Just Do It, Tacheles in Berlin, Resolution and Poo
Everybody keeps asking me about new year resolutions. I thought I'd post here to say NO! I DON'T DO NEW YEAR RESOLUTIONS. I think they're a silly idea and they just make me feel bad when I break them: i.e. I don't like unresolved resolution.
Where was I?
Oh yes, flicking through some pages in my diary from a recent trip to Berlin, I realised that I do have less a resolution, more a new mantra:
JUST DO IT
I've never been a fan of Nike (tho I like what they do on the web); their 'swoosh', which seems to get in front of me at every opportunity: however while sipping a beer in the Kunsthaus Tacheles squat I suddenly realised the true inspirational genius of the thought. Judging from the scrawl in my notebook, the inner monologue went something like this:
JUST DO IT.
Do What?
IT
What's IT?
Well, look about you.
You're in an artists squat in the middle of a city which 60 years ago was raised entirely to the ground and has suffered countless oppressions since.
Looking around I am overwhelmed by colour, vibrancy, emotion, contrasting perspectives and freedom of expression. I don't like all the work, but I love the fact that the work is being produced in such an uncompromising, edgy non conformist way.
Indeed the one philosophy uniting entirely the work of the circumcised-cunt sculpture artist and the painter of the most beautiful landscapes of mournful morning sorrow is that of JUST DO IT. Say what is on your mind, make what needs to be made and it's not the final result, but the process which is of upmost importance. Learning through doing, through making, through getting off your arse and putting yourself up for scrutiny by following through your ideas and translating them into tangible works.
This is a lovely contrast to an adverworld where we are at times so intent on hammering the idea into such a refined state, that any form of palpable execution will only go to reveal the gulf between the purity of that idea and the harsh realities of budget, time lines and squeezed delivery dates. Here our world inevitably diminished the importance of process in favor of product; with no space left for happy accidents, serendipity or just plane fucking around until you get to somewhere that you like.
Tacheles for me felt like I had come home. It reminded me that I need to spend more of my own time in the JUST DO IT frame of mind, putting results as subordinate to process; putting aside thinking in favor of creative impulse.
So, we're back to the new year and my lack of resolutions. Well actually that's a lie - I have 6 things noted down here:
What was the last thing? Oh yes. JUST DO IT and Poo. Well the poo bit came from all that crazy Wurst that I ate in Berlin - as a warning really. If you go to Germany, don't eat more than one Wurst in a day (I had 4 on one day), as it gives you... how shall we say... akward poo. Poo made me think of a funny Gondry film on the same subject matter; now there's a man who has truly taken the JUST DO IT Philosophy, and run with it:
Where was I?
Oh yes, flicking through some pages in my diary from a recent trip to Berlin, I realised that I do have less a resolution, more a new mantra:
JUST DO IT
I've never been a fan of Nike (tho I like what they do on the web); their 'swoosh', which seems to get in front of me at every opportunity: however while sipping a beer in the Kunsthaus Tacheles squat I suddenly realised the true inspirational genius of the thought. Judging from the scrawl in my notebook, the inner monologue went something like this:
JUST DO IT.
Do What?
IT
What's IT?
Well, look about you.
You're in an artists squat in the middle of a city which 60 years ago was raised entirely to the ground and has suffered countless oppressions since.
Looking around I am overwhelmed by colour, vibrancy, emotion, contrasting perspectives and freedom of expression. I don't like all the work, but I love the fact that the work is being produced in such an uncompromising, edgy non conformist way.
Indeed the one philosophy uniting entirely the work of the circumcised-cunt sculpture artist and the painter of the most beautiful landscapes of mournful morning sorrow is that of JUST DO IT. Say what is on your mind, make what needs to be made and it's not the final result, but the process which is of upmost importance. Learning through doing, through making, through getting off your arse and putting yourself up for scrutiny by following through your ideas and translating them into tangible works.
This is a lovely contrast to an adverworld where we are at times so intent on hammering the idea into such a refined state, that any form of palpable execution will only go to reveal the gulf between the purity of that idea and the harsh realities of budget, time lines and squeezed delivery dates. Here our world inevitably diminished the importance of process in favor of product; with no space left for happy accidents, serendipity or just plane fucking around until you get to somewhere that you like.
Tacheles for me felt like I had come home. It reminded me that I need to spend more of my own time in the JUST DO IT frame of mind, putting results as subordinate to process; putting aside thinking in favor of creative impulse.
So, we're back to the new year and my lack of resolutions. Well actually that's a lie - I have 6 things noted down here:
What was the last thing? Oh yes. JUST DO IT and Poo. Well the poo bit came from all that crazy Wurst that I ate in Berlin - as a warning really. If you go to Germany, don't eat more than one Wurst in a day (I had 4 on one day), as it gives you... how shall we say... akward poo. Poo made me think of a funny Gondry film on the same subject matter; now there's a man who has truly taken the JUST DO IT Philosophy, and run with it:
Labels: art, Berlin, concept, creativity, Gondry, paint, traveling
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12:06 AM
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