Dagelijks archief: april 11, 2017

Consider this my mission statement; The artist is present

film-artistpresent-splsh

Marina Abramovic in The Artist is Present (2010)

It is like the difference between Madonna and Mariah Carey.
And it goes for many professions.

First, there are the craftsmen, who will refine and develop their trade throughout their lives. Once they’ve reached a certain status, they will train new craftsmen in what has now become a lineage. A higher standard of photography, a perfected way of oil painting, a new form of contemporary dance.
Even in yoga, which is my main profession, the craftsmen – and those who work according to their lineage – are the majority. And it is at this level of craftsmanship, where the craft itself is nurtured, refined and protected. Where rules are created, manifestos declared, and where professionals unite into unions. Into prize giving committees. Into a clan where you are accepted once you’ve paid your dues, praised when you technically excel and where you are expelled if you have strayed from its path.
Although the skill of the craftsmen will never be questioned (not by me anyway), they are by nature conservative and if I dare say;
Boring as fuck.
But you probably got that at the Mariah Carey reference.

Then there is the second “group”. It’s not really a group because they are by nature renegades and revolutionaries. These are not craftsmen, or professionals, they are artists.
Who will create not because it is what they do for a living, but because that is who they are. Even if no one listened, read or bought their stuff? They would still create.
And if they are questioned, rivaled, or judged? They would still create.
It would be an exaggeration to state an artist has to create in order to live physically. But spiritually? A true artist will wither away when they don’t express themselves.

With countless controversy to her name, Madonna has never apologized. And yet, there is one thing she said to regret;
That the Sex era didn’t give people answers.
That she defied people’s preconceived ideas on sexuality, without actually giving an alternative. She would have liked to tie her (later learned) insights and lessons to it.
When in reality, what made the Sex era so interesting was that she didn’t know that stuff at the time. She didn’t know how the story ended. It was a journey of her testing and pushing her own boundaries of shame and morality. She had to work way outside her comfort zone, in deciding what she dared to photograph, and what she dared to put on paper. 

She was on unknown territory. That’s what made it so good. That’s what made it art. But if Madonna had actually waited ten years, and had published it with her soothing message, the Sex book had been merely Kabbalah PR. 

I m on the verge of moving from being an amateur writer to a professional writer. My Wait Worth 8, the first eight books, will soon be available. And I have so many hopes, and fears, and good intentions surrounding their publication. But I think it all comes down to one thing;
I choose to be an artist.
No matter WHAT.

The biggest regret I have is that I didn’t publish book 1-7 when they were still “my Sex era”. And I was still embarrassed because they contained me falling for my barely-legal student. Me getting my heart broken by my lover. And then again by my best friend.
I felt vulnerable because they all contained me longing for Benjamin.
I felt exposed because I wrote erotica. About anal sex, shame, rape. And a hundred pages more that excited me and turned me on and scared the fuck out of me all at the same time.

It’s 2017 now and like Madonna I know all the answers. And because of that, publishing book 1 to 7 will merely be period pieces. I m no longer moved by them. They don’t scare me. The artist, my consciousness, is no longer present on those pages.

But the good thing is, I have one book left! Book eight, Big, erotica and diaries.
The story of me dating a married man. And it’s still alive and sensitive. It is controversial. It raises questions and pushes people’s buttons without offering any answers. Least of all soothing ones.

By publishing book eight, Big, erotica and diaries when it’s still warm and sensitive, I show that although it took me a hell of a long time, I’m ready.
I’m here.
I’m present.

The artist, is present.

<3LSH

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