Occasionally I engage in introspection that goes far afield and early last night, while doing mindless chores, I began to analyze my intense aversion to traits that may have always been widely spread and now seem to be an epidemic. I refer to hypocrites, elitists, the greedy, those who cheat and lie and think that is all right because that is what smart, successful people do. So I write about these things.

The News-Press continues to print my stuff – about half of what I send them. I think they drop some of my most trenchant diatribes down a little black hole in the back of the newsroom. Still, I can’t complain. Mostly my thoughts appear in their letters column. And recently, I got a Monday column with my photo in the op-ed section – the subject was the crisis in the Middle East, and for this I also picked Ed’s brain because he is the historian.

They edit some things out – keeping me honest, I guess. Or maybe it’s TMI, because I have a tendency to segue from one point to another – sort of a right-brain process where one thought triggers another and suddenly you are off the subject.

This afternoon my tutee,Solveiga, came over for help with her most recent assignment – an analysis of the French artist known as Saint ORLAN, as part of her Humanities course. She is studying to become an RN and must take Humanities first. When she completes this course, she will finally get to medical subjects.

Anyway, ORLAN (she insisted this pseudonym be in all caps when referring to her) did performance art and used her own self as subject matter, aided and abetted by many plastic surgeries to her body to prove her point. I am in awe of anyone so dedicated to their “art” that they can subject themselves to bodily alteration of this magnitude. And maybe her behavior escalates because her brain is deteriorating from constant application of general anesthesia. She ignores all criticism that suggests she is a self-destructive narcissist with an agenda designed to gain attention and nothing else. She is certainly entitled to her illusions and if she gains an audience, I don’t care. I don’t spend much time agonizing over the slavish devotion to Andy Warhol either – these artists and their audiences deserve each other. I do know ORLAN’s art does not move me. Art was invented when cavemen found in themselves a need to create and to copy nature. It was self-fulfilling, and it gained momentum when those looking at the art found pleasure in it. I really don’t think art should be anything else.

If art is used to advance a political/societal agenda, or to prove a point, or to disgust and be sensational, why not? But, then, let’s call it propaganda and not put it in a museum.

What is the purpose of art anyway? I don’t think a “message” is what art is about. I think art should enlighten in an emotional way that is pleasurable. I don’t see the point of rubbing someone’s nose in unwholesome depictions of womankind, one of ORLAN’s themes. We are all, in one way or another, victims of skewed perception in life and have our own backgrounds to refer to when contemplating abuse. I know it is a cliché to say “yes, but is it art” but I think that is a valid way of viewing such “artists”. I don’t feel any emotion at all when I look at ORLAN's work, unless boredom is an emotion. So, to me, her message is not art. It is more like an infantile psyche screaming at the world and I want to tell it to shut up.

Solveiga agrees with me. Sometimes I get flip and make a remark and she wants me to include this in her analysis and I say, yes it is tempting to be funny and dismissive, but teachers usually have a poker up their ass and will be annoyed, so we won’t put that in. She thinks I’m funny.
I am trying to get her to see how to edit herself. She, at times, uses important sounding words in totally obscure ways and I keep telling her “less is more”. I ask her why she uses a word and she says she likes the sound of it. So I Google the definition to show her why it isn’t the right word. Her first language is Lithuanian. My work is cut out for me.

This course ends in three days and she wants to celebrate and said she will bring champagne. Sounds good to me. (Incidentally, we’ve been getting As.)

xx, Teal