impli ot 20 eR exrlorakion® 6s OZ—-ZMVO VAY: Ane 2G roachina an a! maeeat ra enistential aPate /4ime& MACALGAA ? ‘2 a TO @ sensitivita? - Pretty Pickules | LET US ANALYSE THE ARTIST’S SITUATION: By: Laiwan Chung BUCKMINSTER FULLER believes that the problem with our society is that scientists and technocrats have drifted towards non-humanisation because of their lack of using experimental models. He also believes the artist has tended to an extreme of esoteric eliteness, whereby a layman needs an education in Art to experience it. So, what must we do to make viable Art? Until recently, artists have tended to stay away from sciences and technology. Maybe because it’s a little frightening, and stereotypecd as ‘cold’. But looking beyond that surface is a vast mysterious world that artists can explore and create and in doing that help build models the sciences need. Scientists and artists should marry talents. Science and technology are running ahead of us, and artists are the people trained in sensitivity and humanities to be able to blend the contents of a new scientific or technological discovery with varying in- tricacies of human nature. MARSHALL McLUHAN suggests that it’s time for ‘‘artists to move out of the ivory tower and into the control tower of society”’. It doesn’t mean artist as dictator or politi- cian, (although that would be a great perfor- mance piece) but to enter society and work where it is comfortable. ‘‘Art is the by-product of the artist,” wrote Joseph Beuys. It is only a part of the whole of being an artist. Therefore, art must exist with the artist in confrontation with reality, not merely with his/her wishes but a collective community in mind. There is a greater need for a communal spirit. Our society proves itself as misunderstanding the importance of the art role, when everything in dealing with economics we’re first on the cut back list. PART TWO. Economics is like a door to a building. Without acknowledging it we can’t get in. It is, like materialism, an important facet to the progress of the human being. With it we are prisoners, yet, with it we are liberated. It is dangerous to value it greatly. For in our economically stressful age it is definitely going to affect art making. Artists and art students may not make things anymore — and it won’t be because of aesthetics, but the effects of monetary support systems. It’s like making videos because film is too expensive. What does that mean? Will we make compensations for economics? Art shouldn’t be involved in finances. It should hold opinions and_ should acknowledge the fact that money is a part of the art making but does not make decisions of the piece. Now-a-days it’s expensive to be an artist. It’s one of the worst paying, least appreciated and overworked occupations around. The hours are slave rate, and someone asks you why you’re doing it and you know it’s out of obsessive love. Artists must make art. There has to be ac- cessible mediums. All art world bureaucracy should be cut back instead of our budgets and support mechanisms. If not, all artists may go on strike, and then what a state we’ll Didn’t I hear someone sing: “‘All you need is love.””! I wonder if in art history they’re going to call us ‘‘economic art’’ instead of the Post Modernists.