Why I do what I do:
Today was really quite a day, totally in a good way, albeit hectic.I won't bore you with the details of the morning, except to mention that the further I progress into my legal studies, the happier I am studying the law. After a morning spent delving into the mysteries of zoning laws, I got together for a cup of coffee with my fellow aspiring jurist Jon (DJ Macabee from It's Overture). Of course we talked about Thursday night and the crazy new tracks he's been cooking up for the party with his partner-in-Overture, Verse, but we also had a really excellent and wide-ranging discussion about the state of music, art and culture generally.
Good art doesn't come out of a vacuum- the best artists keep their fingers on the proverbial pulse of the culture and their eyes on the state of the arts. The capacity to turn experience, inspiration and insight into truly meaningful aesthetic artifacts is uniquely human, and talent is only part of the necessary recipe for making any sort of coherent and relevant artistic statement. Good art is, at a minimum, in tune to the spirit of the times, and truly great art surpasses (but nonetheless embodies) the spirit of the time that shaped it. There's a good word for it in German- zeitgeist, the time ghost, or more figuratively, the spirit of the time. Good art taps into the zeitgeist. Great art can summon a past zeitgeist back into existence, evoking a moment of past time, and those who partake of such masterpieces find themselves, well, lost in a moment...
After chatting with Jon, I bounced to west midtown and spent the afternoon and early evening brushing up on my digital and manual printmaking with journeyman printmaker Seth Joseph and the friendly studio heads at the Robert Blackburn Printmaking Workshop. Man, but they have some really cool toys over there! I worked in a podunk school district print shop in NJ through high school, and working with the gear at Bob Blackburn was like driving an Aston after driving all my life in a Civic hatchback! I had gone up there to get some prints made for Lost in a Moment exhibiting artist Maria Besedin, and after hanging out for a bit (and showing off some of her exquisite work) I got some of the folks up there excited for the show this Thursday and the Theory thing in general, scoring the core Theory organizers membership access to the workshop studio in the process. Seth also showed off a few of his new works, and they are [singsong] sweeeeet! I'm definitely going to try to get him to show with us again soon.
Some really great conversation and vibing happened there too- a whole bunch of creative people, all following their own individual awesomes, all on point and all rad to hang out with. Talented, insightful people are exciting, whether they're artists in life or artists at life. That's the vibe we strive for with Theory events: getting a bunch of interesting, brilliant, mad and talented people together to look at some art, dance to some music, listen to some poetry, get a little loose, and see what happens from there. The results are generally pretty damn good.
I am so excited for this Thursday. In the gallery, we've got some really exciting and brilliant paintings from Chantal Smith, incredible photographs by Tom Gilmour, some really lovely digital prints by Maria Besedin and a groundbreaking multimedia project from Meat One. Over in the performance space, we've got the eminent MC Ryan O'Neil presiding over an incredible lineup, with live Jamaican chat by Kerosene over riddims by 100 dBs to open, feature sets from slam poetry luminaries Rachel McKibbens and Tony Brown to celebrate the release of my good friend Adam Rubinstein's incredible new book Freshwater Dredge, a special appearance from Adam to read from the new book, a jump-up-out-your-seats set from Ryan and dBs and then a whole lotta danger from It's Overture to bring in 4/20/07 in style.
Come early and stay late- you deserve the best possible evening out with a bunch of amazing people. I know it's going to be my last hurrah before finals, and I'd love to raise a glass with any of you who took the time to read this whole long-winded tirade.Here's all the info, one more time:
See you there!
Cheers,
(theory) Sam
Good art doesn't come out of a vacuum- the best artists keep their fingers on the proverbial pulse of the culture and their eyes on the state of the arts. The capacity to turn experience, inspiration and insight into truly meaningful aesthetic artifacts is uniquely human, and talent is only part of the necessary recipe for making any sort of coherent and relevant artistic statement. Good art is, at a minimum, in tune to the spirit of the times, and truly great art surpasses (but nonetheless embodies) the spirit of the time that shaped it. There's a good word for it in German- zeitgeist, the time ghost, or more figuratively, the spirit of the time. Good art taps into the zeitgeist. Great art can summon a past zeitgeist back into existence, evoking a moment of past time, and those who partake of such masterpieces find themselves, well, lost in a moment...
After chatting with Jon, I bounced to west midtown and spent the afternoon and early evening brushing up on my digital and manual printmaking with journeyman printmaker Seth Joseph and the friendly studio heads at the Robert Blackburn Printmaking Workshop. Man, but they have some really cool toys over there! I worked in a podunk school district print shop in NJ through high school, and working with the gear at Bob Blackburn was like driving an Aston after driving all my life in a Civic hatchback! I had gone up there to get some prints made for Lost in a Moment exhibiting artist Maria Besedin, and after hanging out for a bit (and showing off some of her exquisite work) I got some of the folks up there excited for the show this Thursday and the Theory thing in general, scoring the core Theory organizers membership access to the workshop studio in the process. Seth also showed off a few of his new works, and they are [singsong] sweeeeet! I'm definitely going to try to get him to show with us again soon.
Some really great conversation and vibing happened there too- a whole bunch of creative people, all following their own individual awesomes, all on point and all rad to hang out with. Talented, insightful people are exciting, whether they're artists in life or artists at life. That's the vibe we strive for with Theory events: getting a bunch of interesting, brilliant, mad and talented people together to look at some art, dance to some music, listen to some poetry, get a little loose, and see what happens from there. The results are generally pretty damn good.
I am so excited for this Thursday. In the gallery, we've got some really exciting and brilliant paintings from Chantal Smith, incredible photographs by Tom Gilmour, some really lovely digital prints by Maria Besedin and a groundbreaking multimedia project from Meat One. Over in the performance space, we've got the eminent MC Ryan O'Neil presiding over an incredible lineup, with live Jamaican chat by Kerosene over riddims by 100 dBs to open, feature sets from slam poetry luminaries Rachel McKibbens and Tony Brown to celebrate the release of my good friend Adam Rubinstein's incredible new book Freshwater Dredge, a special appearance from Adam to read from the new book, a jump-up-out-your-seats set from Ryan and dBs and then a whole lotta danger from It's Overture to bring in 4/20/07 in style.
Come early and stay late- you deserve the best possible evening out with a bunch of amazing people. I know it's going to be my last hurrah before finals, and I'd love to raise a glass with any of you who took the time to read this whole long-winded tirade.Here's all the info, one more time:
See you there!
Cheers,
(theory) Sam
posted by Theory Events at
6:59 AM
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