A couple of events happening around Tucson this weekend got me to thinking about the dimensions of cities and art.

• Mercury Portal at Monterey Court
• The Boneyard Project at Pima Air & Space Museum

***
For me, smaller cities, towns and rural areas, by providing more space, physically, mentally and alternative uses thereof of all of the above, allow for/force interesting art to happen.  I notice big cities, while full of perfectly lovely people, tend to get hung up on trendiness. Allow me to disparage Austin for a sec: let’s see, what do we have going on art-wise this week? A couple of printmaking (silkscreen, to be specific) shows, an zine release party on the street art tip; on the highbrow side, some lectures at the University, a commercial gallery show with a tome of a press release, and an installation-performance about the end of the world at an old house.

The installation-performance and apocalyptic theme have been “trending” over the course of the last year or so (but thinking back to those paintings I saw at arthouse in ’06/’07 or thereabouts — can’t find the info online). I think this is because one’s understanding of space in the city is so rigidly compartmentalized: exit ramp, median, lamppost, sidewalk, yard, office park, cool neighborhood, ghetto neighborhood, rich part of town. The destructive nature of this type of art satisfies the urge to break out of this utilitarian framework, to wrenchingly twist it past recognition in order to self-consciously surprise. While this is healthy and interesting and wonderful, it seems to me a bit like unrequited love. The cement does not give back, it merely reflects.

Lacking these utilities and dedicated facilities, smaller cities and rural areas allow artistically-minded inhabitants to make their mark on the environment — and for it to make its impact felt in reciprocation. I’m not talking about some sort of hippie utopia, just the everyday-ness of living in a place where everything is subtracted. There is a perception that things must happen in order for a place to be happening. What would happen if something didn’t happen?

***
As I’ve gotten older, my art has turned outward towards experiencing my environment, away from the introspection of growing up, something probably everyone goes through. I feel obligated a to make a detailed drawing of my next-door neighbor’s plastic-encased vegetable garden.

My dream is to be crank in the country, not a cog in a city.

True to character, I jotted down a few points of interest during the panel discussions that I’ve been assessing, but no significant lessons or questions to add to my mental card catalog, much less post about on here.

Yesterday morning I read a negative [but completely justified] review on Keep Austin Stylish of work recently shown at a fashion event that provided the foil I was looking for:

Does taking a pair of jeans and cutting part of them out and replacing it with neon lace and then creating a “top” by simply taking a yard of tulle and tying it around your boobs really make you a designer? The sad thing is that in Austin it apparently does. I’m sorry to have to be the one to say this but, adorning an outfit does not make you a designer.

Photo credit: http://keepaustinstylish.blogspot.com/

This “bad review” was heartening to read because she had the balls to write it, and because it was the truth. You gotta respect that, and she did go back to compliment the hair and make-up, which was actually eye-catching and well-executed. I haven’t subscribed to this blog over a long period of time (a matter of months, vs. 3-4 years as I have with other fashion blogs) so I am not sure how many other shows have been negatively reviewed on the site, but in general, I rarely come across panned fashion shows or collections. * I will say after barely delving into review-territory on Tu Scene in late ’09/early ’10 that even throwing the teensiest amount of negativity into a commentary is what definitely gets the conversation going.

Another foil: there’s a whole genre of online venues for and by graphic designers to vent about pain-in-the-ass clients/bosses/salespeople and their dismal creative preferences: Sh*t The Creative Director/CEO/Account Guy/Client/Intern Says, Comic Sans Criminal [I'd love to see a site called Papyrus Perp! why won't that font just DIE?!]. And of course, outlets like Design Observer, Design You Trust, PRINT, Voice, etc. offering industry news and formal analysis. And a ton of other stuff I don’t even seek out because it’d probably push me over the edge. I worry enough about designing and executing projects 40 hours a week, thank you very much, and I’m lucky to have sympathetic co-workers there in the trenches with me and a kindhearted husband who actually listens when I need to blow off steam about all of the above.

