The Man Behind the Curtain
by James Roland
So, I’m wondering if art was invented by a coward.
Because I don’t think art is brave . . . or, maybe sometimes it is, or was, back in the day of pissy French kings or twisted Caesars, but not anymore. Art is kind of like a far off land where we send all the deep thinkers who don’t have a backbone. Anyone with the spark of art in them who has guts to go along with it turns into Condoleeza Rice or disappears from the public eye altogether and changes the world person by person.
What we have left is a lot of intelligent folk that use art and the art subculture as a testing ground for their philosophies and rants, their worldviews and pet-peeves. Through art we rake society over the coals, lament the waste of youth, shout at the gods, and nit-pick other artists and human beings.
I’m not trying to say that art is weak. Art is a force to be reckoned with . . . there is no stopping it.
Art is second only to God and maybe, depending on the latest issue of Newsweek, Mother Nature herself.
The thing is, anyone can press the launch button. We can kill millions from a distance but it takes more sweat, conviction, and strength to kill one man face to face. And when you attack face to face, rather than using art or art criticism, you are forced to carry your own sins, or you are blessed to claim your own victory.
Kurt Vonnegut Jr. wrote a short story called Report on the Barnhouse Effect. In it, a soldier discovers his uncanny ability to control probability during a game of dice. He taps into a force so strong he can destroy cities with a single, profound and profane thought. His gift drives him into exile, running from assassins and swarming fans, and in his power to save or destroy humanity he cowers, friendless in dark places.
There is no bravery from afar. True fear is in the eyes of a friend, lover, or enemy who determines your worth with the flex of cheek muscles or the twitch of a trigger finger or the scratch of a pencil. But art is a force that reckons with the artist, a unit of unfaltering measure. No artist is one with his creation and so many, too many, sneak away while art isn’t looking. They slink away with Sergeant Barnhouse and listen to their handiwork on the radio.
It reminds me of the scene in an Abbot and Costello movie when the bad guy walks away and Bud and Lou stick their tongues out at his back. I mean, you can’t flip off world hunger or kick a government in the shins.
But, then again, if the only alternative is Bono or Sean Penn, I’ll risk an eternity of loneliness with a set of dice.
