The SmARTphone
I am not a real artist. I am not a real artist. I am not a real artist.
At least, that’s what I used to tell myself. I haven’t published enough, haven’t been in enough galleries, haven’t got the technical skill or the academic training, wouldn’t know Matisse from Monet. I call my “real artist” friends and say, “What exactly is a found object? Do you see the face in this sculpture? Is this poem terrible? Does this essay make sense? Is this story boring? What do you think--” as if I can’t trust myself. As if real artists always have total confidence. As if the reason I don’t is that I’m not a real artist. For years and years, I told myself I wasn’t a real artist.
But that problem was cracked wide open by Steve Jobs, Larry Page, and Sergei Brin. Not to mention Mark Zuckerberg. Detestable capitalists. Industrialists, feeding on globalization and middle-class greed...who came up with a phone.
A phone with a camera. A phone with the Internet. A phone that could take a picture, edit it, and share it with everyone you know in just a few moments. Suddenly I was a real artist, really making real art and showing it to real people.
And those real people Liked it. So I kept taking pictures. And I went back to journaling, and then to slam poetry, and then to National Novel Writing Month...and then I started sending my work out to “real artists” for real.
The first piece that was accepted was a close-up shot of an Art Nouveau door on a tomb in Graceland cemetery. The exhibit was called Passages, so I wrote a statement about the door being a passage from our world to the small confined space of the mausoleum, and asked if we are objectifying or honoring those who live in the marble houses of the dead.
That photo was also the passage for me from hiding my work, from pretending it wasn’t real, wasn’t important, to believing it was art. Really art. Because it was accepted, I sent a story to a book of fairy tales.
Rejection. A story to a magazine. Rejection. Two poems, an essay, some photos to a magazine. I’ll submit anything to anyone. Rejection, rejection, rejection, I don’t care! An essay submitted to a book; acceptance! Yes! An invitation to model in a fashion show! Yes! More writing, more modeling, more photographs, yes! A sculpture! Yes! Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, because I am a real artist!
And now I can’t stop getting inspiration. A paperclip is a romance; an old cigarette ad a ghost story. A paper shredder is a mystery; a paintbrush a thriller. A wedding at the Plaza Hotel is a Regency romance between an earl’s daughter and a retired major general. I’m eight thousand words in, sixteen, thirty, seventy-five; time to edit. I’ve got hundreds of photos and dozens of dresses and I buy an iPad so I can write and edit and draw and plan any time, anywhere.
Wait...what was that? I bought an iPad? Yes. Because as much as they’re despicable one-percenters crushing foreign workers under their heels, even though there are suicide fences around the roofs of the factories in Shenzhen, even though it cost two weeks’ pay...that iPad lets me make art anytime, anywhere. Just like that very first smartphone gave me the freedom to call myself (and to be) a real artist.
At least, that’s what I used to tell myself. I haven’t published enough, haven’t been in enough galleries, haven’t got the technical skill or the academic training, wouldn’t know Matisse from Monet. I call my “real artist” friends and say, “What exactly is a found object? Do you see the face in this sculpture? Is this poem terrible? Does this essay make sense? Is this story boring? What do you think--” as if I can’t trust myself. As if real artists always have total confidence. As if the reason I don’t is that I’m not a real artist. For years and years, I told myself I wasn’t a real artist.
But that problem was cracked wide open by Steve Jobs, Larry Page, and Sergei Brin. Not to mention Mark Zuckerberg. Detestable capitalists. Industrialists, feeding on globalization and middle-class greed...who came up with a phone.
A phone with a camera. A phone with the Internet. A phone that could take a picture, edit it, and share it with everyone you know in just a few moments. Suddenly I was a real artist, really making real art and showing it to real people.
And those real people Liked it. So I kept taking pictures. And I went back to journaling, and then to slam poetry, and then to National Novel Writing Month...and then I started sending my work out to “real artists” for real.
The first piece that was accepted was a close-up shot of an Art Nouveau door on a tomb in Graceland cemetery. The exhibit was called Passages, so I wrote a statement about the door being a passage from our world to the small confined space of the mausoleum, and asked if we are objectifying or honoring those who live in the marble houses of the dead.
That photo was also the passage for me from hiding my work, from pretending it wasn’t real, wasn’t important, to believing it was art. Really art. Because it was accepted, I sent a story to a book of fairy tales.
Rejection. A story to a magazine. Rejection. Two poems, an essay, some photos to a magazine. I’ll submit anything to anyone. Rejection, rejection, rejection, I don’t care! An essay submitted to a book; acceptance! Yes! An invitation to model in a fashion show! Yes! More writing, more modeling, more photographs, yes! A sculpture! Yes! Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, because I am a real artist!
And now I can’t stop getting inspiration. A paperclip is a romance; an old cigarette ad a ghost story. A paper shredder is a mystery; a paintbrush a thriller. A wedding at the Plaza Hotel is a Regency romance between an earl’s daughter and a retired major general. I’m eight thousand words in, sixteen, thirty, seventy-five; time to edit. I’ve got hundreds of photos and dozens of dresses and I buy an iPad so I can write and edit and draw and plan any time, anywhere.
Wait...what was that? I bought an iPad? Yes. Because as much as they’re despicable one-percenters crushing foreign workers under their heels, even though there are suicide fences around the roofs of the factories in Shenzhen, even though it cost two weeks’ pay...that iPad lets me make art anytime, anywhere. Just like that very first smartphone gave me the freedom to call myself (and to be) a real artist.