"art to die for"

It is always interesting to me to see what forms and manners of art inspire different levels of devotion. This also applies to individual artists. In visual art, it would seem that Picasso and Rothko inspire more intense devotion than Warhol and Koons; they were, one could say, working from a deeper place, and the affect they put into their art is reflected back by the response of their audience. Where poetry is concerned, no one inspires more devotion than Charles Bukowski, and the fact that many experimental poets do not take him seriously does not particularly matter. Bukowski, for better or for worse, was able to create a real-world mystique around himself, a textual role in which he always got to be the tough guy, the hard man, the hero. People love it, because it makes them feel like they, too, can be heroes. It makes me wonder what kind of effect post-avant art is going to have on people, what level of devotion it will inspire. If I could choose, I would opt to have post-avant inspire extreme devotion, the way that the aforementioned artists have. It would be nice to create a kind of mass hypnosis, an Artaudian spectacle that would inspire an audience to cleave tightly to the artists who have created it. It is something Lou Reed used to talk a lot about, early in his career- that he wanted his music to be so beautiful that people would be willing to die for it. Taken literally, this is the essence of adolescent-level art-appreciation- the melodrama, self-dramatization, exaggerated pathos/bathos. However, I do not see anything wrong with inspiring extreme devotion. The best case scenario seems to be this- that post-avant art is creepy, not only in its content, but in the effect it has on people. It should be as hypnotic as art can be, and affective enough to make the hypnosis stick. Talking about this makes me remember one specific experience I have had, with a friend who was more devoted to a single artist than anyone I have ever seen. The artist was Morrissey, the British singer-songwriter who fronted The Smiths in the 1980s. For the purposes of the post, I will call the friend "Jonathan."

It was not just that Jonathan was a fan of Morrissey; for Jonathan, Morrissey was more or less literally Jesus Christ. Every waking moment of every waking day, every new experience related back to Moz on some level. There was an insane degree of internalization that went on in Jonathan; yet, on some level, Moz was ineffable to him. Jonathan would willingly talk about Moz, at length, but about the deeper reasons for his fixation he was silent. It was interesting to watch because, though I have admired many artists in many different disciplines, I have never been this single-minded about an individual artist. In a way, I was jealous of Jonathan; I wished there were a single artist that spoke so completely for me that I did not need anyone else. Many people, of course, feel this way about Dylan, too. In Byron's day, it applied to him as well and, on a slightly more prudish level, to Wordsworth. Certain classes of Americans even feel this way about Elvis. In any case, Jonathan had a lot of glamor in my eyes for his ability to completely identify with Morrissey. It needs to be said that Morrissey (Moz) is not particularly post-avant, but he illustrates a point I am getting to. This parable illustrates the magnetism that certain artists and kinds of art have. Much of it comes from creating a certain kind of persona, and having the talent and flair to see it through. I think that post-avant has the potential to create art (and a plethora of personas) that has this magnetism, and that will inspire this depth of devotion. Artists must be willing to self-disclose, with style, imagination, and edge, and create personas for themselves that have the texture and compelling grain of reality.

This is the tremendous advantage of affect- if you write with great feeling, and you do so without being smarmy, you will engender an affective response right back. It would be absurd at this point to start talking about a post-avant mystique, but it is a real possibility. Post-avant should go where most people are frightened to go; for my money, poets like Brooklyn and Todd already have. I have already been surprised (and pleased) by the intensity of many of the responses I have received on this blog in the last few weeks. If this discourse is possessing people, then I am doing my job. This is the necessary swing of experimental poetry away from the distancing-methods of Lang-Po, towards encouraging a state, for the audience, of total absorption. It also, willy-nilly, draws poetry closer to rock and roll, much in the manner that the Beats did. The difference is that the post-avant vibe is much more noir, much more engaged with imagination, much more intent upon edge. I do not want to limit post-avant unduly, but I think this discourse is spinning a web that can later be honed, refined into top working shape. Whether or not post-avant produces art to die for, that it should inspire extreme devotion is something I will stand behind. It does not have to fall into the traps of Romanticism to do it, either. Going deep with affect, being real with edge is (I would say) enough.