Discovering Your Own Mysterious Sense of Importance:

That which is teachable in art is teaching you about the importance of others: other artists, other works of art, others’ ideas on art. All that is taught about art winds up stealing your sense of importance and transferring it to the art establishment. It’s a strategy for empowering and enriching the art establishment. It’s seldom a strategy for discovering your own sense of importance. Which is what I hope my ideas help you to do.

The art establishment and art industry have their strategies for self-preservation and growth. So should you. You need a strategy for self-advancement, too. You need a strategy for advancing your sense of importance: your own sense of why your life is important: why life is important: why everyone’s life is important. Don’t let the art establishment and art industry dominate your thoughts, control your judgment and crowd you out of your own mind. They have their strategies for self-promotion. You need a strategy, too.

Craft is just a strategy for success. It’s a road map to success. Create your own strategies for success. Create your own treasure map. Map out the hidden sources of your own sense of how and why your life is important: why life is important: why everyone’s life is important. Everything taught about art is craft, i.e., the craftiness of others who want to steal your sense of importance. So develop your own craft. Get even craftier. Find your own personal sense of importance. Find your own personal methods and sources for discovering your life’s importance: your sense of life’s importance. Discover Life!

~ Joy Rip

Click to read all Joy Rip's graphic novels!

Getting to the Real Mystery of Being Alive (Through Art):

“Why is there something rather than nothing?”

Being alive is the true mystery.

Coming into being…

Simply coming into existence is the first mystery.

Coming into awareness…

Coming into consciousness…

Becoming conscious makes us aware of life. Aware of death. Aware of being alive. Aware of feeling alive. Aware of the mystery of consciousness. Consciousness makes one aware of the importance of life!

“Why is something important rather than nothing?”

Art is the mystery of sensing importance. Art is a mysterious sense of importance whose greatest challenge is simply existing. Art’s greatest mystery is that this (or any) sense of importance exists at all. Art’s very existence is a mysterious act of defiance against all that negates this and every sense of importance. Art is an act of defiance against all that negates life.

The universe is largely lifeless. This lifelessness has no native sense of importance or any other sense or feeling. The living’s sense of importance is continually being undermined by the blind, unfeeling violence of the inanimate universe until death and destruction finally overtake them.

But where there is art, there is a hotbed of activity contradicting the cold and uncaring nature of existence. The existence of art contradicts its unimportance. The existence of life contradicts the overwhelming lifelessness of existence. The existence of our sense of importance contradicts its overwhelming unimportance in the face of death and destruction.

What is this mysterious, defiant sense of importance? It is the mystery of why life seems important, feels important, is important, in the face of overwhelming lifelessness’ lack of importance. It is the mystery of how and why your life seems, feels, is important. It defies logic. It defies most of the natural world. Most of the natural world is lifeless and can’t feel.. can’t sense.. can’t feel and sense importance. The existence of importance (and its progeny: value: purpose: meaning: worth) contradicts and defies this world.

Great art is a great act of defiance against lifelessness. Great art achieves greatness by sensing great life, by sensing great importance, by sensing the great importance of life. Great art shares its great sense of importance. Communicates it. Not by convincing others that the artist’s life is important. But by convincing others that their life is important.

The point of great art is not proving to others that your life is greater, more important than theirs. The point of great art is to point the way to the buried treasures of others: pointing the way to where their treasure is: pointing the way to where their source of importance is hidden. Great art is pointing the way to uncovering and unlocking each and every ones own mysterious sense of importance in a violent natural world’s mindless natural order where nothing seems important ultimately, not even life.

If an artist is not pointing the way to your buried treasure, your sense of importance, then he is only pointing the way to his own. In which case, you are merely an obstacle in his way. Perhaps a tool, if not an obstacle, on the artist’s way to fame and fortune. Art then becomes nothing more than a senseless battle of wills positioning for power in a vain contest of egos.

“My art is better than your art!”  (video)

My life is better than your life!

All that is teachable in art teaches what others think is important. What art needs to do is get you to explore/discover what is important to you.  All important art is self-taught in this crucial sense. What is important to you is all that matters in the end.

~ Joy Rip

The Secret to My Success (Is Destroying the Successes of Others):

The businessman guards his trade secrets from prying eyes.

The magician hides the secrets to his supposed magic when presenting his mystery tricks.

