Re: I hate "content"
Jan. 17th, 2025 07:49 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rynlingThere's a post going around Bluesky...
"If there's anything I hope young creatives take from David Lynch, it's to reject the modern IP-driven impulse to explicitly explain and cleanly categorize the logic behind every single event and decision inside and outside of a story at least some of the time."
...and it's a good post, but it's also frustrating.
I absolute agree that "characters need to regularly announce their actions and intentions for the benefit of an audience that's not paying attention" is cultural sludge. I'm also a big fan of "not everything that happens in a story needs to be explained" and "not every character needs to behave in a consistent or rational way." Like I said, it's a good post.
What's frustrating are the "make weird art" sentiments being attached to this post. It's important to keep in mind that David Lynch was making commercial products. He had money, and he had an audience. I'm not saying this as a criticism, of course. I love a lot of "weird" movies and books and games that are still, very definitely, commercial products.
The popular embrace of "make weird art" on Bluesky is frustrating because a lot of the people who are sharing "make weird art" sentiments are the same people who look down on fanfic and zines while ignoring the blogs and indie magazines that promote weird art. In my case, these are the exact same individuals who looked at the book I wrote about cultures of people making weird art and decided that my work was beneath their attention.
The idea that "weird art" is only acceptable if it's being created by a singular famous (male) auteur who enjoys well-established social and financial capital is fascism. I'm not being dramatic; this is simply the model of how cultural gatekeeping works in a social organization that actively combats a diversity of voices and platforms.
In terms of what this means in real life, it's been wild to see so many beloved indie publications and small presses shut down during the past five years because they had no access to government grants for the arts and didn't receive sufficient audience support. Even Women Write About Comics, which has a strong internal community and keeps winning awards, is going to have to shut down in February. The word on the street is that it's going to be the first of many indie sites that post pop culture news and reviews but don't focus entirely on big titles.
If you really want people to make weird art, then you have to support weird art.
"If there's anything I hope young creatives take from David Lynch, it's to reject the modern IP-driven impulse to explicitly explain and cleanly categorize the logic behind every single event and decision inside and outside of a story at least some of the time."
...and it's a good post, but it's also frustrating.
I absolute agree that "characters need to regularly announce their actions and intentions for the benefit of an audience that's not paying attention" is cultural sludge. I'm also a big fan of "not everything that happens in a story needs to be explained" and "not every character needs to behave in a consistent or rational way." Like I said, it's a good post.
What's frustrating are the "make weird art" sentiments being attached to this post. It's important to keep in mind that David Lynch was making commercial products. He had money, and he had an audience. I'm not saying this as a criticism, of course. I love a lot of "weird" movies and books and games that are still, very definitely, commercial products.
The popular embrace of "make weird art" on Bluesky is frustrating because a lot of the people who are sharing "make weird art" sentiments are the same people who look down on fanfic and zines while ignoring the blogs and indie magazines that promote weird art. In my case, these are the exact same individuals who looked at the book I wrote about cultures of people making weird art and decided that my work was beneath their attention.
The idea that "weird art" is only acceptable if it's being created by a singular famous (male) auteur who enjoys well-established social and financial capital is fascism. I'm not being dramatic; this is simply the model of how cultural gatekeeping works in a social organization that actively combats a diversity of voices and platforms.
In terms of what this means in real life, it's been wild to see so many beloved indie publications and small presses shut down during the past five years because they had no access to government grants for the arts and didn't receive sufficient audience support. Even Women Write About Comics, which has a strong internal community and keeps winning awards, is going to have to shut down in February. The word on the street is that it's going to be the first of many indie sites that post pop culture news and reviews but don't focus entirely on big titles.
If you really want people to make weird art, then you have to support weird art.
no subject
Date: 2025-01-18 10:32 pm (UTC)But I guess it's easier for people to assume no one ever takes creative risks than to acknowledge that the risky stuff has always been out there - it's just increasingly hard to find under all the sludge. It's exhausting trying to look for the good shit, and I'm not always up for the effort. A lot of these people with Takes on weird art would do well to admit the same about themselves.
(Someday I hope to finish a version of that story that is even less marketable and where both protagonists are even bigger messes, and just put it on the Internet somewhere hard to find.)
no subject
Date: 2025-01-20 02:01 pm (UTC)I’m a fan of the story you published about the hot mess of an adventurer who kills a dragon (except he definitely does not). I would gladly read an entire novel in that style. If it ever appears somewhere online, I hope at least one person finds it, and I hope that person is me.