Cyan of the Times

So I have to admit my urge to wheat paste was more than slightly inspired by seeing Shepard Fairey work in the Banksy documentary, Exit Through the Gift Shop (watch it on Netflix). All I have to say about the experience is knowing where there are legal tag walls is amazing. I’m too old to go to jail. And if I want to make a political statement or some sort and make sure people see it, I’d probably use the internet. But nothing can really compare to creating a large tactile piece of art in a public space.

So, here are a few shots of the piece. Taken with a cheap WalMart cell phone. I don’t really buy into the whole smart phone thing, and no, it’s not because I can’t afford one (even though I can’t). I’m already addicted to the internet. I don’t think I necessarily need to carry it around in my pocket all day.

So maybe it’s a bit cliche.. that all my introspective art lately has related to the topic of Love. I’ve been talking to a lot of different people about the topic as well. It seems like every where I go I’m sort of searching for some meaning. We live in this society where the meaning of the word has changed in sort of an interesting/devastating way. Over the past few decades we’ve seen the total destruction and partial re-creation of the family unit. It’s no longer mother father son and daughter. Now we see same sex partnerships, aunts and uncles, even people with no blood ties whatsoever coming together to form family units. I would even consider many of these “families” more valid than some of the traditional family units that seem to struggle to remain intact in some sort of forced manner that may or man not include genuine love at all. This makes things a bit interesting in turn when it comes to love between two people. I’ve always had a problem with the whole fairy tale aesthetic that we’re raised with as children. The whole night in shining armor, princess in a tower, triumphing over evil, and living happily ever after scenario really doesn’t translate into reality in any way shape or form. Via feminism, girls have to learn how to be their own white knights.. and well… I guess we’ll see how our generation makes out with the whole “happily ever after” thing.

Here’s the thing for me, since in our new world we’ve created, women and men can be self sufficient and don’t need to maintain intact household units for survival, we have to really learn how to love others and choose who we love wisely so that we can create healthy relationships and maintain healthy situations for our children to be raised in. We also need to set wise examples for future generations. Whether this means you have a life partner, spouse, or whatever label you decide suits your relationship, the whole aspect of LOVE should be carefully considered. I think the key to maintaining this love is if you decide to raise children in whatever family you have created, there has to be a certain element of selflessness that becomes very important. You have to set a good example. You can not abandon this family unit because you selfishly decide you want something else. You have to nourish your family with love and honor your commitment to this THING. This FAMILY. This FUTURE you have chosen. If you’re going to get the urge to run all willy nilly, abandon your partner, or generally put your own desires before your family, you should probably decide to do if after your children are grown and self-sufficient or no longer need you.

Whether you believe in god or not, the whole issue of morality stems from this decision to honor things that are larger than we are. The SELF is not as important as the greater good. Basically.

The Evol Love concept I’ve been contemplating lately and appears in the wall piece here comes from my emotions on how we hurt others through the process of finding what we want for our lives. Hopefully we will be sensitive to the feelings of others enough that when the time comes to make a commitment and decide to procreate we will honor that commitment realizing how much potential we have to hurt others, and ultimately act ethically. But hurting others in that initial process of figuring out what we want is sort of inevitable. I feel like there are a lot of gender and sexuality issues that come into play (I won’t get into that here, however) that for our generation, can take quite a bit to figure out. And I guess Love really is sort of a battlefield. With great power comes great responsibility. When someone chooses to love us, we are in turn given the ability to either nourish their existence, or crush it.

At 26, I can’t say that I don’t feel my biological clock ticking. And I’ve been through my fare share of heart break and breaking hearts… and I’ve also taken the necessary years to figure out my own gender awareness and hash out the complexities of sexuality and I feel a decent bit of guilt for the people I’ve had to hurt along the way. Granted,  I’ve been hurt no doubt. But, hopefully at this point I’ll see the end of this era of my life come to a close and I can make a conscious decision to finally commit to some sort of family unit and move forward. I’m interested to see how others similar to myself handle this situation. I feel like I could write a good bit more on this topic, but I’m not sure this is the appropriate place.

What it comes down to is.. without love you have nothing. Every good thing you ever do, if it’s not done in love, it’s done in vain (yes, that’s the word of Christ). To put aside your own ego and live for something greater than yourself will make your life mean much more than if you were to entertain your own selfish whims and desires. Even you Atheists should understand this. So in the end I can only hope that people will realize this and act accordingly.