Unlimited

Featured image: Your Path

Is democracy and art, as it is understood today, an unlimited rule?

“ True patriotism springs from a belief in the dignity of the individual freedom and equality not only for Americans but for all people on earth.”   Eleanor Roosevelt.

Does democracy determine right and wrong? 

If democracy is determined by the majority, does that mean right and wrong can be determined by the majority? According to some, the answer to that question should be yes if democracy is determined by the majority. That concerns me because what then happens to the individual?    And what happens to individual freedom? The word democracy has changed today. Why?

Democracy used to mean the right of the individual. The individual was protected under the constitution. I am not seeing that anymore.  Perhaps, that is why there is so much repetition in the arts today. Individuals just aren’t as important anymore. Art is going the way that America’s democracy is going. The understanding of art is changing. because the individual is excluded.  

There are many who don’t like that art is dominated by the individual, but honestly those spaces are so few and far between – perhaps we should protect that space of the individual.  It is certainly what I champion.  For me, art has never been dominated by another’s unlimited rule.

For as long as I can remember, the individual artist has determined what is right and wrong for them and their work.  If an individual artist determines to live on what he/she creates then selling their work must be taken into account when they create.  If an artist feels they are entitled to be supported by something else because they are different and creative, then they are beholden to who supports them.  If an artist determines to support themselves and can’t make it by selling what they create because no one wants it, then the artist must choose what is more important to them.  

Being creative isn’t anything special. It is just taking the hand of cards you were dealt and playing them the best way that you know how.  Being creative isn’t a “better” different than anyone else's kind of different.  It is all about your uniqueness and how you share it with others.