Why compare to art writing to fashion and graphic design? For one, I read comparatively more about these subjects than I do art, and because they are both creative, subjective cultural topics, unlike, say, computer programming or neuroscience. Not that one can’t write passionately about computer programming and neuroscience, but a slogging through lot of the empirical information to get to the juicy conclusion would probably be rather dry for most people. And also because both forms cull hugely from visual art — contemporary, historic, folk. But there doesn’t seem to be a lot of conversation and second-guessing about pre-reqs in those communities. You’re either with The Establishment [anyone who has a print magazine presence] or you’re a rogue blogger. If anything, blogging has actually helped the fashion machine reach out and grab consumers by the lapels through the web with all kinds of creepy tracking MO’s. The last couple of years have seen the rise of the Superblogger – once fairly regular people who now wield influence* over media and major brands. [On a side note, wouldn't it be cool to see something like IFB for art bloggers? A support network, not so much an information aggregator]. The only pre-reqs I can gather in a general sense for these two sectors are that the writer must have a passion and knowledge about the subject matter. Graphic design bloggers take it one step further, but not a big one: the expectation is that one works in the field, which would require a piece of paper issued by an educational institution. So while it’s true not just anyone can write well about fashion or graphic design, there certainly seem to be less hang-ups in those communities.

When I write on my own site here, I worry about being invalidated because I didn’t go to a prestigious state school with a strong visual art program and don’t aspire to move to NYC or get my MFA [but Marfa, Alpine or heck, even Silver City would be OK]. Maybe because I don’t possess that background I’m more likely to second-guess myself, and it’s just my perception of a snobbish vibe that actually has little to no existence in Austin, because all the kids who went to state schools with fancy art programs seem to be equally doubtful.

So my question is, why are art writers so self-conscious? As Women & Their Work Executive Director Chris Cowden pointed out [via], Texas doesn’t have as many writers as it should considering the amount of work out there. I don’t ask this in a self-congratulatory, “hey, let’s give ourselves some credit” or self-aggrandizing, “hey, let’s not be so hard on ourselves” Oprah-esque self-esteem check. I’m just curious as to why this conversation is happening with visual art and not these other cultural communities I mentioned.

• Is it because there are formal conventions [or perhaps "trends" is a better word] to graphic and fashion design one can delineate and analyze?
• Is it because unlike fashion and graphic design, art is not completely consumer-driven, thus making its value harder to quantify?
• Are we afraid of hurting relationships with readers and other artists in our locale?**
• Is it a self-image problem? Do we have to be the first at everything, bucking trends unless we’re the ones who establish them?

On a side note, personally, when it comes to trends I just try to give myself a break. I dislike a lot of trendy work, but usually only for that reason — because it’s popular, and when something is popular, the quality and technique and be better manipulated to have a market and influence. But ubiquitousness is not a real reason to be so harsh about it, because I’ve come to realize it’s kind of inhumane. 95% of trendy art won’t even matter in a couple of years anyways, and the 5% of artists that do evolve deserve success because they progressed, and I think if one progresses in any endeavor, it’s a show of real dedication. Another quality to respect. So why get so upset about it? Just take a look at Facehunter and you’ll see fashion conventions are flimsy, transparent and easy to puncture as a layer of cellophane. Graphic design styles, on the other hand, shift slowly from decade to decade, with relatively little hand-wringing over the past, present and future.

Probably the most common trait I can chalk this self-consciousness up to is that most artists who can write decently are people who are caught up in thought about how they’re communicating on several levels, which affects what they produce in their visual art, all through to the way they speak and write. I’m not that surprised when I read something by an artist friend that shows they have a real gift for language as well. These are the people who should be encouraged to write, start a blog. To give whatever they think they might be capable of a try. Honestly, the only other group of cultural contributors I hear stressing more about writing than artists are actual writers!

If you’ve made it this far, you might’ve judged I’m probably not cut out to be in the aforesaid artist-writer group. I guess this is more of a stream-of-consciousness journal entry than a critical essay. In fact, as I was writing this, I kept imagining how I’d discuss this through a Margi Kimball-style brainmapping illustration!

Going back to my sparse written notes, I see a couple of other thoughts I’d like to elaborate upon, but not to nearly this extent. Lucky you!

__________________________________________________________________________________

* See Mr. Boyd’s wonderfully comprehensive summary of the Summit for further illustration about cheerleading and much more on his Houston-based art blog, The Great God Pan Is Dead.

** Earlier this week, the dazzling WendyB brought up an important caveat about this perception: Famous ≠ Rich. Still, I would love it if designers sent me free shit and all I needed to do in return was snap a few self-modeling photos and post them on my broke-ass but famous blog!

This is where the written word has the advantage over visual art. One can choose to revel in, explore, partially accept cafeteria-style, be indifferent to, ignorant of, or reject the parameters of the four-dimensional experience set by the artist, but short of putting down the book, or trying to read a book in a language one doesn’t understand, one cannot escape the immutable structure of words set forth by the writer. I use the term structure loosely, maybe I should say construct of words. Words written on a page provide a defined space for experience, a four-dimensional experience that takes place in the mind. Now, what one sees in the mind’s eye is open to the reader’s interpretation, but the paramaters are the same: the words provided by the writer, the rectangular shape of the page, reading from left to right, turning pages from left to right. Art does not come with inherent directions for interaction. And if there are, they are usually given in words in the form of statements, descriptions.

