9 April 2013
1) I have spent a solid month thinking about three things that “know one knows about me” but I feel should be made Internet public. In this process it became clear that everything that I consciously know about myself I feel like everyone knows. However, the things that no one knows are things that I am consciously unaware of. And so, a seeming innocuous “blogger profile” question resulted in a rather rigorous existential dilemma. I came to three quasi-epiphanies.
The first is that I have a very difficult time doing things without conviction.
The second is that I am attempting an intellectual project to see how much my reality is effected by what I perceive to be social and cultural realities I was born into and must engage in to live a socially and culturally acceptable life. I also want to know if perceiving these lives as separate is the source of human existential anxiety.
The third is that all of these ideas are subject to change and probably will in either a few hours or years.
2) On the topic of defining art, I am among those who believe that if a person calls him or herself an artist and makes something then it is art. If someone or an institution calls something art, it is art. Lastly, calling something art does not make it “good art”. Time and its passage define “good art”.
3) The Venice internship program provides an opportunity to address three questions that I have been particularly curious about.
The first is how a nation constructs its identity through art.
The second is how is art history written and who writes it. This internship provides an opportunity to begin to think critically about work that is being produced in the UAE in a way that I feel is laying the groundwork of literature that could possibly be used in research papers or academic things years from now. It is almost a promise to the future in an archival kind of way.
The third is simply that I feel that the UAE has provided me with a unique set of opportunities and experiences and I want to continue to engage with, especially on the topic of art.
4) I think Venice, Italy, and Italians will be beautiful. I think that the weather will be much more delightful than the snowstorms and blizzards I have been subject to the past few months. Lastly I think that Venice, Italy, and Italians are going to be an experience far different than anything I have experienced as of late.
