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Sand and sense: On being an artistic diversion

Posted By Chris Matarazzo On In artistic unknowns by Chris Matarazzo,education | 6 Comments

Have any of my currently unknown artistic brethren and sistren out there noticed what nifty little curiosities we seem, to our  acquaintances? I mean, if we won big fat awards or sold something for hard cash, we would be seriously interesting — legitimate, even. But until then, we are breathing diversions; we are, at best, refreshing company, because if we are, indeed, forced to cut the grass to make ends meet, we still refuse to stray far from playing in the backyard sandbox.  And, oh, the little castles we can make! Such delights! Such fun!

Once, at a very young age — I believe she was still in my mother’s womb, in the second trimester of pregnancy, but I may be exaggerating — my sister painted an outstanding piece. One of our great aunts looked at it, and instead of recognizing the astounding quality of the work, she remarked: “Isn’t that cute?” (She’s a professional illustrator now [my sister, not my great aunt, may she rest in peace].)

Cute. That’s the best the lady could do.

But, take heart. We encourage creativity in schools, here in the U.S. of A. Save our music programs! Save our art programs! Why? Kids get better math scores when they study an instrument; they learn to think creatively, which helps them later in life; not, however, because they might contribute some beauty or profundity to an ugly, mundane world. That’s silly . . .

 . . . unless you make a lot of money or win a big award. Because that means success. For instance, it is clear that everyone who has ever won a Grammy is a serious artist.

Anyway, we encourage our kids to be creative so that creative thinking will serve them well on standardized tests — which are F-ing stupid, across the board, says the writer/musician/vice-principal writer of this article — or in solving business-oriented problems when the stakes are real.

Thomas Gradgrind [1]is alive and well — but he allows a creative period per week now, because statistics show creativity breeds augmented normalcy.

But stick with it — keep living the creative life, and you are certainly not despised; you might very well be adored, like a pet rodent. You are, as I said, a refreshing, slightly silly, getting-his-hair-rumpled-like-a-little-kid amusement for those serious adults who stand outside the sandbox with both dress-shoes firmly on the grass, smiling benignly down at you over their folded arms.

I was once playing a gig in a bar. I was in my late-twenties. A friend from high school walked up to the stage to say hello. I hadn’t seen him for years.  We exchanged a hearty hand-clasp. He said: “You still doing this nonsense?”

He was a cop in a tiny town, which meant that, mostly, his job amounted to writing tickets and chasing kids away from keggers in the woods. Do I respect the police? Of course I do. They keep us safe. They risk their lives, sometimes. But do the police respect me? Well, not this one. To him, my musical life was “nonsense.” My passion was “nonsense.” If having passions is nonsense, then people like this guy are certainly quite sensible.

Yet, there he was, my policeman friend, about twenty minutes later, dancing, sweating and giving me the thumbs-up over the shoulder of a grinding girl-pal (who was, if we are really going to analyze this, grinding to my beat and not to his).

I suppose my nonsense made more sense when he got drunk.

Chris Matarazzo’s ARTISTIC UNKNOWNS appears every Tuesday.

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Chris Matarazzo [5]

Chris Matarazzo is a writer, composer, musician and teacher of literature and writing on the college and high school levels. His music can be heard on his recent release, Hats and Rabbits [6], which is currently available. Chris is also the composer of the score to the off-beat independent film Surrender Dorothy [7] and he performs in the Philadelphia area with the King Richard Band. He's also a relatively prolific novelist, even if no one seems to care yet. His blog, also called Hats and Rabbits [8], is nice, too, if you get a chance...