Conceptual art is an inadequate term because it emphasizes concept over response, and if one doesn’t understand or even see the concept, it’s not perceived as art, or it is somehow belitting on the behalf of the executor. Maybe it should be called experiential art (or situational art? sit-art?) because regardless of whether or not one “gets” it, one has undeniably still experienced it. The mode of entering the situation is therefore established, like the pages of a book; the point is not so much to understand, but to undergo.

* I spent late last year and early this year composing an essay in my head about why erotica is not art. It’s unpublished on here because as I started to write it out longhand, I could see all the holes in the argument. I knew then that I would be headed back towards this acceptance of a wider range of visual expression as art, I just wasn’t ready to take that position yet.

Painting is better the more it’s like sculpture; sculpture is worse the more it’s like painting.

A painting can be:

The descriptions of A, B, and C could be related to sentence structure; speech, the most basic form of expression. A would be an object of some kind, since the object or event portrayed is the subject of the expression. The Battle of Sebastopol is portrayed in the painting (object of preposition). It would still be an object even if you said, This painting portrays the Battle of Sebastopol. In B, the painting would be the subject of the sentence. The paper and paint is on the wall. It is C, the verb, in which both the object and the materials are transformed into something new. It reveals, so that we may see lies. It conceals or lies, so that we may see truth. And all of the above vice versa.

Let’s not deceive ourselves. Ruses abound. Conventions that elevate. A canon of props. Presentation that distorts through lenses, reflections of the original, like a periscope. Implementations of frames, white walls, pedestals, white walls, bright lights, polished floors. Reproductions in the form of mass-produced prints, whitespace of pixels on the Web, photography. Things that, seen in real life, might still fit the B definition can define an entire lifestyle in reproduction. Interior décor of living spaces, with the right wall paint color and furniture, particularly art photographed “properly” for lifestyle magazines and websites. Finally, there is the question of Authority. Who is Authority? In our ever-fragmented society, Authority can be found in the collection at the city museum, the director of the trendiest gallery, the framed art section at Target, the local watercolor society, art history college textbooks, photography in décor/architecture/lifestyle media. This is where things get tricky, as we all know. Depending on one’s sensitivity to these things, you can see through the BS to the work itself and determine whether or not the materials/subject are indeed transformed.

But must art be transformed all the time? Do the materials/subject need to be transformed in order to be considered art? My favorite paintings in the museums are the portraits and still lifes. Things that don’t claim to be anymore than what they are. Exercises in capturing reality, air shows of a mastery of technique… and perhaps the wealthy patron’s self-interest in portraying themselves a certain way or promoting a non-art-related agenda. Perhaps these genres are transformed to me because they represent the lifestyle and psychology of bygone eras I cannot begin to fathom.**

So is this requirement, rather, request for transformation a 20th century/contemporary invention? At first, I would think yes. We work largely to extract meaning from detritus. But no, that’s not really true. In the previous question, I mentioned the patron’s agenda. Was the painting a transformation to him? A transformation of self reflected in the pool of religion, possessions, wealth, intellect? It must’ve been.

Characteristically though, anything I aim to critique in the work of others, I am hyper-conscious and critical of in my own work. I fully admit my own vulnerablilty and insecurity here. Everything I do, I ask, am I really transforming these materials? Am I pushing this beyond paint and/or fabric? I cup my hands around my mouth and gently breathe onto the materials and ideas. I water them. I make outlines. I attempt bestow life and conjure magic into them. Softly. The insights are big bangs, whole worlds of thought, but their actual growth is slow, it must be done gently. Mainly this happens when I’m not actually working on something. It happens at the gym, in my dreams, on a walk, going down youtube or wikipedia rabbit holes. I psych myself up for days, work through the next steps, then go back look at the results objectively, as if I happened across it in a gallery, café — anywhere you can see an actual painting, not a print. I’m a perfectionist; most of the time I fall short of my own assessments. Did I succeed in the transformative aspects? But you can’t do that forever. Eventually you have to go with your first instincts and make your only goal to finish the damn thing. Because really, in this questioning, you’re drifting further and further ashore from the original  idea. That’s the journey I often take; the transformation is due to an certain amount of extensive study/research and Socratic-type questioning  on the intellectual level, and equally deep emotion and gut-driven determination. Both exercises involve the spirit, the soul, and I can’t help but feel that if one is lacking, the transformation is not complete. So if your painting is just paint and paper, or your painting is just a picture of something, don’t be ashamed to admit that, to admit that it needs props. It is not necessarily an insignificant thing. But please don’t assume that is is art.

