Social Awareness is Not a Fad

I’ve passed the signs and the t-shirts a thousand times but I never bothered to read the pamphlet. It begins, “Legalize LA is about recognizing, celebrating and embracing the diversity of Los Angeles.” Sounds pretty cool right? While the Legalize LA campaign presents itself as founded on compassion it really seems to be about looking cool. And social awareness is really in right now.  Feminism, environmentalism, pacifism, veganism…the list goes on. From elementary school we are taught to see the U.S.A. as a melting pot but when you boil it down, Legalize LA is not about immigration, it is about selling clothes. The same way Legalize Gay is about selling clothes; the campaign promises to celebrate sexuality because it knows that sex sells.

The pamphlet closes with pictures of “some first-generation immigrants who have managed to grab their piece of the American Dream.” Chris Craig has referred to this as the “Oprah Effect.” Oprah who is really the exception is made into the rule. Oprah has been reified to sell the dream; if she can do it, anyone can! In my opinion the American Dream should be scrapped. The notion encourages us so see ourselves as autonomous free beings with lots of choices but those “choices” have already been chosen as choices. We buy into our own oppression by viewing the American Dream as “natural” the same way we buy into conformity by purchasing the store’s front window display.   

While I agree that we should indeed Legalize LA, the pamphlet seems unaware of its own contradictions and absences.  My favorite is the “Who We’ve Hated Timeline” featuring Native Americans, Irish, Chinese, Germans, Jews, Japanese, Italians, Russians, Mexicans, and Middle Easterners. First off, hated implies a period of racism and systematic discrimination that is over. And what about other marginalized groups such as women and African Americans? 

On the website a skeleton in a lace bra and panty set promises me the inside scoop on what’s hot right now. Her eyes tell me that for the low price of $49.99 I too can purchase my sexual freedom! I would by no scale call my style reserved yet none of their fall ideas I would be caught outside of my bedroom in. Companies like American Apparel and Urban Outfitters are just two examples of the ways we buy into our own oppression. I could go on ranting but what do we do about it? I’m not about to start sewing my own clothes from strictly organic cotton imported from Africa where human beings die from malaria everyday in the name of maintaining the integrity of organic cotton. So where do we go when awareness has never been enough? 
-Oriana

Art shakes the human mind. Sometimes to such an extent that reality and art seem to be too close of relatives. That is, if we consider art to be reality; the way the universe is laid out; in its natural motion.

To me it is fact that “life”, and “art” are different, that they are two separate things still equally absurd in nature with a cause and effect fluttering between the two. They’re both full of eerie turns and twists and occasionally we get lost in their materials. But defining art in the way that Stockhausen has, giving art too much freedom, allows it to contain no definite ends in it’s definition and instead allows us to consider the whole universe as a masterpiece, a work of art that is constantly moving and changing in its biological form. This isn’t necessarily a negative outlook on art, but it is a tad demented and broad.

Stockhausen considers art to function in the above way, to be infinite and to possess an uncanny ability to transform its viewers outside of their current mental states. In this sense, composition is somewhat of a phenomenon, a surprise. And we were surprised by 9/11. But because Stockhausen reduces art to such a simple form, as it can be applied to virtually anything within the universe that is composed, art is now all of reality, even a terrorist attack. It certainly is a beautiful definition, but there is a problem, and the problem is that his comment makes art seem too easy. It somehow takes away the importance of the human mind and intentional creation. It erases the line drawn between art and reality.

The attack on 9/11 was intentional, and a picture of two buildings exploding is moving, but as Tommasini puts it, this is an example of truth, not composition. At the same time it’s not necessary to assume that what is said here defines art as something untrue, because it’s just the opposite, as art still exists in a world built on truth. But the idea of an attack being called “art” allows anything in general to be art also, deteriorating the importance of its separation from life itself. Art is meant to be separate from reality, simply, an extension of our perception. It is a reaction of everyday existence. It is important and in the best interest of an artist to keep this separation.
-Larry