To all of you who laughed at me when I danced in the common room yesterday, I give you a hearty FUCK YOU! I tired not to be bitter, but I can’t help it. I guess I should not even care. Why should I let the words of drunken fools bother me? I was doing art, and you all took it away from me. Do you know how much nerve it took me to unveil my dance in front of people?
It wasn’t supposed to be something you would do at a bar to pop music. It was a spiritual piece I have entitled ‘Galapagos’. I am an Island, ever evolving. I am a system, closed, self-sufficient. It is a revelation about my life, and where I have come as an individual since I came to Halifax. When I swam like a turtle on the floor, it was to symbolise where I had come from; it was me, living in my protective shell, beneath the bosom of my mother. For you to laugh and joke and pretend to be Ninja Turtles was a disgrace, entirely rude, and shows your complete inability to understand, appreciate, and love fine art. Well, thank you for making this turtle go back in his shell. Thank you very much.
—An Island no more
This article appears in Oct 8-14, 2009.
NINJA TURTLES ARE AWESOME!
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Sounds like you need to find the right audience. I’m sure with the right crowd, your art will be properly appreciated.
welcome to the real world, finally.
This is a funny one
I was at a wedding last week and there was this arty chick there doing pretty much the “Elaine Dance” the whole time. Provided much amusement.
Stay in your shell, nobody likes arty Gwen Noah-esque interpretive dance other than a select few.
hahaha
Some things you just gotta do for yourself and no one else.
I was with you until you started swimming on the floor and then the giggles hit. I don’t know if you’re at NSCAD or what, but doing art opens you up to receiving criticism for it, even when it’s got a shitty delivery. Work on getting rid of your special snowflake mentality and the idea that your art is super precious. And possibly choose a better venue, goddamn.
Dear “Island”,
I am going to say this as gently as I can.
I am also an artist, so I understand where you are coming from.
But you sound like a beginner who has not yet learned this one golden rule: when you choose to present your art to an audience, they have the right to respond.
The audience is not your kindergarten teacher, they are not there to shower you with praise just because you step out onto the stage.
Art is a dialogue—it needs a creator and audience in order to exist. Without the audience, it’s just your own private sketchbook, locked in a drawer, seen by nobody.
The onus is on YOU to select what work is seen by particular audiences, and present it to the best of your abiltiy. You cannot blame the audience for not “getting” what you do, if you yourself have chosen to present something in a context where it cannot possibly succeed.
Furthermore, it is YOUR job, as the artist, to make the work GOOD. If the audience doesn’t “get” what you are doing, perhaps there is a problem in the work that you have not addressed. Just because something is “done” does not make it automatically “good.”
Yes, it takes bravery to present something of yourself in front of people. Many people CANNOT do that. But YOU have to be a grown-up, and take your art seriously if you want other people to take it seriously also. Is your dancing a serious pursuit for you or is it something so treat as la-la-la playtime?
If you want people to care about your inner thoughts, your “evolution”, your personal storyline—and I ask you if it is THAT unique?—you had better not do it badly.
The old “nobody understands my brilliant complicated genius” is a tired game best left to adolescents. If you want to communicate something to an audience, then figure out how to do it in a way that MAKES them WANT to pay attention.
Saying thing like “this turtle represents my evolution” doesn’t make it so. And even if the comparison was crystal clear (which it isn’t) you still have not answered the bigger question of WHY an audience should care one tiny bit about “your evolution.”
I suspect you do not yet have much training in dance, and that you need more in order to gain an understanding of how it is is done, and how certain themes can be presented.
One more thing: of all the arts, dance is a really, really, really hard sell. I go to a lot of contemporary dance performances, and the audience is very small indeed. Occasionally I see something absolutely fantastic, but most of the time the work is obscure, with certain challenges, often merely “interesting” in an academic way, rather than truly compelling. And these are works performed by incredible dancers at the very top of their abilities.
Audiences can be cruel, or worse, disinterested. But artists, especially beginning artists, are often guilty of expecting rave reviews for very little effort. They need to be called on it when this happens. No one, not even the most “sensitive” or “open-minded” person has time or patience to waste with bad art.
“Art” (and by this I mean all the arts including music, painting, dance, writing etc.) is the most difficult and demanding of paths. It has chewed up and spit out people far more talented and driven than yourself. But that doesn’t stop anyone from trying, again, and again and again . . . .
So pick yourself up, get back to work, learn, study and perfect the craft behind your art, and be more selective in how you present your work and yourself next time.
Good luck!
Hahaha… I would have laughed too… Natural selection is dead, so now we have waaaay to many aspiring “artists” in this city.. Sometimes the pretension makes me want to puke.
I’m sorry – I would have laughed my ass off with your turtle motions. What the fuck did you really expect? To be Yoko Ono’s rightful successor?
You lost me at “Galapagos”. Seriously. I’m an art student and I am fairly lenient in terms of tolerance for all of the arts, but you can’t honestly expect the average person in the “common room” (work?) to be as well.
Not to mention the description of your dance reads like the dialogue of the many far-left leaning characters in a Mike Judge script.
If this was true, it would be a hoot!
TTFN… Right on as usual 😀
You need to find an audience of “luvvies” who are firmly latched to the Arts Grant Tit – they always know how to pretend to appreciate artistes, as long as they don’t try to hone in on their grants.
Galapagos? try galoshes needed to wade through this fuel injected turtle shit.
The Emperor Has No Clothes: I remember seeing Gwen Noah demo some dance out in front of the Lacewood Library a few years back. All of the adults, when they realized it was actually over began to clap. The kids (under 8 yo etc) started laughing almost immediately. Of course, they were quickly told to stop. And thats one to grow on.
Puts my interpretation of a harp seal on crack to shame.
Small wonder Mr. Harper cancelled Arts grants if space cadets ponce around as turtles – it should go a long way when you try to get gainfully employed at Pets Unlimited, er I mean Twats Unlimited.
Did anyone happen to get this performance on film – I’d pay big bucks to see this shitstorm?
Reminds me of Cherita dancing at the talent show in Donnie Darko.
If you walked into the common room and saw some guy acting like a chicken, I guarantee your first reaction wouldn’t be to assume it’s a serious interpretive dance about his personal journey and sit to watch with rapt attention.
Christ! Have a sense of humour! I know this dance was a big deal to you but have the maturity to be able to laugh at yourself once in a while. Don’t take yourself so seriously. If you can’t take criticism with grace and maturity then get out of the arts!
Oh how I wish this event actually occurred, but alas it’s too ridiculous to be true.
And the Galapagos Islands are known for tortoises, FFS.
The Galapagos are best known for their finches – that’s what Darwin based his theory of natural selection on. In closing : Ninja, Ninja Rap! Ninja, Ninja Rap! Go Ninja Go Ninja, Go! Go Ninja, Go Ninja, Go! GO!GO!GO!GO! Yo, it’s the green machine gonna rock the town without bein’ seene. Have you ever seen a turtle get DDOOOWwwwnnn … Slammin and jammin to the new swing sound. Yeah, everybody let’s move – Vanilla is here with the New Jack Groove. Gonna rock, and roll this place — With the power of the ninja turtle bass.
Iceman, ya know I’m not playin’ – Devistate the show while the turtles are sayin : Ninja! Ninja! Rap!