*Transformers

**I wish that I was born a thousand years ago

At last, we got the space we wanted to display participants’ creative responses to the prompts on the Downtown Tucson Scavenger Hunt back in March. The resulting photos, drawings and writings will be displayed in old window display boxes on the side of the former McLellan’s department store, a beacon of classic downtown shopping for 50 years which has been vacant since the early 90s. The opening will take place inside of the currently vacant building, which is amazing in its enormity filled with layers of history. The space reminds me of: Gindler’s department store in Hallettsville, Texas, where my grandma took all the grandkids shoe-shopping once a year throughout my entire baby-to-teenhood (it shut down in the late 90′s and was remodeled into a special events venue, where we held our wedding reception in 2005 [man, that was surreal for me]); and Florian Slowtawa’s One After the Other at Arthouse in Austin. This process has been a lot of hard work and worry trying to put all these pieces together, but we made it! We thought about having a gallery exhibition, but that context seemed too far removed from the general public — people who work downtown, people who utilize services downtown, people who go barhopping and to concerts but don’t go to art galleries. We wanted this display to be in the middle of the things, literally. We wanted the Scavenger Hunt to be a statement of creative thinking by “regular” people — whatever that means (adults, kids, artistic, non-artistic, families, singles, couples) — outside of the ongoing city government and developer drama, and less so an overarching “high art” concept. That’s not to say that there won’t be future happenings that are more artist-produced and less community-driven, but our goal is to evoke positive conversation about space, businesses, history, future and shape a collaborative spirit. Hopefully Pop Up Spaces can influence the much-needed breakdown of the paracitic city-developer power structure and enable the public to demand the ability to make changes to their city as they see fit, on their own.

DOWNTOWN SCAVENGER HUNT EXHIBIT OPENING MAY 9

POP UP SPACES presents

The Downtown Scavenger Hunt Exhibit
McLellan Building in Downtown Tucson
63 E. Congress (corner of Scott and Congress)

OPENING EVENT
SATURDAY, MAY 9, 2009
10:30 AM – 12:30 PM

Exhibit on building exterior facing Scott Avenue will be continuously available for public viewing throughout the summer.

“It was fun. I drive through downtown all the time but have never paid attention to the great old buildings.”

“Awesome! Great activity to involve kids and families.”

–Feedback from Pop Up Spaces Downtown Scavenger Hunters

On Sunday, March 1, 2009, 30 plus Southern Arizonans descended upon downtown to take part in the Downtown Scavenger Hunt. Participants were given clues to find 10 locations, each one with a short creative activity that encouraged them to engage with the current environment, reflect upon the historic record, and imagine future possibilities for the space.

The 10 locations (and their interactive activities) included:

- At 41 N. 6th Avenue, which housed Model Bakery from the 1940s to the mid 1960s, scavengers found a “kiosk” with a note that said, “This place used to be filled with the welcoming scent of baking bread. Now it’s covered in bars instead. Write a note about what you think happened and tack it to the bulletin board.”

- At 47 N. Scott, most recently the restaurant Motzi, visitors were asked, “If you could open this restaurant tomorrow, what would be on the menu?” Responses in the attached booklet included “cactus cookies,” “eggs Florentine (a breakfast joint)”, and “tasty Indian food.”

The public is invited to come see the activities from all 10 spots and the comments, drawings and photos produced, and to explore the interior of a currently empty space at the McLellan building. Printed handouts of the clues will be available for participants to find the sites on their own, and other fun, family-friendly participatory surprises are in store. Co-founders and local artists Julie Ray and Rachelle Díaz will be present answer questions about the ideas behind the Pop Up Spaces project. Visitors are encouraged to try something new downtown, whether it’s lunch at a local restaurant, or a trip to the nearby Tucson Museum of Art or Tucson Children’s Museum. You can also enter the raffle to win a basket full of wonderful goodies showcasing the eclectic mix of businesses the area has to offer.*

For those unable to attend the opening but want to try the Downtown Scavenger Hunt, the clues may be downloaded from our website here. Participants in the ongoing scavenger hunt are welcome to send digital photos and comments about their experiences to us at info@popupspaces.org. Photos of the March 1 event may be viewed online.