The artist divulges the secrets of his craft by demystifying the creative process of his art in order to cut through the illusion of magic that keeps him from penetrating to the core of a true mystery. The artist must destroy the illusions that stop him from seeing a true mystery, the illusions that stop him from tapping into the power of a true mystery and divulging its profundity.

The artist is an iconoclast. A natural iconoclast. A creative destroyer. But very few artists are iconoclasts of their own art. Most artists only want to destroy the honored images of the establishment and replace them with their own. In short, they merely want to destroy the established culture in order to become the established culture. This sort of power grab is nothing new.

The artist must destroy the very idea of art to resuscitate his power to appreciate the wonder of life. The idea of art must be hammered – stretched until it breaks – shattered – to breath new life into it before its liveliness fossilizes, turns to stone and becomes just one more oppressive object of worship.

Every object of worship uses its authority to define and police the limits of worship rather than expand them, even if that object is an idea. When an object of worship is an idea, that idea no longer enlightens. When the idea of art becomes so established that it becomes an object of uncritical worship, it becomes just another lifeless symbol of power and wealth – a painful reminder and tasteful instrument of oppression to all who don’t possess it.

When art becomes an established object of worship, it can’t help but use its authority to define and police the limits of art, the limits of life, the limits of worship, the limits of understanding. When art becomes an object of worship, it’s time to smash it.

~ Joy (anti-art) Rip

Art Is Life: Demystifying Art to Get at Life:

To repeat: “Art is a mystery. Art is mystery.”

However, art is not the illusion of mystery or illusion of power that artists, works of art and the art world often hide behind. Art is real mystery. Art uncovers real mysteries. Art is not the hidden techniques that manufactured it. Art is not the hidden assumptions behind an object, activity, style or form being recognized as a work of art. Art is the real mystery that remains after hidden techniques are revealed and learned. Art is the mystery that survives after hidden assumptions are exposed and questioned.

Art is not a technique, not an activity, not a style, not an object. Art is not even an image or idea. Art is the experience of that image or idea. It is the experience made possible by some technique, some activity, some style, some object. Art is a state of being. A state of being alive. Art is not a lifeless thing. Not a mindless thing. Art is a heightened state of consciousness. A heightened awareness of life. A heightened awareness of being alive. A heightened appreciation for life. A heightened state of being.

Art does not teach you how to live. Art discovers how to live. Art is mystery because art is discovery.

Art is pure mystery. Art is pure discovery. Demystifying art, destroying the unnecessary illusions of art, gets one closer to this pure appreciation of life. Art must destroy itself to renew itself… To renew its mystery… To rediscover itself… To rediscover life!

Art is the mystery of life. Art is the pure appreciation of life. Art is life.

~ Joy Rip

Click & read all Joy Rip's graphic novels free!

Where are we? Where do we come from? Where are we going?

Art Is Mystery:

The most rewarding experience an artist can create is discovering and unearthing a profound and profoundly felt mystery. For a truly profound mystery uncovers an irreducible sense of importance about one’s existence by exposing a new and inexhaustible source of something that feels important and is important. For it is important if it feels important until one rationalizes or allows others to rationalize the feeling away.

Art is mystery. And you cannot teach art because you cannot teach mystery. You must awaken it. You must awaken your sense of it. You must feel it. You must experience it. You cannot teach a profound appreciation for mystery. You stumble upon it. You stumble upon your feelings for it. Your feeling for it.. your feeling for anything.. your feeling for anyone.. is itself the mystery.

Feeling is the mystery. The deeper your feeling, the deeper the mystery.

You cannot teach art. You cannot teach mystery. You cannot teach feeling. You must experience it.

You must experience the profound mystery of feeling. Stumble upon it. Unlock it. Unleash it. Discover it by feeling it. Discover your own mystery: your own source of mystery: your feelings! You must uncover your feelings. They will lead you to your own mysterious sense of importance. Your feelings are your own mysterious sense of importance. Get to the source of it! You must track down what feels important to you.. and get to the bottom of it.

Get to the strange and mysterious source of your feelings. For what could be stranger than this peculiar faculty for sensing importance. What could be stranger than feeling.. feeling alive.. in a barren world. It’s a mystery that one’s sense of importance exists at all in a violent, uncaring universe that continually undermines that sense of importance.

