I have to admit to Michael Jackson contemplation. While I liked some of his music and certainly had my share of opinions of his eccentricities, I never really paid that much attention to him. And now he is dead and I’ve been watching MTV’s marathon of his videos and listening to I Wonder Who’s Loving You a lot.
My mother remarked that when my cousin and musician Jeff Hanson passed away recently that she felt a smidge guilty that it was only then that she really paid attention to the beauty of his lyrics.
And I realized that there is logic to the dead artist cliché. Now that the machine/work in progress has finally stopped we can finally take a deep breath listen to Thriller with fresh critical ears without having to think about his nose job. Now that the artist is dead, the work can finally truly finished and can transcend. I think to be genius the work has to transcend the artist, move beyond the cult of personality. Death helps us forgive and forget art’s flawed human origins. Its no surprise that while there has been some musing on Jackson’s foibles, there has been so much more focus on “Damn this dude invented the moon-walk and Billie Jean”.
Rich from fourfour (one of my favorite pop-culture blogs) put it more eloquently:
[Jackson’s songs are]…scotchguarded with perfection, utmost examples of art that demands to be separated from its artist.(emphasis mine) And one of the most heartening phenomena I’ve observed in the population’s relationship to art has been its ability to do just that. I’d never give the public that much credit if I hadn’t observed countless examples of the unmitigated joy that results en masse when anything from Thriller is played at a party, no matter the attendees, no matter the occasion and still to this day.
MJ your work in progress is over and your comeback is now.
Filed under: Artists, Design & Visuals, creative process, fandom, movies, review
I’ve just come back from watiching a screening of Zidane at the MFA. In a nutshell: 17 cameras all lovin’ Zidane during one game from start to finish. I am too tired to write this out coherently so here are some bulleted thoughts:
· Zidane looks to be on the verge of tears pretty much the entire time. He smiles exactly twice throughout the entire film. Not to give away any spoilers or anything but he is on a winning team.
· I wish all games were shot this way. I had already pre-forgiven myself in case I fell asleep during the screening but I was pretty much riveted the entire time. The action was so vivid. I loved watching Zidane sweat copiously all over the field and pull up his knee socks. I also like that I had a better close-up of players who got injured. The drama of injured players is a minor side interest of mine.
· No silly announcers. I know certain announcers become famous in their own right but after seeing it this way with all the raw crowd and ball sounds I really prefer it. Who cares what some dude has to say. OK, granted there was also some audio by Mogwai. I still like it better!
· Occasionally the film would have some text of things Zidane has said about The Game. I really liked when he said something along the lines that at time he feels the game is scripted and he just shows up. I do not think he meant that it was rigged, so much as something a bit more spiritual perhaps. I am regretting that I did not write this down at the time. He also mentions that there has only been one time where he knew he would make a goal.
I really enjoyed watching this, and may try to catch it again. Highly recommended for sports fans and cynics alike!
Fandom and obsessive hobbies are very interesting to me, mainly because I don’t particularly view myself an ardent fan of anything. I enjoy certain people, art, activities etc. immensely but I never quite get that glint in my eye. So this piece on scapbookers in the LA Times was a a great read. Who knew these ladies could be so vicious? If I were a PhD student I would be seriously considering writing a long treatment on how scrapbooking (and perhaps other crafting) might be parallel to the Victorian Arts and Crafts movement, in that scrapbooking exposes sexual repression and/or other lack of freedom to express oneself. Or something like that. I am sure many would disagree, but I am enjoying my Freudian explanation right now.