POP UP SPACES seeks to produce temporary, interactive, site-specific installations in empty spaces in which the visitors are not just expected to be passive viewers, but asked to be active participants. 
The goal of these art-based experiences is to enhance economic vitality and public engagement in downtown Tucson through promotion of the area’s culture, history, architecture and business community.

*Raffle prizes donated by Desert Blooms, Voices Community Stories, Fox Theatre, Dinnerware Artspace, Chris’ Cafe,  Shot in the Dark Cafe, Cup Cafe, Maynard’s Market & Kitchen, On A Roll, Rockin’ Queen, Hydra, Preen,  and more.

Exhibition space donated by John Wesley Miller. Exhibit panel printing sponsored in part by Reproductions, Inc. Special thanks to Monica Surfaro Spiegelman and photographer Roy Chamberlin.

Lately I’ve been thinking that artists need to re-consider the way they present themselves to the public in dress and unfortunately, in some cases, basic hygiene. As governmental entities and charitable organizations run lower and lower on funds, public outcry grows against their financial footing of non-essential projects that support lazy artists. Now is the time for us to combat that crank stereotype. I’ve seen artists who go all-out on the presentation/installation of their work to near-perfection yet viewer-ly accessible as possible, and arrive at their own opening in blown-out khaki shorts, birkenstocks with nasty cracked toenails hanging out (in the over 35-ish crowd) or stanky All-Stars, pit-stained t-shirt and oily hair (if they’re under about 35).

Same goes for interaction with non-artists. By the word interaction, I mean interpersonal relations beyond things like manners, etiquette, sense of humor. Throwing our visionary weirdness in in the face of squares who will never “get it” doesn’t help to win respect and will continue to put us on the fringes of public opinion in emphasizing the vital role the arts play in everyday life and education. Rather than being militant eccentrics in our dealings with average Joes, let’s shift that energy to doing really, really awesome work and producing mind-blowing public shows with the best of the money, time and energy we have. This will take a lot of honesty with ourselves: honesty about our own apperance and actions, honesty about how the other half really lives and thinks, honesty about our own expectations vs expectations of others. It takes a great deal of consideration, maybe not quite courtesy or “dumbing-down,” but consideration nonetheless.

It’s OK to be who we are, knowing that we can let ourselves go with other creative types, but I’ve found it’s effective to meet people halfway upon similarities, rather than getting them to come “up” to your level. For me, this is not an easy thing to do; it takes a lot of energy. Sometimes the most open-mindedness you can sneak into a stoic viewer is a nod of acknowledgment; other times, a little consideration in your interactions with a person opens doors and windows in them that they didn’t even know they had.

If you are going to ask for public or private financial charity, take extra care in how you present yourself. While the mystique of the bizarre worked for 20th century artists shaking the centuries-old system of academies, salons and commissioned funding by patrons, we’re now on the threshold of the post-fame era. Luck is running out, being in the right place at the right time is a four dimensional gamble in which the odds are against you a kajillion to 1. Now, anything, happening anyplace and anytime can be self-promoted online, yet needs to be well-presented to get the attention. I’ve noticed that art and fashion blogs (and bloggers, as they choose to reveal their appearance) whose photos/graphics/writing are well-realized, hitting the ideal nail on the head, get the attention, while others slightly less than masterful in those forms — however inspired — fall more or less to the wayside.

Presentation isn’t about marketing — I think that conversation is being phased out, slowly, as laypeople’s web and photography skills increase, and also simply because marketing lacks what is at the core of art: grabbing someone by the lapels out of the Everyday and teleporting them through a psychic pneumatic tube into the hyper-temporal, spiritual Whatever. And not always on an “elevated” or “higher” plane, just a different, and important one. Making them honorary shamans.

Maybe this “etiquette” I speak of is the backlash away from the self-centered focus concerning embrace or rejection, sobered into the austerity of simply being respected.

An extremely bastardized title of The Atlantic‘s* “Post and Riposte” section. Oh, well. I’m re-posting this from Tu Scene to here because I feel it’s more in the art-writing vein, which I have guiltily neglected for the past couple of months.

(Don’t worry CAG, I didn’t forget about you either, the title was just too appropriate to resist). Lots of people have been chiming in on PLAY’s Facebook links to articles in the Arizona Daily Star and Tucson Citizen regarding award-winning chef Janos Wilder’s (of Janos and J-Bar fame) new restaurant location alleged to go at the corner of Congress and 5th, that would result in the displacement of Tooley’s, PLAY and Central Arts Gallery. According to the articles, Tooley’s owner Patricia Schwabe was apparently notified by Wilder (or representatives) and cooperative about the “transition.” However artist and PLAY co-founder and artist Jessica Van Woerkom says she was not contacted by any of the parties involved in the business deals or by the media who were writing this article. PLAY works very hard to put on well-publicized and outstandingly-attended events twice a month or so, myself and other artists make a extra cash for selling marchandise there every couple of weeks, their contact info is ridiculously easy to find… why were they not informed?

