makeshift art exhibit, and then, like all powerful entities in charge, it wants a piece of the action, and it goes about it the only way it knows how, by acquiring as it would any other commodity. And the next thing you know there is elevator music of the Sex Pistols and Van Gogh coffee mugs. To return to Kierkegaard, as the majority subsumes the minority’s truth the truth must once again retreat to a new minority***3. Truth exists, but it prefers the demimonde to Fifth Avenue. It can’t survive for long as a commodity to be bought and sold. And this is the problem with art—the problem that has existed for millennia and exists to this day--the virus-like craving for acceptance from the world at large, felt on some level, at some time, by the artist. And nowhere is this paradox more striking than with what is now called “outsider art”. In order to be accepted something must first be defined. Critics of the day didn’t know what to make of the Impressionists’ splashes of color and seemingly improvised anti-compositions. But eventually a new generation was able to redefine Impressionism until it not only became accepted by the masses but its paintings today command some of the highest prices on the world market. The paradox itself is that this “definition” is the entrée to acceptance for the artist and her art, and in the process of being defined the work and the artist are thereby changed****4. Like trying to observe a molecule. Like Schrödinger’s cat. In the unopened box the cat—or in this case, the art--can exist in its charmed space. But once the box is opened... So we have “outsider art” at the fancy Manhattan gallery, in the glossy magazines, at the Venice Biennale, and the majority appears with checkbooks in hand.

The question that must be asked though, is how can a work of art be known, be recognized without this process taking place? Is it even possible? Is it not human nature to want to distinguish oneself, to stand out from the masses? The initials after one’s name, the resume, the awards, the renown, the bank account. Intrinsically these things have nothing to do with art, but we have spent centuries convincing ourselves that they in fact do, to the point that we cannot look at a piece of artwork without this somewhere in mind. Here’s how it works: There is the artist. There is her art. There is someone who sees the art. And this is where the trouble begins. How to look at art without comparison, without categorization, without the awful weight of the continuum of art and consequently art criticism and the opinions of society and the marketplace hanging above one’s head? How to see something for what it is, intrinsically, without rushing headlong to that next step, the Pandora’s Box of acceptance which leads to commodification? And the question this raises is what is art’s true purpose? Is it personal or is it cultural, or can the personal be cultural (which is a heterodox notion in an orthodox mindset). I think of what the Spanish call duende. In the Spanish arts, duende is difficult if not impossible to define, yet it is recognized instantly when it happens. A guitarist plays flamenco. Something about the musician, the audience, even the night itself suggests that something rare may occur. Something beyond all definitions. Something risen from within as well as without, coaxed into existence by the entirety of the scene as if from a sacred space. Something that won’t be repeated and whose lifespan might be but a moment. “Eso es!” people call out. “That is it!” And in that moment all who can hear and can see and can feel are forever transformed*****5.


*1. "The artist is the only genuine and profound revolutionist, in the following sense. The world always has, and always will, tend to substitute appearance for reality. The artist, being always alone, being heterodox when everyone else is orthodox, is the perpetual upsetter of conventional values, the restorer of the real... His function is to bring back humanity to the real." –-T.S. Eliot

**2. “Truth always rests with the minority, and the minority is always stronger than the majority because the minority is generally formed by those who really have an opinion, while the strength of a majority is illusory, formed by the gangs who have no opinion—and who therefore in the next instant (when it is evident that the minority is the stronger) assume its opinion, which then becomes that of the majority, i.e., becomes nonsense by having the whole train and numerus [big numbers] on its side, while Truth again reverts to a new minority” –from The Diary of SØren Kierkegaard (#128)

***3. Ibid.

****4. “Throw away the lights, the definitions, and say of what you see in the dark that it is this or that it is that, but do not use the rotted names. Throw the lights away, nothing must stand between you and the shapes you take when the crust of shape has been destroyed. You as you are? You are yourself.”
–-from “The Man with the Blue Guitar” by Wallace Stevens

*****5. Since I heard faintly the voice of the first wild goose, upon mid-sky alone my thoughts have been fixed. –-Mitsune, Japanese ca. 900

FUCK IT! IT'S ALL BULLSHIT!!!

Today's art scene is FUCKED! If you wanna know what's REALLY happening check out the listings under "EVERYTHING YOU ALWAYS WANTED TO KNOW ABOUT KRONOS BUT WERE AFRAID TO ASK!" (especially "ART GALLERY 101")... (over there, to your right, muthafucka!---->)

GOES GREAT WITH THE SOFA!

Check out highlights below from our recent exhibit of amazing oil and mixed media paintings from this artist who is so famous that I can't even say his name without having to pay him $10,000, so I will let his work speak for itself...


"Untitled #1" 164" x 164" oil on canvas



"Untitled #2" 184" x 98" oil, mixed media on canvas



"Untitled #3" 212" x 152" oil, watercolor, bird's feathers, lint on canvas


"Untitled #4" 417" x 361" oil, acrylic, watercolor, vomit, boiled ham on canvas



"Untitled #5" 188"x 127" acrylic, macadam, barnacles, Nutella on canvas



"Untitled #6" 504 x 504" crayon, pencil sharpenings, used Kleenex, toenails on canvas



"Untitled #7" 1253" x 1253" radioactive elements, moss, amoeba, dental floss on canvas


--all work copyright 2009
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KRONOS ROCKS YOUR ASS OFF!

PUNK/INDIE/ALT/ROCK @ KRONOS!!!

KRONOS UNPLUGGED!

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