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Yesterday

 

Yesterday

Since the death of my father & the separation from my wife last year, plus years of losing friends and family, illnesses to my wife I have been running towards death. Seeing my father’s slow demise in aged care through COVID, the pain of losing my wife, I lost the taste for life. I gave up thinking about planning my life or taking agency. Numbing myself with alcohol I was spending my life savings with abandon. I guess I thought, if I was conscious, that I wanna die like a cat. Go off somewhere till the engine gives out. But finally the thought came to get some help. Of course things are not as simple as that. I’d been talking with people & making friends & the act of talking heals. The seeds are sewn & we don’t even know it, till we feel empowered to get strategic. Now I’m still at the beginning, but I’m exercising & taking days off drinking & my mind is coming back & I’m taking pleasure in being alive. I bought some nice shirts, rather than just bumming in tshirts & shorts. As the bard said “clothes maketh the man.” I’m taking pleasure in life. Key point: I bought a year diary & am writing down my plans for each day. I’m walking close to 10 kms per day. I’m allowing myself simple pleasures. I’m not being so severe with myself. The whole Catholic Survivor guilt & the rejection of my wife & years of being belittled. Life seems filled with pleasant things. Even things which require effort. A feeling of satisfaction. Of eating less desperately. I’m still well over weight, but gradually improving. I’m standing up for myself. I still battle a mental illness. But so did Beethoven! So did anyone who’s achieved greatness. Yesterday, I spent a couple of hours looking at, being looked at by, listening to, thinking about etc, Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander art & am totally convinced it is the best art coming out of this country. Not only the incredible sacred paintings from remote communities but also the urban, non-traditional art made by more ‘Westernised’ artists. That video about the dolphin is extraordinary & I was thinking that, while the appeal of the awesome Desert & far North art is objectively understandable, as they take in abstract expressionism, colour field & narrative figurative approaches in an utterly unique way, is there a sense of 19th century ‘Exoticism’ about the public’s delight? & is there in this exoticism, an attempt to escape from the universal & earthy struggles we must all face: life & death? For both the remote community dreaming paintings & the more ‘Westernised’ works, the artists are addressing the same themes all artists face: what is the nature of existence & reality? & its affective extensions. As we know for all artists, money is king & so give the public what they like, or at your peril. Nevertheless as an art enthusiast & fellow artist, I would like to see more works made in urban settings. But of course, these lack the immediate impact of the remote painters. Anyway, it’s all good. I don’t wish to get mired in a dichotomy. All this art is made by First Nations Australians & the diverse yet shared experiences of belonging to an ancient culture, with the richness of perspective that this affords.

We whiteys are Mersaults (Outsiders/Strangers) & lack that abandon to the work & cultural confidence of First Nations artists. We still suffer from cultural cringe, we still feel like children, we still fail to take ourselves seriously. We know not why, we behave the way we do. Or care to find out. Unto death.

I believe that great art can be made from anywhere, as long as one is prepared to look long and hard at the nature of existence & reality & realise that universals do in fact exist, if as poetic truth, which is what art deals with. There’s no running away from life & death for long. There’s no running away from ourselves for long. So Australian Artists, cut the ‘cute’ act & face the big questions. Whether in comedy, tragedy, whatever. Medium is irrelevant. Just spend more time on the work & less on your grant applications.

 

 

Published & Copyright Malachi Doyle 2024.

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