Ultimately, the issue here is not who screwed up, whether you think it’s the city, developers, property managers/owners, tenants, the Universe, whatever. There’s no point in playing the blame game. Governmental administrations anywhere, no matter how much their city is perceived as being a Utopia, will have instances of gross incompetence, and he who has the most money will rule. Mr. Wilder has occupied space in downtown before, so it seems safe to assume he’s probably actually in favor of the revitalization already happening now, where the little guys have made huge strides without much backing from big bucks. But when there’s 26 empty buildings in 2 square blocks — a plethora of spaces just itching for investment that would not involve displacement of valuable, if low-funded cultural arts businesses — it seems reasonable to expect that the property owner would at least notify the tenants of the move, and the tenants, in return, have a right to ask for some compensation to cover moving expenses in the situation that they are not being evicted upon grounds of non-payment, physical neglect, criminal issues and so on.

Throughout all of this drama is that it’s important to keep in mind why people go downtown. People don’t go there simply just to indulge in gourmet food and then drive back to wherever they came from. They go down there for the culture and the experience. Besides myself, I know and regularly witness many, many, many veritable throngs of people who go to downtown in the evenings to visit the galleries and music clubs first, THEN, if they feel like sticking around, frequent the bars and restaurants that service the area. And without those lower-middle-working-class patrons, yes, Tucson is stuck with a downtown polarized by only the very wealthy and very poor.

Hopefully, this will open a door for PLAY and CAG to occupy new locations with improved facilities and more communicative property owners/managers. It’s also a sad but crucial case showing that artists must know their rights and verify that their business arrangements are 100% legal. Or, I hate to say it, but sometimes beautiful things have to die in order for people to miss them. This, in turn, lights a fire under more creative butts to start their own venues. I remember when this happened in Austin when a couple of popular and critically-acclaimed art gallery/studio hubs had to close. A handful new venues sprung up in their place as a result, and then it spread like wildfire on buffelgrass. True, the art scene was never quite the same after these places shut down, but it turned out to be a catalyst for expansion. Necessity might be proved, again, to be the mother of invention.

Blogger’s Note: While I don’t read it very often, I find the Star in particular sadly lacking in doing basic research on individuals involved in the pieces they write, much less contacting them prior to publishing their articles. I understand in the newspaper industry there are hard-and-fast deadlines and there’s no way for journalists to get everyone’s angle, but like I said, this oversight can be prevented by a short Google search, and clicking on one or two web pages. To be perfectly candid, when compling calendar listings for Tu Scene, I give up if I can’t find any concrete info on the web about an event within Google’s first Search Results page. I’ve pointed this out with the Star before regarding the Winta Fresh Graffiti Competition, and in a recent Star article on February’s IGNITE event presented by Dinnerware, the title of the presentation Julie Ray and I did was not mentioned, despite the fact that there were two paragraphs and quotes from Julie devoted to our presentation about Pop Up Spaces. Plus, although we did our presentation together, I was identified as a “friend” of Julie Ray, when all you have to do is Google “Pop Up Spaces Tucson” (our website comes up #1 in the results) and it’s quite obvious that MAXED ARTista Molly McClintock and myself are co-founders and creative directors of the project. Maybe I’m splitting hairs, but where several hairs are missing, that’s what most observers would call a bald spot (as I’m sure several male readers can sensitively attest to). C’mon editors! This era of the struggling printed newspaper is not the time to let quality control fall by the wayside! Blow off your readers and your publishing company is kaput. I find it ironic that I’ve seen fewer issues with accuracy in the Citizen and yet they’re the enterprise that’s supposed to go down.

*The Atlantic is one of my favorite magazines ever and, as I learned reading back issues at my parents’ house over an excruciatingly long Christmas break (no money to go anywhere), re-designed (or at least directed by) with, according to his introductory letter, much respect of its illustrious history by none other than Graphic Design God Michael Bierut. I wonder if it’s any k’winky-dink that The Atlantic‘s new/vintage masthead is highly similar to the banner at Karl Lagerfeld’s Guide to Life (or vice versa). ‘Cuz that’s the level Bierut’s on with us design nerds.

