Rubino (he/him) - ART IS DEAD vol.4
“I'm Rubino :0 I grew up in BC but now live in Montreal. Primarily my practice in centered around feeling comfortable with discomfort, and a way for me to sort out my anxieties about myself and the world around me.”
Why are stories important?
I think the sharing of knowledge happens primarily through storytelling.
How are you celebrating what challenges you?
doing it and loving myself for it.
So art is dead? Not the first time I've heard it, nor the first time I have felt it. Yet something about the aforementioned statement demands clarification for me to accept as reality rather than a misguided expression of resentment.. Now in order to understand this statement for what it truly means, we must understand the functionality of death on socio-conceptual and organic levels. It is from within the arts, in combination with observation and reflection on the world around me that I have come to understand death as something intrinsic to life. Throughout this discussion we will unpack how and why death functions this way, and re apply this logic to the understanding of the arts: its expression, and the spaces that it exists in, in order to find out if art is truly dead, and what that means for us as artists.
It's no easy task I have assigned us dear reader, to understand death, we must discard neither subjective nor objective realities. It is at this point as thinkers we must be open to all possible interpretations of the unknown. To clarify, I am not asking after the soul, nor its journey, but the specific event of death and its function in the livingworld. There are two main concepts I must be able to articulate for the sake of discussion: loss and decomposition. There is a physical and emotional side to both these frameworks which must be mutually understood to articulate the function of dead.
Loss is quite literally the act of losing something. There are many ways to experience loss, this definition being vague with intention. We lose things. We lose people, relationships, objects, abilities– if you can “have” it you can(and will) lose it. There’s a lovely duality here to acknowledge, it’s a classic dynamic and an inescapable cliché. Tangibly, this can be manifested through the death of a loved one, the end of a friendship, or even mismatched socks; their partners devoured by the couch and washing machine. Sometimes an intangible loss is more nuanced to identify: a misguided expectation, obstruction in the path of a goal, the fleeting warmth of the last rays of a sinking sun ,and accepting bitter truths. There is even a loss to be experienced in the most loving self actualizations: I am a man (now I have to stop trying to be something I'm not). The emotional affect of loss is grief. These examples are griefs that I have been personally faced with, and should be universally understood on varying levels. Of course grief itself is an emotional state that finds everyone many times, but reactions, and ways of processing should be expected to differ widely across cultures, communities, individuals, and instances.
In order for the subject/object to be dead it must be lost in a way that disables its return to the original state, such that would cause an experience of grief.
Decomposition is the physical act of transforming from one state into another after death. Again, like loss decomposition is a concept that applies to a diverse set of situations involving the act of death, dying, and being dead. Even the physical decomposition of a dead body will vary based on numerous environmental factors, in addition to the chosen method of preserving the body. For example, when my father’s body was recovered it had been submerged in water for some time, he had decayed to the point that he was nearly unrecognizable. Thus only my mother was permitted to see the body until cremation was finished. Still, after cremation, and the ashes had been collected, there is no way of knowing that this is the case. I reference both the literal decomposition of a subject and a non-traditional usage to describe processes of change related to the loss of said subject. My father had non-figuratively decomposed in the water, his nitrogen feeding the life in the river and wetlands surrounding. When he was burned in a simple pine casket his body underwent a secondary, figurative sort of decomposition in which flesh bones bloat and pine turn to ashes. Ashes scooped into sachets. I have one, my sister another, my mom’s, I think she has hers. But there is another portion of him fully consumed by the river. Part of the body was consumed by the flooding river that spring and summer.
Later, a portion of ashes is intentionally given back to the wetlands. He feeds a trail we walked along many times, many years ago.
And back to the river again in 2024, a different spot, ashes in the water sinking into the sand. My sachet of ashes is seemingly sacred and safe, yet I know that nothing is immortal to time, clumsiness, sunlight, or the oils secreted by my skin. With death, decomposition is inevitable. On an emotional level this brings us back around to our discussion of grief. Grief acts out the uncomfortable and transformative measures of decomposition, addressing emotional response, rather than physicality. This is to acknowledge memory and emotion as subjects of decomposition after death, and acknowledge the natural sadness that comes at and all moments after the loss.
In identifying the act of decomposition we must consider the goal of the outside effects on the flesh. Inherent to decomposition is an eventual transformation from one body back to the earth. This can be the physical return to dirt: nourishing plants, fungi and all kinds of microorganisms, eventually creating food for larger creatures, who die and become bodies and bloat and bones and dirt again.
Another manifestation is through the loss of memory, and retelling of stories. We must re-remember in grief, over time memories become warped, selected, and retold through the mouths of others. If I ever have children their only knowledge of my father will be through stories, and he will be but a legend to them, this too is decomposition in its own right. The place where the cycle seemingly restarts is a place of peace or acceptance, as the lost item is returned back to the place of origination.