Art is a mystery. Art is mystery. It is the mystery of why anyone would find art important. Important enough to do. Art is a mysterious sense of importance staring down life’s unimportance in the face of death and destruction. It is the mystery of why life seems important, feels important, is important, despite all the evidence to the contrary. It is the mystery of how and why your life seems important, feels important, is important! Art is the most abstract and irrational sense of importance there is.. short of insanity. If it can stare down the most brutal common sense existence has to offer, so can you. Today’s antics of the avant-garde write tomorrow’s existential survival manual.

Photographic Realism Before Photography

~ Joy Rip

ART VS. CRAFT:

Joy of Art Versus Drudgery of Craft …

Art is Joy! Yes!

Joy is experienced! Yes! Not taught.

Art cannot be taught. Art can only be experienced.

High art heightens experience. It is a heightened state of experience. It is a means for getting high on life. It is an artifact of being high on life. It is the artifact of an artist high on life. This artifact, his art, may or may not succeed, however, at getting others to be high on life.. and share his joy.

Talent cannot be taught. Talent can only be discovered. Anything that can be taught about art is craft. This includes the teaching of ideas about art such as art techniques, art histories, art theories, including these theories. The only art involved in the teaching of ideas is the heightened state of experience some talented teachers are able to create in the minds of their students. There is little or no learning involved in a boring learning experience, let alone any art. Gifted artists and gifted teachers are able to create heightened states of consciousness for others. A heightened state of consciousness is the only rewarding experience art offers. If art fails to deliver this, it fails as art.

Gifted artists and gifted teachers are able to create heightened states of consciousness in others by first being able to create such desirable experiences in themselves. They create rewarding experiences in themselves for themselves, first and foremost. Only then does the possibility of successfully sharing their rewards with others appear.

An artist is a success if he succeeds in creating a rewarding heightened experience for himself alone. But he becomes even more successful the more he succeeds in sharing this personal success with others.. by making these personally rewarding experiences create rewarding experiences for others. Who really wants to be a big success only in his own mind when he can be a bigger success in the minds of others?

~ Joy Rip

Read all my haunting graphic novels for free online at joyrip.com where images capture the high spirits of tragic beauty as words channel the raw energies of new-found realism into new forms of ghost stories. If you enjoy discovering artist books, you’ll enjoy these original visual literary works.

~ Joy Rip

Context is everything! Packaging is everything!

How to Get Your Shit into a Museum:

50 Year Golden Anniversary of “Artist’s Shit” (1961) by Italian Artist Piero Manzoni.

How shock value and controversy fan the flames of attention and fame, making art (or anything) go viral.

Performance Art, Publicity Stunt or Halloween Prank:

“I just come up with the ideas. I let others take the trouble or get in trouble executing them. That’s the beauty of conceptual art.”   The Idea Man

Do this (to get your controversial crap into a respectable museum):

1. Write your name on brown paper lunch bag.
2. Crap into the bag.
3. Close bag so you can’t see into it.
4. Place bag at door of venerable art institution.
5. Set fire to paper bag.
6. Museum guard comes out and stomps flaming bag of shit to put fire out.
7. Guard walks back into museum leaving trail of shitty footprints in halls of power.
8. Document (photo/video) footprints of your shit before museum janitor cleans it.
9. Publicize event and make a name for yourself.
10. I am artist because I say I am! This is art because I say it is!

Performance Art: "Quiet. I'm thinking."

You leave an indelible impression behind no matter how the critics beat you down.

~ Joy (trick-or-treat) Rip

ART VS. HARD WORK!

How to Succeed in Art Without Really Trying

Art has nothing to do with the work ethic. Art is only about joy. Effortless joy. The artist does art for the sheer joy it brings him. Art audiences engage art and consume it for the joy it brings them. This is true even if the only real joy they get is making money from art.

Discipline in art must be an instrument of joy to make sense. And the sense one makes out of discipline and hard work is usually monetary sense. That is to say, the idea of being productive as defined by hard work and discipline is always about making money. There is nothing pleasurable here about discipline and hard work except the pleasure we extract from it by making money. There may be many mysterious ways to produce pleasure from pain, but the simplest is to profit from ones pain by making money from it.

The work ethic hates easy money and free money. The work ethic believes money should be earned through ones own hard work and suffering. But easy money and free money are always more desirable than hard work and suffering for it. Those who take joy in the amount of suffering and hard work it took to create something (even demanding it) have a sadistic and masochistic streak in them they may not wish to acknowledge.

