Blog: Should History Be Rewritten?

Featured image: At The Beach

Should the concepts, ideas from the past be changed or should we use them as a foundation to build a new and different present and future? Should we try and change what has historically happened? Can history be changed?

What is happened in the past is what has established the present. It is in the past, I stand by the the old saying, yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, today is a gift. I use history as a foundation to build concepts and ideas that effect the future. I use history as a foundation to build upon what I search for in the present. I use history to change the present for the present and the mysterious future, this is part of all the art create and all of my current thinking. You cannot change history if happened with a particular context and time. But you can only use it to build upon the present. 

When I gave tours at the docent in the Chasen Museum of Art I always asked from the ancients to the present moment – what rules were broken with this piece of art? It forced one to think of the past and forward to their, the artist of the time, future and what they wanted to change. We talked about cultures where artists were unhappy with what was happening and wanted to change it. We talso alked about the kind of visual work the piece actually was. For example, was it a visual diary, context, of what was happening at the time asking, shouting for change, or was it a new concept, idea as to what change can look like and be or how individuals could view their gift of the present? 

Both are visual ways of seeing, and recording the gift of the present only one is art- art creates something new, something different, something original, something unique to the artist who created, make it. It is not a repeat of voices who have shouted at them. Art builds upon history and moves forward with a different ways of suggesting change, different in the fact that it is unique and not a repetition a historical recording of the present. Both are important if they build from the historical past and suggest change, but both are not art. Both loose their importance if they try and rewrite the past to fit the present.