well... (Off-Topic)

by Kermit , Raleigh, NC, Saturday, December 10, 2022, 18:36 (716 days ago) @ cheapLEY

I can’t pretend to be well read on this subject at all, but it did tickle the back of my brain and I’ve been searching for this video since this sub thread started. I just couldn’t remember where I saw it.

For many years I had a print of this in my living room.

Every once in a while, I'd get a visitor who would kind of furrow their brow, and ask me what I liked about it. The simple answer was "I don't know, but I do like it very much." All that's to say, art isn't supposed to be easily explained, and you can't account for taste. The nature of it is ambiguity--it exists to jolt us from our preconceptions, whatever they may be. If there's only one way to interpret a work of art, it's not that good.

I think there's a lot of people who want art to serve a preferred narrative, and sadly, I think there's at least as many wannabe censors now as there was when Jesse Helms was above ground. The other bad trend is the idea that what you are according to some census category defines what you should like, or what you can create, or what you can imagine. I disagree, and I'm in good company.