Art is a suicidal project for what it negates. For saying "No" to what is cultural, economic, social and political system. Against advertising, against the capitalist system.
As artists we can't let the enemy sleep in our bed because it will have a bad outcome. However, the cultural intervention is not contaminated by any of the structures, within which, the artist, outside of Art, has to, fataly, live with. There is no submission to the bank, to the capital. Art creates a space of freedom. No art project with muscle, oxigenated by freedom and free will, has the capacity to act in the cultural world without the media saying: That King is naked. That could lead, and it does, in a certain way, to an isolation of the cultural corporation, of the cultural industries. But this isolation leads us to other exits. As artists, we are not alone, there is more people.
The artist should get hurt, fall. The artist should have the right to fail. There are many faillures that are better for artists than victories. We learn much more, even how to be "more" people. The artist should be pluridisciplinary, because the artist isn't inserted within the structure of the status quo of the world. To make whatever he our she wants.
Is there any interest in making a life out of Art? In getting money? Art is Life. This is the commitment of the artist. This is the pride of not being dependent of the cultural structures. It's what gives some identity to the artist. This path must be understood as a poetic adventure, as a possible utopia. Possible with tenacity, spirit of sacrifice or even masoquism. Without competition, without public.
The public is an abstract society. There are people. For the most part, the artist does not know. They are someone, somewhere, who likes a piece because of a sort of tuning effect. The artist isn't creating for this or that person. The quality and rigor exist. But, they can be subaltern. There are more lives.
Truthfully, the artist makes his work for himself. So that he likes it. Afterwards, his work leaves the atelier to travel. If there are more people who like it, that is great. If there aren't, there is, absolutely, nothing wrong, because the desire of the artist who made it is fulfilled. Otherwise, he wouldn't do it. It would be, perfectly, idiotic to create something he didn't like.
Art is not merchandise. Camões said "Who doesn't know of art, doesn't like it." This statement marks that difference. The artist is not subordinated to the publics taste. It is a, somewhat, primary, but very real, way of saying that the artist only does his work for those who like it. Art is for the amateurs and he artist is an amateur. The professional side is born of the technicism of the "know how" to do it. Aside from that, in everything else, the spirit is that of the amateur. Thus, recovering the word itself. Frequently, in the professional and commercial structures, amateur is understood as a sort of, almost, pejorative term. But it is evident that the word "amateur" is the "one who loves", the one with the ability to love. The one who has the taste for it, the sensibility, the intuition, the will to wonder. Without it, the "know how", the artezanies, the hand-made would disapear, along with the human and the human knowledges that, then, take esthetic attributes, of plastic beauty. This beauty, this esthetic harmony has an amplitude that surpasses the technicism. But there is another amplitude. These other aspects which, to the public, are unintereresting, aren't for the artist. If the public is disinterrested it's because it is mindless.