Understanding the Death of Art
Here there is no sense in defining art as we did death. It’s not that the real world effects of art are more or less tangible than death’s, but that my personal understanding of art is simpler to define. Art is in everything. Every creative expression is art. It's not about skill, it's about creativity. Sure I might find enjoyment in an art piece that is both aesthetically and conceptually fleshed out more often than one that isn’t, however the ‘quality’ of art is not the matter of this discussion, and frankly I think it is irrelevant to the understanding of death I am utilizing here. Art is the outcome or object, the creative expression is the action of making art /the force it is derived from. Creativity is a capability that anyone can tap into at any given time, an instinct perhaps as well as the subject of decomposition. Art is the physical thing that dies or the subject that is lost, but creativity can only be subject to decomposition. This is to say in every moment (although maybe not at the time of) there is an opportunity for creative growth. Real moments of loss have been a catalyst for the production and conceptual understanding of my art. Sometimes this is immediate, but many times it takes slow painful reflection to enact the tactics of loss and decomposition.
As a recent(ish) art school graduate, I must admit the current reality of the art market is not exactly pretty. In turn I must acknowledge the validity of the frustrations of my peers. I can make art; the issue is selling it. I would fault capitalism for producing, replicating, and thriving off of the contexts in which we must market and sell ourselves alongside our art to be bought as products. However we mustn't dare credit the wills of capital for the death(s) of art. I am grateful that art, and its infinite expressions predate capitalism. To know the death of art is not a function of capitalist values but a function of art itself should serve as a massive relief and perhaps a place in which to source action. The ability for art to kill itself will be essential to art outliving capitalism (as it has died and outlived many eras of human history) . The artist has spent millennia pushing their craft forwards, transforming it into something new. While art and culture transform alongside one another, both perpetuate the effects of the other. If the artist seeks to escape the shackles of capitalist, consumer, “high art” culture, it becomes time to kill art. I believe this can be done through a variety of avenues. Nevertheless, to succeed in a true killing, as to start a new pattern, there must be something to lose. There must be something to decompose and a greater purpose for decaying flesh to feed. In the instance of systemic networks such as the aforementioned capitalist forces, there becomes the need for entire communities to come together to kill art. To dismantle such a thing would certainly involve the death of life as we currently know it, but decomposition can only bring us closer to an organic state. I imagine this as a world where we take much better care of eachother. While grief is inherently ‘not fun’ one may persevere through the stinkiest parts of its rotting state, to find new growth. After a shared experience of grief it is common to come out with deeper communal understanding. Now I could reckon all day with art, grief and capitalism, but today this is not my end goal. This is all to illustrate the power art serves on a large scale, to have us both as reader and writer, engage in an inter/intrapersonal critique of our art’s function in therealworld. As I continue my writing, and sort out my thoughts, I find myself inciting the death of art.
We may use intentionality to kill art, but sometimes it just silently slips away in the night and we do not notice until something doesn’t feel right anymore– something is missing. Now no shade to Miss Emily, but the four years I attended Emily Carr University of Art and Design are still giving me nightmares, over a year after graduating with my BFA. I can’t say I felt well prepared to jump into the arts as a primary source of income. And what has my art degree even got me? Well, I got lifelong friendships, sharpened my critical engagement and thinking skills, a cannabinoid dependency, and a creative spirit stomped down and fermented into a fine aged wine, leaving me woozy and evocative. But did I get a job? Fuck no, not ‘in my field’. Throughout my schooling I struggled to accept the death of my art practice as it was before my formal art education. Just when I’ve done enough work to find something to hold on to, I am faced with a new context again. Like a first sip of an expensive wine, it’s drier than I had naively expected. A part of this is just growing up and learning to accept, and another knows I must understand what action must be taken to change this. Both of these thoughts are the workings of grief. It is such that the death of art incites both personal, and communal evolution.
As of late, it seems that both my peers and I have been demanding some kind of change. Faulting many different exterior forces for this death of art, however they do naught but apply pressure. It is up to the artist to revolutionize the production of art. We are the artmakers after all! We control the function of art. Be not afraid to cry. Be not afraid to try new mediums; to ask for help; to offer kindness. In these actions in which we serve our core values and nurture our creativity we may decompose with grace.
So is art Dead? Sure. Does it matter? No. Why not? It seems that as an innate functionality of death it must give birth to something new. Art dies all the time, and as long as there are artists pushing art forwards, art will always be dead. It is in the decomposition of the dying art in which inspiration is derived, praxis advances, and new materials found. I celebrate the death of art, everyday I attend her funeral. I pick up her bones and sharpen them into weapons. Dry friction dissolves them to dust in my hands, taken by the wind, and I scramble after. Down a rocky slope, tripping and landing in a rush of cold water. I can’t wait to see where my body will lay still.
Trashcan Media, Rubino, Beautiful Trash for Beautiful People, vol.4 published August 1st 2024 ‘ART IS DEAD’