Prologue

1. Sametová Revoluce. The Velvet Revolution (Czech: sametová revoluce) (November 16- December 29, 1989) refers to a non-violent revolution in Czechoslovakia that saw the overthrow of the Communist government. On November 17, 1989, riot police suppressed a peaceful student demonstration in Prague. That event sparked a series of popular demonstrations from November 19 to late December. By November 20 the number of peaceful protesters assembled in Prague had swelled from 200,000 the previous day to an estimated half-million. A two-hour general strike, involving all citizens of Czechoslovakia, was held on November 27.

2. Tucson, Arizona. We drove past a couple wearing 6″ black platform boots, some sort of zippered pants-like skirt or skirt-like pants, black trenchcoats, flowing black tresses and inked-out eyes, lurching to the bus stop or corner store in the blazing summer sun. The sidewalk was otherwise desolate and treeless: a mundane concrete desert. It didn’t matter which one was male or female. I asked my husband, “What’s up with all the goth-y people here?”

 I.
A Big-small City

Tucson is a mid-size city, not affluent. A little too big and not “cultured” enough to be called a college town. Like any other big-small American city, I would imagine artistically-inclined kids growing up here feel trapped in an unsophisticated society. Goth, a lifestyle that elevates music, art and fashion, offers a mode of connection with a larger artistic/cultural movement. And, one hopes, a sense of belonging. A sense of understanding and validation.

II.
Social Posturing

Trends are self-perpetuating. We are social creatures, even the goths who appear to wallow in misery and loneliness. Here, they are seen as the “cool,” artistic people, much like hipsters are in Austin. This starts in the adolescent years: say there’s a 6th or 7th grade kid who’s discovering he or she doesn’t fit in. Then, after summer, they come back to school all blacked-out and with a new, stronger sense of self. This happens every day in Austin, except the changelings are about 5-10 years older: young people arrive from across the country wearing American Apparel t-shirts and All-Stars; three months later they’ve latched on to giant sunglasses and neon.

In all trends/styles/communities, there is room for creativity and distinctions within the group, when you are part of it. But from an outsider’s perspective, everyone looks the same, the music sounds the same. I wonder if an outsider wrote this post on the Austin craigslist missed connections awhile back (paraphrased from memory):

m4w (Beauty Bar): You looked so hot in your skinny jeans, vintage shirt, pointy shoes and unusual haircut.

The description was lengthier and a bit more elaborate, but the tone was just as cutting. In Tucson, go to the craigslist musician category. Everyone wants to start a death metal/grindcore/punk band. To me, it all sounds the same. But then again, I can point out the subtleties between German trance and nu acid house, and why one is boring and the other is cool. For example, today I found a remix of Mondotek’s Alive (related to the TEPR remix of Yelle’s “A Cause des Garçons”) on an mp3 blog that primarily posted the type of *yawn* house played after 12am in Top 40 clubs.

The point is, here in Tucson, goth is a mainstream alternative lifestyle, like hipsterism is in Austin. For further analysis on this subject, I suggest Josh Aiello and Matthew Shultz’s brilliant A Field Guide To The Urban Hipster. It’s a bit dated (2003), certain groups have evolved, but it begs the question “How weird do you wanna be?” Are suburban soccer moms the Truly Weird? Are Nascar dads the Truly Weird? Are white male capitalist entreprenurs the Truly Weird? What about factory workers? How do they see themselves as a group? How do they see us? Today, the true artist (my definition: dedicated, driven, underground) no longer labors away in a decrepit urban warehouse or in the rustic elegance of a country barn, (s)he works out of his garage in a tract housing development or out of a corner of their living room in a nondescript apartment complex. Maybe the quality of their work isn’t that great, but that depends on what your definition of “good” and “quality” are.

III.
The Twilight Zone

I wish more research would be done on why, particularly in Mexican-American border regions, goth is the mainstream alternative, when in many other areas of the U.S., it died at the turn of the 21st century along with candy ravers. A few months ago, I watched a documentary about Latino hardcore Morrissey fans in the Los Angeles area called Is It Really So Strange? What could’ve been a great story shed little light on the reasons behind the obsession from this unexpected demographic because the narrator/producer was, like, the whitest, dryest most monotone guy. Ever. He just couldn’t connect with the people he was interviewing and not so much because he was not a part of their culture, but because he was just a walking social disaster. Naturally, his interview subjects were reticent about their fandom, which made for a total disappointment of a film.

I’ve asked my goth-leaning brother- and cousin-in-law about why they’re all into vampires and ornate silver crosses and black clothes. They grin and say, “I’m just in touch with the (or did they say my?)… Dark Side.” I’ve prodded further on one or two occasions: why? What’s so cool about the dark side? “Life is dark and pointless,” they intone. Nihlism. Emptiness. A daily drudgery between the next party or fuck, and even suffering and pain is a part of those experiences as you commiserate with your goth-y buddies.

