Browsing through the photographs in the photography competition at the DuQuoin State Fair today, I noticed that I usually agreed with the judges' opinions about which pictures were the best. But not always. Sometimes I couldn't understand why they'd picked one particular photo over another. On second look, however, it came clear. For instance, a third place photo was of a line of semi tractors shot from the side. Not among the winners was a much more interesting photo of a riverboat in some exotic locale or park. I definitely preferred the second, and couldn't understand the supposedly superior value of the first, until on closer examination I realized that the composition of the former was clearly better, with the fronts of several gleaming semis of different colors all offset at an angle, compared with a fairly straightforward shot of the riverboat and its environs. But the subject matter of the photo was, nonetheless, relatively mundane and uninteresting compared to the riverboat. That doesn't mean I think they gave third prize to the wrong photo; it was a photogragaphy contest, after all. But it put me in mind of a behavior I have noticed among people who are partisans of a particular art form, whether it be writing, poetry, cooking, winemaking, photography, or what have you. These partisans may or may not be practitioners of the art form in question; they may merely be aficionados. But these partisans often have one thing in common: valuing form over content. When confronted with an example of their art, they do not, as a layman would, evaluate it primarily on the basis of its content—for instance, how satisfying a meal is, or how interesting a photograph is. Instead, they evaluate its form—that is, how well it conforms to the conventions of the art. Not that those conventions cannot be broken; they can. But to be worthy, art that breaks the conventions must do so deliberately, being fully aware of the conventions that its breaking, and the result must be equal or superior in the very criteria—form—that current conventions enshrine. Eschewing form—for instance, paying no attention to good grammar in writing—will get your work condemned as unworthy before the content even gets examined. Similarly, a photo of an extremely interesting subject, or a poem containing vivid imagery or profound feeling, that does not demonstrate an awareness of the established conventions of good form (or, perhaps, an extremely rare genius of new form) will not be seen by these partisans as legitimate representations of the art form—unworthy, in fact, even for consideration, so that the content, however valuable it might be, never even gets evaluated.

This is a mistake, in my view. No, I am not saying that form is bunk and content is king. Nor am I saying that these "art partisans" completely ignore content (notice I do not say "function." The form/function debate, while sharing some similarities with the current discussion, is actually quite distinct) in their worship of form. Not at all. If a work of art has vapid content, the best form will not save it. But at least the content gets looked at. This is not the case with art (often lay-produced) with poor form. Again, this is not to say that form has no place. Comparing two photographs with equally interesting subject matter, the one with the better composition will undoubtedly be more pleasing to look at. Nor am I saying that a competition such as the one that inspired these thoughts should pay less attention to form. In evaluating the relative worth of art qua art, a close attention to form is appropriate. What I am saying is that to dismiss a photograph, or an argument, or a movie, or a piece of writing, as without value out of hand because it doesn't measure up to your standards of composition, or structure, or cinematography, or grammar, is a mistake that can blind you to otherwise worthwhile art or ideas, and what's more—since the general public, in any given medium, is innocent of most of the fine conventions of that medium— leave you baffled as to why most people like what they do, and mark you as ivory-tower, snobbish, and out of touch with everyone except your fellow aficionados. The supreme irony of all of this is that in those media in which you are not well-versed, you are percieved by that medium's partisans as just as much of an unsophistocated, unworthy bumpkin as anyone else.

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Date:	2005-02-07 23:56
Subject:	What this blog is about
Security:	Public
Mood:	hopeful
Music:	James Horner - Titanic
Tags:	blogging

Alright, here’s the deal. I’m transcribing my journal(s), and posting the entries into blogs. I have another blog (which you’ll have to find on your own if you want to read) where I post my deep thoughts and significant ideas. Since I’m completely anal and figure if I’m going to post some of my journal I may as well post the whole thing, here is where I’m going to post those entries which I think are too trivial or too personal for my main blog with my name on it. So what you’re going to get here is a grab bag. Most of it will probably be crap; entries too short or disconnected or irrelevant to make much sense. But occasionally there should be good stuff: extremely personal entries that are too risqué or too intimate for me to post to a blog that lots of people who know me read.

So have fun. This should be an interesting ride. If you don’t know me and happen to stumble upon my regular blog, drop me a line and let me know. If you do know me and stumble across this blog...let me know. I guess. I hope I don’t get too embarrassed.

Calion

Update 7/9/07: I’ve changed tactics. The extremely personal stuff, if it gets posted here at all, will be protected so that only my bestest friends can see it. So I’ve linked to here from my main blog, which, for the record, is at http://homepage.mac.com/calion/blog, and called Genius/Idiot.

