art?

I rarely enjoy discussing art much anymore. I rarely go to see art much anymore. My art viewing excursions have waxed and waned since I went to art school...mostly they've waned. Yes, I blame art school.

Perhaps I just didn't have the temperament for it, perhaps somewhere inside myself I hate art just a little bit, but, in any case, so much discussion of art and meaning for two straight years in intimate settings with a limited number of people left me running and screaming when the whole thing was over.

Today, however, I broke my art avoidance habit and went to see some work in the galleries of Chelsea. I generally dislike Chelsea (so far away from the train, so much bad, overpriced art), but sometimes I stumble upon a show there that leaves me with food for thought and makes the trip worthwhile. Plus, I found out that one of my favorite professors from school, Nayland Blake, had a solo show up that would be closing on March 8, 2008. So I made my way to the western edge of Manhattan...

Nayland's show made me miss my regular studio visits with him. He was one person at my school with whom I never tired of discussing art. This is probably because Nayland believes that other sources of inspiration (music, writing, etc) are just as if not more important to the creation of new work than other visual art is. He was also suspicious, I remember, of the usefulness of a formal art education. I respected that, even though I was going into massive debt receiving my own formal art education.

I only visited galleries on West 24th Street today - there's so much jammed into that one block between 10th and 11th Avenues that continuing on to other streets ends up overloading me with too much visual data.

I'm glad I went to Chelsea today. More often, recently, I find myself having the urge to start drawing again (I've all but given up making artwork in favor of writing and music in the last couple years). Perhaps, with baby steps like the one I made today in visiting a few galleries, art and I can become friends again.