failed silkscreens and why do i worry about not being part of that?

Can you guess which one's the model? Obviously these did not turn out quite as expected. Not so bad considering it's a first in screen printing. In fact we should rather be patting me on the back for trying something new rather than trembling in the corner paralyzed within the bizarre boundaries I set up for myself. I think I should also be happy that this design came out of and is for the art collective I belong to, despite it's disheveled geographically-disorienting condition right now.

I have often been asking myself recently if no one really wants to make arts together. I've been trying to rally local creative spirits as well as old school friends and my supposed art collectiv comrades. This is not to say anything of judgment on these fine and noble folks, but rather to remark on how hard it really is to make collaborative work. It might be easier if I was actually living in a city but I'm not so sure about this (ie aren't people misanthropic and alienated everywhere? AND wasn't I the most depressed and reclusive while I lived in Portland, the "city of every artist"?).

I picked up my new Artforum the other day (a necessary delivery to my PO Box that makes me feel like there is a world outside Vermont, however undesirable). Low and behold- an article on Red76's Ghosttown by Matthew Stadler. It was quite a terrific article as it was self-consciously cozying up to the challenge of ephemeral community interaction art being almost impossible to circumscribe with artsy-critical blah blah blah. I particularly liked Matthew's quote from Charles Ludlam, describing how, in these types of art situations, you become "a living mockery of your own ideals... if not, you've set your ideals too low." This one phrase saves the article from going too far in it's almost-accusation of Ghosttown as being "shallow". Now, I'm sad I wasn't in Portlandia to witness Red76's Clothing Swap and Open Kitchen, but the commonality of it gives me the sensation that I can easily imagine exactly how it went down. The beauty of the universal experience. I feel comforted and inspired, not because I actually witnessed the art, but simply because I know it happened.

I often feel as if all the people around me are the artists and their interactions are the "real" art. Why can't I let go of my artsy critical blah blah blah, I ask myself? It can't be as simple as "the teachers did it to me". No no no, the teachers only tapped into and fed a fire that was burning a long time before that. Perhaps even longer than I've been alive. I am only an incarnation of some universal anxiety, pulsing constantly in its attempts to make meaning (as if it wasn't already there). Resolution: I will try to "wing it" more often.