But why Mexican-Americans? Is it a rebellion against the Old School ways of their families and elders? Is it a depressive facet of the ultra-complex experience of being bi-cultural (e.g. the Sad Clown)? Or, is it a rebellion against others of their own generation: the urban gangsters or the straight-edge traditional kids?

My husband and I say after we get south of San Antonio on IH-37 that we are entering The Twilight Zone. It’s a gradient that runs all the way to The Valley, growing stronger when we veer onto Hwy. 77 in Robstown, on through Raymondville and Harlingen, and finally coming to a delta in his family’s home of Brownsville, at the southernmost tip of Texas, the Mexican border; nothing beyond it but the mouth of the Rio Grande, endless flatlands, coastal marshes, and then the open Gulf. Everything “American” is tinged with Mexican culture and perspective. The clerks working in the chain stores in Sunrise Mall (warning: don’t go the the homepage, some really blaring Broadway-style music turns on) give you your total in Spanish before switching to English. The hot food focus in convenience stores is tacos and tamales, not hot dogs and fried chicken. And everything Mexican is infused with the crass commercialism of American society, creating a veneer of quaintness over the commercialism, or the crushing thumb of consumerism blunting what is unique and traditional.

IV.
Drug of Choice

César posed the goth question to his Tucson host when he came out to take a look around prior to our move. His tour guide said, “It’s because there’s a lot of meth around here.”

Let’s think about this. I’ve seen plenty of bleary-eyed redneck meth heads driving beat-up old pick-up trucks back in Texas, particularly in impoverished rural Colorado County where my mom commutes to teach middle school. The town’s water tower proclaims it’s “The White-Tailed Deer Capital of Texas” (read: hunting). My dad jokes that it should really say, “The White Trash Capital of Texas.”

So what does a style of dress have to do with a drug of choice? Not all hippies are potheads; not all potheads are hippies. Not all hipsters are cokeheads; not all cokeheads are hipsters. Not all crackwhores are urban; not urban females are crackwhores. Etc., etc.

Drugs are most certainly not a reason.

V.
Relative to… What?

This has inadvertently gone from a cultural sketch and self-analysis of my mild annoyance with goths. I personally thought they were more silly than anything else, like on Chris Kattan and Molly Shannon’s sketch “Goth Talk” on Saturday Night Live in the 1990′s.

A few weeks ago, I went to a dance party night at one of the cooler bars here in hopes of hearing something comforting, something familiar, something that reminded me of home: hipster blog music. But many people used it as an excuse to showcase their full-on fetishwear (and I use the term “on” loosely). I could barely stop staring as a girl in a light pink bikini top, matching hot pants, feather boa and Christmas pageant angel wings danced by herself till her friends got there: a dude sporting a kilt and mohawk and his girlfriend, fully stockinged and corseted. And they were, shall we say, not attractive in a conventional sense that would’ve made this display, um, nice to look at.

Now I find myself questioning my own style in clothes, taste in music, art and home décor, diction, inflection and body language as an outsider to the mainstream alternative lifestyle here. I wonder, what to non-hipsters think of hipsters in Austin? Do they look at our equally outlandish 80′s outfits with the same mild annoyance? The wrinkled nose? The curled lip?

One of the reasons I was not too keen on moving away from Austin was that I felt I’d found my place there. A place where many a nerdy, artsy, goofy-looking middle school pariahs could find community, a sense of belonging. A place to love and be loved. Maybe I would’ve grown tired of belonging eventually. “Once a rebel…” Or perhaps it was too late; I was sucked in. On the other hand, my husband had been rebelling against what he considers to be an oppressive atmosphere for a number of years, and I think his reasoning is the catalyst: our generation is not rebelling against the older generation like our parents did when they were young. That tie has already been broken. Our rebellion is against one another, our peers; but it is a Velvet Rebellion, an oxymoron. “Rebellion” implies hostility, anger, violence. Yet we do it through our clothes. It is soft, expressive, joyful – Velvet. Why? Are our differences with each other so negligible that they’re not worth fighting for? Have we grown so distant that we don’t know any other way to communicate? Do we not know how to fight? Are we afraid? Are we too selfish to abandon the system we are products of?

Epilogue

A newish writer-friend mused over drinks the other night, “I wonder when people are just going to rise up and say, ‘Fuck the system.’ ” I wondered to myself what he meant by “people.”