Being productive in art is always about producing joy. The more joy you produce, the more productive you are. Not the other way around. Unless being productive always produces joy. Being productive in art is not about producing works of art. Producing works of art is not about having something to show. Having something to show is not just about having something to sell. Having something to show is not about having something to get recognition for. It’s about experiencing joy! The joy of recognition. The joy of money.

You Too Can Succeed at Art and Become Rich & Famous!

The Joy Of Art

The Joy of Art

The joy of making money is about the joy money produces. The joy of making art is about the joy art produces regardless of whether it makes anyone any money.

Discipline for the sake of discipline is worse than cruel. It’s worse than pathological. It’s pointless.

“Be useful!” Says the work ethic. Art is not about being useful. Art is about pleasure: the pleasure of joy. Usefulness has no role in art beyond the usefulness of pleasure and the pleasure of usefulness. Every artist is a hedonist through and through. Pleasure…  Joy…  is a higher order of being, a higher order of existence, than either usefulness or suffering.

The goal of art is not to make art look hard to do or impossible to do by anyone other than the artist. Such principles of scarcity are economic principles, not artistic principles. Yes, talent of any sort may be scarce and not commonplace by definition, but talent is a gift. Unlike learned skills, talent cannot be earned through hard work. Thus the very definition of talent defies the work ethic. Just like free money, talent is undeserved. A gift. An undeserved gift. A lucky break. A happy accident. An unfair advantage.

Read... How to Succeed in Art

~ Joy (life’s unfair) Rip

Spy Camera Glasses Broadcast Wirelessly!

Point-Of-View (POV) Spy Camera Glasses:

“Our engineering team at ZionEyez is currently developing Eyez, the latest innovation in personal video recording technology. Eyez embeds a 720p HD video camera within a pair of eyeglasses designed to record live video data. The recorded data can be stored on the 8GB of flash memory within the Eyez glasses, transferred via Bluetooth or Micro USB to a computer, or wirelessly transferred to most iPhone or Android devices. After a one-time download of the “Eyez” smartphone and tablet app, users can wirelessly broadcast the video in real time to their preferred social networking website.”

I’m a little late to the show but here’s a link to Eyez™ by ZionEyez HD Video Recording Glasses for Facebook : a wildly successful past Kickstarter fundraiser for some wireless spy-camera glasses. Eyez camera glasses come with interchangeable tinted and clear lenses, and they can be fitted with prescription lenses by any optical store. This Kickstarter fundraiser far surpassed its fundraising goals and is now closed. But you can still go to their company website at www.zioneyez.com and order a pair. If you preorder before October 1^st, you can still get the $150 Kickstarter discount (regularly $200).

The stunning success of the Eyez Kickstarter campaign to raise money for preorders of their wireless-HD-video-streaming-bluetooth-camera-glasses shows a startling amount of interest exists in easily and secretly broadcasting ones life and worldview instantaneously! Many spy-camera glasses exist on the market, but none of them can instantly broadcast live wirelessly. The people at ZionEyez downplay the surreptitious uses its camera glasses make possible and do not advertise them as spy-camera glasses. Instead, they focus on the convenience of hands-free videography.

10 Things “You Need to Know” About the Future of Publishing:

“8. Everyone will be a self-publisher. Self-publishing is becoming ever cheaper and easier. Soon the bar for entry will be so low that merely being alive will cause you to be a self-publisher as new forms of free, automated publishing platforms continue to enter the market. (24-hour podcast or webcast of your life as it happens. When you pass away, the machines will still be recording. But don’t count on anyone alive to care or know you’re missing.)”

My Life Is Better than Yours. Watch.

My life is more interesting than yours. Join me. Excitement is just a HD video world broadcast away. You can just picture a new army of unpaid volunteer photo/video journalists taking to the mean streets with their hidden cameras in search of good times, new adventures and breaking news. More personal the action captured the better. More private the moment recorded the better. More unguarded the subject the better. Catch the world unaware. Unveil the hidden truth and it will go viral. Direct cinema for the masses. Cinéma vérité on a shoestring. Documentary production for the busy or lazy Everyman. Live, streaming, unedited, unreal reality TV. Everyone can now dominate the media industry like the star each knows himself/herself to be. Don’t be dominated or intimidated by The Media or the images of the rich and powerful. Your Eyez puts star power into your hands. Dominate the world with your POV. Start your own media empire. Create your own media world. Fight the powers that be. Broadcast your life… every waking moment. Now! Before everyone else does.

~ Joy (never smiles) Rip