        There’s no one to tell me what to do. I think that’s what hurts most of all. There’s no one in the world I can put my faith in. There used to be many. Parents—somewhat; teachers—a little; friends—a few; books—almost completely. The authors of books—almost any book—were people I could put my faith in, could trust, could learn from. It eventually narrowed down to a few I believed in the most; now those have trickled down to nothingness, as I have slowly outgrown them all. What will it be like when I am old? I once said, “We read Ayn Rand for inspiration, but who did Ayn Rand read to get her ideas?” Her thoughts were so new, so unheard of—she must have felt all alone in developing her theories. Who would have been good enough to inspire her? I now know how she must have felt. I never, never imagined this would happen to me. After my latest revelations I fear I might even have outgrown Card.
        I feel all alone in a cold, harsh world, with no one to lead the way. Maybe that’s why being in the forefront of everything is so distasteful; it’s scary. You have no surety that you’re going in the right direction, and no one to catch you if you should stumble and fall. You can easily end up in a black pit of despair or wrongness, with no visible way out and no one to help you find one. It’s hard. Normally, you’re only pushing the envelope slightly, and there are people around and behind you to take up the slack and help you out if you should slip. Not so here.

        There’s no one to tell me the right thing to do. I feel so lost and alone.

        It’s so much easier to argue with and improve someone else’s viewpoint than to come up with a completely new on of your own.

        Maybe—maybe philosophy and what they call “great” literature actually have something. We’ll see.


        I have no more dreams, only hopes.

        I’m beginning to read The Great Ages of Western Philosophy, and I can see from the first page of the introduction to the first volume that there will be much in there to piss me off, and I might as well start writing from the beginning. But first I think I’m going to reread Zen, because it was from there I got the idea of critiquing philosophy line by line. But perhaps I should just read Feeling Good first after all. I think it’s more important. Arg. I really need to find a way to keep a real diary.

        Crying a lot today. I wish I had the will to keep a real diary. I’ve never enjoyed writing about my day, tho’. Not sure why. Never wrote very much about how I feel. I think it’s because it’s so damn inefficient, so damn much work for not enough return; you can never really get the whole thing on paper, and it’s so slow.
        I hate being the only one who knows the answers. I hate being the originator. Oh, for one or two things, or to periodically fill holes, correct errors, help perfect a system, sure. That’s fun. But creating the system to being with—that’s too much work. That’s not much fun. It’s too much damn work. I want to have fun. I want to play. I want to do what I want in a basically good world, and do my part by contributing to the goodness, by increasing the perfection, here & there. I’m not cut out for this.
        But I don’t see that I have a choice. When there’s no one else doing it, I don’t have the ability to stand idly by and do nothing. I do have to know the answers; I had just hoped to learn them from someone else rather than having to find—or worse, create—them for myself.
        Why do I dread that so much? Why does it seem like so much more effort? I really don’t know. But it’s true. I don’t want to be a historian. I don’t want to be a philosopher. I want to be a scientist. I want to work. But it doesn’t look like it’s going to work out that way. This is why I was crying.

by Stephen Jay Gould

•P. 36: “But our search for numerical order, and our overinterpretations

Update: Wednesday, January 16, 2008 4:00 PM

Hmph. I hate it when I do that. I have no idea what I was going to say, of course; it’s nearly ten years later. I’ll have to add a new Tag: Unfinished. Sometime I may get around to looking at the book and trying to figure out where I was going with this. If so, I’ll remove the post from LiveJournal and put it on Genius/Idiot.

#a: Playtime. I don’t even want to say funtime, because that could imply something structured or planned, like movies or parties. Anytime you haven’t allowed playtime, your plans have failed. Make sure you have a cutoff time, though, or you’ll go all night.

Excellent cinematic device, used in Lethal Weapon: use a TV show—or the audio of—to establish timing between scenes.

Delana—Laurel

GIS: General Information Services

        Okay: Here is the quintessential question: What will I do with my life? I already know many of the answers to this question; the task here is to put them in order and then figure out how to implement them.
        Better: How will I live my life?

❑Send these notes to him?
❑Read “Evidence that Demands a Verdict”

TMI: The starting point for the Information Revolution

We need to teach ourselves how to live in this world we’ve created.

Jim, you must remember, and keep remembering, that most of your life will always be thinking. There is no stopping point. There is no place where you are done and can finally act. Action must take place within and amidst the thought.



* TITANIC