I was just thinking the other day, not as a gatekeep but as a philosophical question: Can you make anything considered art without understanding pain? I feel like in order to even make pleasurable art you need to make it in constraint contrast to pain.
Take your favorite musician or act and listen to their couch surfing, barely eating first album then listen to their 20 year run, financially secure album and you’ll have your answer.
I gave it a listen since I grew up with U2’s first albums and still liked their music through the '90s (it’s of course hard for people today to imagine U2 being young and fresh in a world of overproduced pop music, but that’s really what they were in the early '80s). I’m quite accustomed to music that gets better the more you listen to it, but that forced U2 album got worse every time.
My favorite line was “Every sailor knows / That the sea / is a friend turned enemy”. Bono, nobody fucking sails any more, or even grew up knowing old people who once sailed.
Studio ghibli’s Miyazaki (cant be bothered to look up his first name, but hes not the dark souls Miyazaki) is famously incredibly depressed/nihilistic but also makes incredible films and simply cant be forced into retirement. Pain does make art.
I was going to say food, but then I remembered every long-time cook can handle hot things barehanded because they’ve burned themselves so many times they’ve lost sensation in their fingertips.
I was just thinking the other day, not as a gatekeep but as a philosophical question: Can you make anything considered art without understanding pain? I feel like in order to even make pleasurable art you need to make it in
constraintcontrast to pain.I don’t believe all art comes from pain, some comes from pleasure — as in, it pleases the eye and such.
Take your favorite musician or act and listen to their couch surfing, barely eating first album then listen to their 20 year run, financially secure album and you’ll have your answer.
You leave U2 alone!
U2 asked for it when they forced their album onto everyone with an iTunes account.
I gave it a listen since I grew up with U2’s first albums and still liked their music through the '90s (it’s of course hard for people today to imagine U2 being young and fresh in a world of overproduced pop music, but that’s really what they were in the early '80s). I’m quite accustomed to music that gets better the more you listen to it, but that forced U2 album got worse every time.
My favorite line was “Every sailor knows / That the sea / is a friend turned enemy”. Bono, nobody fucking sails any more, or even grew up knowing old people who once sailed.
Unless they are always depressed like Radiohead
Studio ghibli’s Miyazaki (cant be bothered to look up his first name, but hes not the dark souls Miyazaki) is famously incredibly depressed/nihilistic but also makes incredible films and simply cant be forced into retirement. Pain does make art.
Same for comedy. I think a bit of trauma is required to be a good comedian.
I was going to say food, but then I remembered every long-time cook can handle hot things barehanded because they’ve burned themselves so many times they’ve lost sensation in their fingertips.