Open me

My father used to (he's too weak now) tell me three things, alternately or together, when I tried to show him my art:

1. You haven't suffered enough to become an artist.

2. You haven't lived enough to become an artist.

3. If you want to become an artist, you have to find a subject. (in his mind, a subject which reaches the majority).

............................

He is absolutely right. There's nothing important in art that was made without pain (while doing it, and during the long process of becoming an artist). Pain is pain. I don't believe in art without pain. Art without pain is entertainment, which isn't art. I also love and need entertainment. But I need art more than entertainment.

To live enough means to experience enough, to suffer (again) enough, to fight enough, to get lost enough, to be poor enough, to belong to enough, to travel enough, to be rich enough, to fuck enough, to work enough, to be alone enough, to be in charge of enough, to love enough, to be betrayed enough, to be new enough to be able to provide the new.

The "find a subject" thing has always been more difficult to admit. The "subject" means the possibility of working with a special "me" that is enhanced by the others. It is an open me, able to share. This open me always pretends to be the real me, but it is only a trick. Only the open me can talk, and it talks the language of the others.