Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Culture


When I was young & bullet proof, one thing I never had was a closed mind. I was always open to new ideas & influences. In fact I welcomed them; they were the stuff of life & living.
As I got older, in fact around the time my daughter was born, my mind closed somewhat. I was not prepared to give the same time to new ideas. I realise now that this was an inevitable part of maturity.

Today I say...Bugger that! I realise that I love new things. New technology, (remember I grew up in the space race everyday there was something new ) new music, new idea's, the only problem is that today's new idea's are hard to put a finger on...is it just a new generation drawing influence from the past, as we have all done, yet without putting a new edge to it?

The reason I think about this is because I firmly believe in the cyclical nature of things, kids are influenced by their parents, it shows in their work. Nothing wrong with that. If you can then take the idea & expand on it, add some new thing we had not thought of & then move the idea a step forward.

Take for example the work that came out of the Bauhaus in the thirties, we see the same idea's crop up time & time again, yet each generation adds their own twist to it. I do the same things when I write music, I go back to those early electronic artists who inspired me & hopefully push the work along in my own tedious way.

Yet I cannot help but think that as generations are handed this thing called culture, they water it down dealing in cheap idea's, quick fixes, easy money, rather than trying to reach the motherlode.
Brian Eno said "Culture is everything we don’t have to do " rather than those things we have to do, such as earning a living. It is how we define ourselves at play & leisure, which today seems to be binge drinking, gangs & drugs. I cannot believe this is a true picture of our society, I have to still believe that people out there want to be creative & put their minds, idea's & concepts out there for us to enjoy.

If we have no concept of art or culture then the Lascaux cave paintings would not exist. Our culture defines us as human beings; our ability to accept & encourage culture defines our humanity.

Listening to:

The legendary "Lost " 4 tracks available for download soon.

Watching:

Outrageous Fortune

2 comments:

Yorkshire Pudding said...

We have to strive for something beyond the cave and we shouldn't be leaving it up to the culture vultures of London or Sydney, New York or even Auckland to take us forward - culture and art and design are there for all of us. There are no membership fees - you just climb aboard. I visited the Bauhaus exhibition in Berlin. You notice the simplicity and the passion of those timeworn designs.

David said...

I agree with you, my main moan was about lack of creativity, but I also agree that culture is for everyone, not an elitist few.