Thinking About Thinking About Birdman
Of course you’ll notice the “meta” in the title to this
blog. For those of you who have not seen Birdman, this refers to the fact that
the movie evolves around actors in a play, ergo, the acting about the acting.
Now to be honest, this movie did not get my full attention
because I have a 3 year old and an 11 month old so 2 hours to do anything
without interruption is 1. Rare and 2. If it does happen, it happens later in
the evening and this blogger gets up at 4:45am everyday so in-depth analysis
of a movie at night is low on the priority list.
Translation: I fell asleep.
However, I watched the end (last 15 minutes) the next day
and came away with the following:
The movie would be great for an undergraduate aesthetics
class as it asks the question, “What is art?” And, for me, the movie delves into
this further by asking, what is the process that is necessary and sufficient
for someone to be called an artist?
Ask yourself if you think the music of Britney Spears
qualifies as art. Most of us don’t really think so and if you massage the idea
a little bit you find that the answer is that because she doesn’t really “bleed”
for it, unlike those artists we know that do bleed, and do so in obscurity, for a long time.
Now ask yourself why we have this prereq that the artist
bleeds. Why can’t there be artists that are genuine and authentic, yet the art
comes easy for them. That seems to rub us the wrong way. Why?
In the movie, Michael Keaton bleeds, literally and
figuratively, for his art but is seen as the talentless action hero from his
days past as Birdman. The antithesis is Ed Norton, who is shallow, pretentious, and phony
but has critical success.
There are subplots and sub characters that all serve to drive
the essentials questions of what is art and who can be called an artist. The
movie does a wonderful job making you think about possible answers.
What qualifies as art and who qualifies as an artist?
I am reading an Eddie Van Halen biography and upon re-learning (I think I read this back when I started learning guitar in the mid 80’s) that Eddie would often begin practicing as his brother Alex was heading out on a Friday night to party and upon his return home at 3am, Eddie would be in the same spot, guitar in lap.
ReplyDeleteNow take this and relate it to the idea, proposed in the Birdman blog, that an artist needs to suffer in order to “qualify” as an artist. But here’s a rub to the “suffering” idea: Having read a ton of interviews of EVH over the years, I get the sense that he was so compelled to play, so compelled to learn, to get better, that he would not view missing out on parties and socializing as suffering at all. The suffering would have been going to the party and not being with the guitar.
I feel the rub is actually more hidden in this case. The artist suffering in EVH’s case is in human relationships. It is apparent in this biography that Eddie, admittedly, not only lacked social skills but knew that he lacked social skills. The social skills that most of us pick up and social mores we learn to navigate are often times lost on an artist that instead chooses to have a relationship with an instrument. Think about it, the guitar was never not there for him, hour after hour, day after day, month after month, and year after year. The bonding and facility happened with the guitar, not people.
How is one supposed to possibly learn complex, layered social skills and cues, when the bulk of time that is usually taken to master such things is spent on mastering the guitar and music? Compound this with the added ingredient of fame and the outlook isn’t good.
EVH suffered failed relationships, musical and otherwise, and a marriage while he continued to succeed as an artist.
So now I am left with a different question: not whether or not an artist must suffer to qualify as an artist, but if being an artist in this vein is worth it.
Is it a forced dichotomy for artists? You can be with people or you can be with your art, but not both.
http://www.philostv.com/christy-mag-uidhir-and-aaron-meskin/
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