Friday, September 30, 2011

That Rare Toaster

Where does inspiration come from? I was sitting around this morning trying to come up with some short film ideas and all that was coming to me were generic stories probably fueled by all the shit I’ve watched over the years. By 11 I needed a drink. I threw on my boots and stalking cap (to cover my eye brow that is now only half there because, in the end, I just think too much). Sweating, but semi-pleasing to the eye, I ventured out of my apartment to let life inspire me. My only goal was to get a double Ceasar, which I did, along with some pretty good pasta smothered in cheese sauce and littered with bacon pieces. I brought along some sharpies and my sketch pad so I could write down ideas as they came to me. Suddenly a man walked in and there, to my ignorant surprise, was all the inspiration I ever needed. I won’t reveal much more about it since I want to write a screenplay about him.

But this brings me to the point of my entry: inspiration. It’s such a weird intangible thing that it can sometimes seem like it’s a million miles away and all your mind can do is swim around in a shallow puddle of dead ideas. Then, when you’re sick of thinking about crappy ideas, your mind wonders and you’re automatically thinking about what the fuck you’re even doing? How are you going to get by as an artist if you can’t even come up with a short film idea? I look at some of the great works of our time and wonder how am I supposed to compete?

Then you’re thinking that maybe that’s not the point. Art, to me, has always been a mode of expression that artificially reflects real life. What better inspiration than observing life itself? Our society is so soaked in fantasy and escapism that we have lost our ability to observe the simplest things around us. We’re too hungry for entertainment so we can forget the grind of daily life. We seek entertainment to take us away from life, but as I said, art is life. Talk about a vicious circle. All “art” is doing now is pointing out how shitty our lives are. How we are nothing but a society being guided by some invisible hand and are being subjected to so many ideas designed for the soul purpose to make money that we can’t even come up with an original idea ourselves. Then there’s all that other shit I won’t even call art since it’s soul purpose is to generate capital and turn us away form what art could be. We’ll just call that media.

Now, back to inspiration. As shitty as our society is I’ve decided to work towards a greater goal in life. I’m not after money nor fame. I want to change minds. The greatest minds of our time have worked in some pretty shitty social situations. My canvas is the dump we call society and I will fucking dig until I find that rare toaster that still has an electrical plug and works. Wish me luck friends.

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