I admire the Dadaists. They were mad.
I’m sorry for u, my reader cos I’m in a perverse mood today and am going to unreservedly crib. This is not an enjoyable blog, so read only if u r in as bad a mood as I am. And I warn u, ur mood will not improve.
The Dadaists were a set of free thinkers. They didn’t believe in the set principles of the world. They were rebels. Dada knows everything, Dada spits on everything. Dada has no fixed ideas. A reaction to the war, the Dada movement rebelled against very civilization itself. It’s rather difficult trying to describe a group who stated they were nothing, yet everything.
They were rather cool in the way that they tore apart everything, yet accepted everything. If someone entered their group and said he was an artist, he was. Even if he couldn’t lay pencil on paper. He was an artist cos that’s what he said he was and that’s all is needed for art. What is art anyway but an expression of self? Who can judge what is art and what is not?
What is the point, u may ask.
The point is that I have reached breaking point. I have been tolerating that my paintings are marked for the past two and half years and I haven't let it bother me too much. It is necessary that we need to be marked during the formative period so we grasp the basic principles but this is my third year and I don’t like it being dictated to me how I should express myself. Why do I have to put up with someone giving me a 70 for a painting just because they don’t like my style? I don’t paint for their satisfaction, I paint for mine. If I am not allowed to use my creativity, how can I call myself an artist? Where did free expression go??
Art is subjective and I don’t think anyone has the right to judge whether my work is good or bad or whether my friend’s work is better or worse than mine. Any 2 people might view the same work differently; one might feel I deserve 90; the other might hate my way of depiction and think I deserve 30. So where does that leave me? I don’t think marking art is either practical or useful except if one is trying to read into the viewer’s character, not the artist’s.
But why should I have a problem now? I've been known to stick on my walls works for which I’ve been marked 30 because I like it, even if my teacher doesn’t. I guess the end point is that rejection always hurts, even if one is blessed with a thick skin. I recently wrote a book review on the Zahir for my popular fiction paper and got marked 30 for that out of 50, which is also a rather sad mark. The point was that the teacher was not fond of philosophy and disliked the book. Even if I had just been marked for my grammar and basic writing skill, I should have got better marks. So where does she get off marking me subjectively for a piece of writing that is essentially me?
Rejection hurts. This world sucks. Big time.