mon 08 jun 2009 08:42:29 — witte de withstraat
unexplained
i think something i am learning this year, is how to really think of myself as an artist, per se. it involves being sensitive to meaning that you can't explain, and trusting in the inexplicable. i've always been able to do it, but i didn't learn to trust it.
in my life i've done a lot of artistic things that could easily be explained, and i know how to do that, and it's called marketing. work made for hire. there was usually pressure from someone in the opdrachtgever chain, to eliminate anything that might seem too mysterious from our message.
meanwhile the ability to work with nonexplicate meaning has always been there in me, and it comes out in this or that independent movie. i'm not a very good cameraman but i have an eye for significance that only makes sense later when you put it together, and even then the sense it makes is dreamy.
i think i've learned a lot from hanging around with micheline dumonceau. i like the drama of her struggle. i call it the battle for beauty within a repressive avant-garde.
i guess the big question then is, if i retire from being useful, what happens when i'm an artist per se? i keep thinking you have to go register with some kultuurkamer somewhere, just as when i started my production company i had to register with the kamer van koophandel.