4 ms·

How is to express yourself vain? I suppose keeping a diary, which in its own way is a literary form, is vain?

by Ardit20 16y ago

jdietrich 16y ago
It's vain when you think that your deepest feelings are so interesting that people would want to hear about them them. It's vain when you're more concerned with what you have to say than whether people will enjoy hearing it. I get genuinely angry when I go to a gig or a show where it's obvious that the performers are self-absorbed and have no interest in the audience. The audience have paid to come into town, they've paid for their tickets, they are paying for drinks at the bar, the least the band can do is try to entertain them. When bands play indulgent solos or play a bad song that the drummer has written, they're insulting their audience by saying that their ego as a band is more important than the enjoyment of the fans. If you keep a diary or paint purely for your own pleasure then that's fine, the problem comes when you expect people to care about your art. We tell aspiring writers and musicians and artists that they should 'be true to their art', but I think that's dead wrong - I think your duty is to be true to your audience. There's an interesting exception in comedy. A bad comic can't hide - if he's not funny, it's obvious to everyone. Today, comedy is really the only artform where it's acceptable for an audience to boo off a performer, but historically it was commonplace in all performing arts. I think we as a culture should be prepared to say "no, you haven't worked hard enough on your performance, go home until you're good enough to entertain". It happens every night at comedy clubs, but rarely anywhere else. I think that mistake is a symptom of the prizes-for-all narcissism that says everyone's opinion matters no matter how ill-informed or poorly thought out, that every crude doodle is a work of art if the doodler really meant it. A fundamental trait of narcissism is magical thinking, the belief that wishing something makes it so. The art world has in many respects come to define art as whatever the artist decides is art.
- Vyk 16y ago
  "I think that mistake is a symptom of the prizes-for-all narcissism that says ... every crude doodle is a work of art if the doodler really meant it." It is. Art is a process as well as a result. Whether the result is good art, mediocre art, or bad art is the real question here, and some art is undeniably terrible.

How is to express yourself vain? I suppose keeping a diary, which in its own way is a literary form, is vain?

by Ardit20 16y ago

How is to express yourself vain? I suppose keeping a diary, which in its own way is a literary form, is vain?

It's vain when you think that your deepest feelings are so interesting that people would want to hear about them them. It's vain when you're more concerned with what you have to say than whether people will enjoy hearing it. I get genuinely angry when I go to a gig or a show where it's obvious that the performers are self-absorbed and have no interest in the audience. The audience have paid to come into town, they've paid for their tickets, they are paying for drinks at the bar, the least the band can do is try to entertain them. When bands play indulgent solos or play a bad song that the drummer has written, they're insulting their audience by saying that their ego as a band is more important than the enjoyment of the fans. If you keep a diary or paint purely for your own pleasure then that's fine, the problem comes when you expect people to care about your art. We tell aspiring writers and musicians and artists that they should 'be true to their art', but I think that's dead wrong - I think your duty is to be true to your audience. There's an interesting exception in comedy. A bad comic can't hide - if he's not funny, it's obvious to everyone. Today, comedy is really the only artform where it's acceptable for an audience to boo off a performer, but historically it was commonplace in all performing arts. I think we as a culture should be prepared to say "no, you haven't worked hard enough on your performance, go home until you're good enough to entertain". It happens every night at comedy clubs, but rarely anywhere else. I think that mistake is a symptom of the prizes-for-all narcissism that says everyone's opinion matters no matter how ill-informed or poorly thought out, that every crude doodle is a work of art if the doodler really meant it. A fundamental trait of narcissism is magical thinking, the belief that wishing something makes it so. The art world has in many respects come to define art as whatever the artist decides is art.

Vyk 16y ago
"I think that mistake is a symptom of the prizes-for-all narcissism that says ... every crude doodle is a work of art if the doodler really meant it." It is. Art is a process as well as a result. Whether the result is good art, mediocre art, or bad art is the real question here, and some art is undeniably terrible.