Why Artists Feel Misunderstood (one of the reasons)

Artists are funny people. Maybe a little hard to get to know. See the power of art is that it connects to us, there is something in it that speaks to the universality of the human spirit - about how, as different as all of us are, there is something at the core that is the same.

What artists do is they live their lives with up & down emotions & with visions of beauty & glory far beyond what they can actually express & then they fumble to try to find the words, the colours, the notes, the shape, the form, the movement, the whatever to give 'flesh' to the visions they've seen in their head. And an artist 99% of the time fails in this. The vision in the head/heart is always more beautiful, always more grand & perfect to the artis than the artistic expression that the rest of us get to see.... this is part of why artists are not always happy people & why artists are all mostly crazy (or on their way there).

But artists have to be faithful to their work, they're driven to create & so they just keep creating. Even when they decide to stop creating, the 'art' finds some expression. Or if it doesn't it just manifests in some kind of self-destructive tension which eats away at the artist from the inside out until they let the 'art' out.

The artist's struggle to understand beauty & make it visible to us is part of all of our struggles as humans. We are all searching for 'beauty' in some form or another. Most of all we are searching to love & be loved, know & be known.

There is this odd phenomenon where people often find something that an artist has written, drawn, painted, sculpted, danced, played, sang, etc. that gives voice or picture or movement to the things that our heart's been trying to say. And for the person seeing/hearing/feeling the art, it's breathtaking, it's life giving 'cause it suddenly unlocks for the first time exactly what they've been trying to say/feel/express. & suddenly the 'audience' feels this deep connection with the 'artist'. They feel the artist 'knows' them 'cause the artist has expressed something they could not express for themselves. And from this we get things called 'fan mail' & 'stalkers' & such (two sides of the same coin in some ways).

But often the artist is dumbstruck. They fumble around & create an expression of the vision they've been given. Mostly their unsatisfied with the artistic expression 'cause it didn't do what they wanted it to & instead, the art was it's own animal with a mind of it's own & basically got out of the artist's control & became this something 'other'... and then the artist, who is desperate to be known & understood like everyone else, hears that someone feels that they are finally 'understood' because the art expresses some deep part of their heart that has been locked up for years. & so the artist starts to hope that maybe this person has truly understood the art (which the artist doesn't fully understand) & then they start to hope that the audience/admirer has actually understood their artist heart (which again, the artist doesn't really understand completely either). And so the artist is suddenly all hopeful that maybe, just mabye, their long days of isolation & insanity are over because someone really understands & then they ask the person, the audience, to describe how the art made them feel.....

...and here's the kicker. Often what happens then is that the audience/admirer describes the impact of the art on their lives & it looks totally different than whatever the artist was trying to express... & so the artist thanks the person, but often walks off feeling even more alone & misunderstood.

Been thinking about that a bit this weekend with some written miscommunications. Been thinking that some people may hear the stuff I write - which is all metaphors (& hence, technically all lies - since, as pointed out in the wonderful book "The curious incident of the dog in the night time", a metaphor is saying something is something else, when really it's not, so therefore all metaphors are lies) - and think that they know me from reading what I've written. Looking back at what I've written over the last little while it's all random half thoughts, the expression of parts of thoughts while the real truth of each statement remains hidden slightly beyond the view. As much as I may write stuff in the open & attempt to be vulnerable & such, the real truth is that me, the real me, is only known through the mundaneness of walking through life with me, finding out about my day to day.

Mostly I just write to keep from going crazy 'cause the thoughts will still be there unless I empty them out in some creative outlet. (& yeah, I'm not so far off of crazy. Yesterday I was contemplating what it would be like to just randomly kill people walking down the street. I had some internal tensions I maybe needed to get rid of & this is what I was thinking. Mentioned this to a psych nurse friend of mine & they actually have big long names for that condition & she recommended I should head to the hospital right away. Somet times I wonder if that's not the best course of action).

& yeah, it's just an odd thought. Makes me wonder how Jesus feels with the Bible, with his big love letter to humanity & how everyone's took & misinterpreted it & twisted it. I wonder how much fan mail Jesus has got about how I really loved this one verse 'cause it made me feel better after I broke up with my girlfriend, I wonder how many stalkers Jesus has had following around wanting Him to be their 'one & only' cause they figure no one's understood their psychotic anti-social tendancies except for the radical called Jesus... (sometimes the 'stalkers' are cult members, sometimes they're the fire & brimstone preachers who think God only likes people like them)

...and I wonder in all of it if Jesus sits there like most artists, going, wow, I wish you'd buy me coffee & take the time to sit & listen to the person behind the art, to see the love that paints sunrises & sunsets, to see the heart that shapes every blade of grass & adorns every flower with rainbows of colour; to see the loving hands that sculpted the features of your face & to know the voice that sings over you in every moment of every day. Maybe Jesus is just sitting there going, I wish you knew that I did all this art for you - it's such a joy for me to do all these things & really my one true joy is you & all this art it's for you, it's an expression of how much I delight in you & long to know you & lavish my love on you.....

"Skin" By Bill Mallonnee of Vigilantes of Love

now i'd seen him despondent
a few times as of late
sometimes the answer that love gives
is the hardest one to take
i know he was prone to paint
the voice of his own fear
so vincent he picked up the blade
and he put it to his ear

look at yourself in the mirror
you're all rumpled red stubbled and gaunt
you walk a dead end path in a dry corn field
and now this morose response
your princess she don't wanna see you
no your princess she don't wanna hear
so vincent he picked up the blade
and he put it to his ear

now look if you're gonna come around here
and say those sort of things
you gotta take a few on the chin
you talking about love and all that stuff
you better bring your thickest skin
sometimes you can't please everyone
sometimes you can't please anyone at all
you sew your heart onto your sleeve
and wait for the ax to fall

you there with the paint box
you there with paper and pen
me i got this blunt instrument
i'm gonna play on 'til the end
and you know you come with empty hands
or you don't come at all
you deal your best hand out in the marketplace
and let the chips fall

the package it comes wrapped up
there is a lesson here
vincent he picked up the blade
and he put it to his ear

now look if you're gonna come around here
and say those sort of things
you gotta take a few on the chin
yeah you're talking about sin and redemption
well you better wear your thickest skin
sometimes you can't please everyone
sometimes you can't please anyone at all
sew your heart onto your sleeve
and wait for the ax to fall