2016-01-03


Making decisions based on knowledge instead of habit. For instance, it took everything in me not to accept a job that would obviously exploit me financially and exhaust me physically. In the past, I would take it anyway. I would then sputter out and wonder why I went against my better judgement.

So, I'm nervous about money. The month is not that promising. One day a week I work for a tedious, laborious job for $10 per hour. Not only am I relentlessly worked, I am gaining nothing from the position when I was led to believe I was. I accepted the job because I needed money. It was the first job I secured after being laid off from my $26 per hour position. Now they want to cease paying under the table. This would cut the 10 to possibly 7.50 or so (I actually don't know I'm just guessing). The person who funds the company goes on tropical vacations regularly.

I'm reading a lot about revolution. Historically it begins with an internalized reversal of attitudes, a personal restructuring of belief systems and an educated awareness of injustices. In the context of the art world, it is only a microcosm of the greater society so the same expected injustices occur: An infinitessimal fraction possess the wealth, of course. The art world relies on exploited labor and unpaid "internships". The art world is elitist, exclusive, and disdainful of those who do not possess the same institutional resources such as higher education. For instance, there is an art category called "Outsider Art", which basically just means "other", and is definitely pejorative.

Just read any ivory tower gallery press release. I mean, I can't even handle how badly they reek of privilege. How distant they are from the point of art.

I am looking at art and I see a real lack of responsibility. I am seeing a lot of white people like me holding the building up and insisting on it's superiority--Not that everyone has to be a political artist, I'm certainly not. But it seems a bit inane and ignorant to make art about one's privileged bubble. For instance, I work at a gallery with a video show about nothing. Like honestly, I've watched these videos and nothing real is happening. Yet the statement is all about words, the loss of words, communication as food, a commodity. So in other words, everything and nothing. I mean, how privileged and disconnected do you have to be to sit around and think about things that are actually not real. How cushy is your life that you entertain the idea of words, lack of words, etc. It just blows my mind how low energy it is, how decadent it is. This is what I'm supposed to uphold, look up to, glorify as intelligent, want to model myself after.

Of course, I am looking at my expectation of being paid more than 10 dollars per hour. There is the entitlement of having gone to college, and the entitlement that goes hand in hand with being white and male. For me, the problem is an issue of survival at this point. I reject work, as mentioned above, because if I took it, it would mean I would be working 7 days a week (AGAIN), because that would allow me to afford my paired down, simple, and frugal life. But I finally realized as a human being I HAVE to rest, I NEED to rest, and therefore, it is a human right that I deserve at the minimum 1 day a week in which I am NOT working. But since I did the 6 day a week work week for my first year in LA, I learned that it is NOT SUSTAINABLE, and there is a reason the five day work week is the standard.

Ok, enough for tonight. Thanks for listening.

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