Art Is What You Can Get Away With or How I Learned to Stop Being a Cop and Appreciate Expression

If you're as invested in art as me, you've heard this quote before, attributed to Andy Warhol.

"Art is what you can get away with."

The beauty of this quote lies in not only it's simplicity but it's complete accuracy... and ability to inspire if you view it from the correct perspective.

I also like that it pisses quite a few people off. Including me at an earlier iteration of understanding.

"What you can get away with?" This gives anyone with a brush, paint or other less conventional material license to call themselves an artist?

Yes. Anything done with the intention of expression can be art. 

I've been seeing a few successful artists (mostly Justin Bua) take a pivot in their careers lately and just start judging other artists' work in these snarky, short form content pieces and I gotta say...

It's totally fucking lame. 

Do I like a lot of modern or performative art? Not really.

Let me get something out of the way before I go any further. I don't love the art of Andy Warhol.

I personally don't consider the banana taped to the wall at Art Basel in 2019 'high art' (though I found it VERY funny)

And we know that the CIA used Jackson Pollock and other abstract expressionists to 'fight the Cold War'.

So why the fuck am I talking about this? Who am I to tell you what to judge or not judge? Well, because I've been through this part of the mind maze and it leads to nothing but wasted energy and dead-ends.

I had some mental blocks, unchecked emotions and cognitive biases floating around in my head that were contributing to this. 

Including but not limited to-

• jealousy disguised as superiority, 
• unrecognized negative attachment via hate to an expression I didn't understand,
• projection of inadequacy, and
• anger that I didn't have the monetary success of these 'hacks' who made copious amounts of money off work that I read as unskilled and low effort.

It was actually me who was unskilled, because there's one skill that is applicable throughout all of life and especially if you want to be an artist.

And that's understanding and properly using and communicating your mind and emotions. I'll write more about this later. Suffice to say I was misplacing my frustrations.

Here's the point: I now don't have the time or energy to become negatively attached to someone else's expression that doesn't actually effect me. 

If I don't like it, it's just not for me. And that's all I need to say about it. No more attention or energy is needed in that direction.

I don't need to make it my job to judge every artist painting squiggly lines on a canvas. My job is to figure out  the best way to express myself. 

In fact, I've flipped my perspective on that type of art and artist. I'm actually very grateful for them. A hundred years ago, I would not have been able to pivot in my late twenties and say 'You know what? I'm going to be an artist now. I know I didn't go to art school or have any other credentials but I used to draw well as a kid, let's see what I can do with that.' 

In other words, 'Let's see what I can get away with'

In a way Pollock and the other abstract expressionist artists indirectly made that possible, whether they were promoted abroad with CIA money or not.

Look. The art world is tough. We don't need to be cutting each other down.

Policing people's expression is, in fact, being a cop.

Don't be a cop.

Social media encourages cop behavior. It's like a cop-generating machine if you just scroll and judge, scroll and judge. But you can use it as mirror and find the cop inside your head.

So, I'm trying to give you a shortcut that bypasses the urge to sit upon the throne of judgement- which is really just a prison disguised as a throne- and dictate who passes muster and who is a fraud. Or in the words of that dude from Catcher in the Rye 'a phony'. 

I wish someone had told me about this fifteen years ago. That you don't have to hate someone's artistic expression. There's plenty going on in the world for you to turn your ire towards

Without getting too political, it's probably those in power who want to launch a dystopian technocracy that pries into every little aspect of your life, or weapons manufacturers, or market manipulators. It's definitely not artists, immigrants or trans people, or whoever the demagoguery deems the scapegoat du jour.

Anyway, I digress.

Patton Oswalt said it really well here:

Don't get trapped in judgement and don't be a cop. Get off the glowing light box unless you're using it to express yourself. And don't be like the guy in this Father John Misty song:

 

Yes, I just discovered embedding and I will NOT be stopped.

Obligatory Promotion

If you made it this far, may I offer you a hearty congrats and my sincere gratitude. I've been enjoying my morning writing practice and hope you are too.

Please share this! With anyone, but especially your artsy friends who might be a bit snobbish and emotionally constipated.

If you want to support my art beyond that, I've just made some new t-shirts and hoodies geared to all my artist friends who get paint on their clothes. If you're an e-mail subscriber an automatic discount is applied at checkout.

All the best,

-Andrew