My Cable TV Experience
I recently got to be on an episode of the Seattle Channel’s Artzone (episode 5/15/08). It’s a local television show highlighting the Seattle art scene with every kind of medium in mind. Usually on their show, they have a painting displayed in the studio and Nancy Guppy, the host, describes the painting : who made it, the inspiration, yadda yadda yadda.
I happened to have made friends with Nancy a few years ago. First I waited on her and her mom at the killer queen anne restaurant the 5 Spot, where i used to work. i wow’d her and her mom and said i was a big fan of almost live (a local SNL of sorts). a few years later i was doing a gig with WorldVision at Bumbershoot and i saw nancy and a camera guy walking around… so i went over to her…. she remembered me… and i told her what i was doing… and they came over and did a featurette on my africa mural at bumbershoot.
i lately got put in touch with her again because of a mutual friend who i was telling my television show idea to. she gave me nancy’s info and we had a phone conversation about how to put a show together. in that conversation, she invited me to be on her show and i said i should paint in studio… since that’s my shtick. one thing led to another…. and voila! the show that you can watch.
nancy asked if i could bring in three paintings to have in the background while i was painting. i went through my limited collection of on-hand work and i brought the steve zissou portrait, a picture of holly by the ocean, and the painting below called “the Value of $300″….
When we had a little break from taping, i went out to the snack tray to grab some fruit and some awesome banana bread. one of the women in the sound booth came out and joined me in the enjoyment of the tray. we started talking and she said she was enjoying my painting in studio and thought it would be a great episode. i thanked her and told her i was having a great time.
She started asking me about my paintings…. and then brought up the painting that is above.
“it’s really freakin me out,” she said.
“Good,” i replied. “it freaks me out too.”
She asked me what it meant and i explained to her that it was actually part of a series that sought to highlight some of the things that are killing the spirituality of the north american church. this one was about materialism. the name “the value of $300″ pointed to the fact that for $300 you could have an ipod or you could help and actual human being survive for a year and provide a future for them. it’s not a knock on owning and ipod and saying that material goods are evil and we should have none. the only i’ve learned how to explain it is from a scene in steven spielberg’s Schindler’s List. if you haven’t seen it it’s about a wealthy nazi business man, played by liam neeson, who is heartbroken by the torture of jews and decides to hire jewish prisoners into his business sneakily and ends up saving the lives of 1100 people. when the war ends, he let’s everyone go and tells them he must flee cause he is part of the nazi party. when he is saying good bye to his closest jewish partner, played by ben kingsley, he says to him ” i could have done more….”
i found this scene on-line so you can see what i’m talking about
(this was put online by the jewish task force… so their little propaganda titles are a the beginning and the end)
I told her about this scene and how oscar schindler said that he could have done more. he looks at his car and he did not see a car, but a way that he could have bought 10 more jewish lives with it. his gold pin on this jacket could of at least gotten one more life.
i think the meaning of this painting is not against materialism… but that i wonder if we will all have the moment at the end of our lives (whether we are physically alive or dead) when we will see all our material resources in the light of human life… and we will realize that human life was the most important thing… and we will have wished that we could have done more. i hoped that this painting helped me to keep in perspective what is most important and how i was going to use my resources in life.
the girl from the studio said that loved that and appreciated the explanation. then we went back to our places and continued to do what we needed to do.
i had a great time at the studio and i think that nancy’s show is great. it also meant a lot to me to talk with that woman from the studio about the painting i made. it made me realize that art can really cause a heart change, and that although that art with agenda can often fail, it can also change the way we see the world. a painter that i really respect said one time “the job of the artist is to wake the viewer up.” i really believe that. not that i think that everything that i make has to be culture changing. i’m not that profound. but my hope is that it can be more that just a way to accent your walls and match furniture. it can have the power to change things. i want to be a part of that. it’s what i have to offer to the fight. and i hope i learn to wield it well.
finally… nancy wanted to endorse me in some way, and we taped this little diddy
