an ode to visual ephemera
today we’re talking art.
the Real Fatgrrlz OGs will remember that i am first and foremost an artist. its what ive always been, no matter how much the people that make thousands of dollars more than me at work think it’s nothing more than a cool party trick.
its dumb and contrived to say, but making art is what gives me life. i love to create - for myself, for others. i enjoy looking at other people’s art and appreciating the time and skill and craftsmanship going into their craft - whether its a masterwork or a shitpost.
with the rampant and violent usurping of the Internet as we know it by AI, so too has our very foundation for resources online. generative art has flooded the likes of Pinterest, Pixabay, and Flickr, muddying the lines of between good reference photos and useless digital slop. setting aside the incredibly ethical concerns regarding the use of AI as a whole, i dont think anyone is arguing that seeing it fucking everywhere is tiring and annoying as hell.
it is in this occurrence that i had began to really think about my relationship with art and what it means to me. i began to take on more traditional mediums, and lo and behold im actually painting with watercolor rather than trying to mimic watercolor effects in procreate. for as much as i really, really dislike the whole argument of traditional art having more meaning than digital, i wont deny that ive been finding painting to appease my brain worms more. something about the chaotic nature of watercolor really challenges me. i love it
personal diatribe aside: its been a pain in the ass finding references on pinterest because nearly every other post is some sort of AI nonsense. its really fucking annoying.
it is in this frustration that i have realized a definitive flaw in the way that i and many others use pinterest for references/inspiration, which is that we treat the references with such immense disregard that its practically digital ephemera - something you see briefly to perhaps maybe use like once someday then forget it exists at all because its served its fleeting purpose.
In the greater current zeitgeist, this trend is practically a given - everything, from the food we eat to the clothes we wear to even the furniture in our homes or the cars we drive or the phones we use, everything is fleeting. temporary. microtrends rise as fast as they die. nothing is built to last, because reliable products are not profitable to the technocratic oligarchs of our world. disposable ones are. as such, all things become as ephemeral as a ticket stub for a flight or a mcdonalds receipt.
despite the actual importance of references and inspiration, we dont treat it with the same level of respect. we dont care because its temporary and who cares. its just a picture.
except, we need that picture to better illustrate our vision. we need that video to better understand our movement. we need that song to better set our tone. to capture an image, real or unreal. and after all, these ginormous datasets are full of data from real, actual images that are made by real people. they take from it as we take from it - except, yknow, putting ideas onto metaphorical (digital or literal) paper rather than deranged frankensteining of data that does not actually think about the whys behind the data - only that it is.
isnt it about time we recognize the foundations of our creations? to pay tribute to the worth they bring? they are ephemeral, yes, but they are important nonetheless. they inspire. they aid.
ok, prose-y nonsense is over. for pinterest and other image/content aggregation platforms, i think the issue is twofold - part of it is the above (the lack of respect we have for those that support us, even if temporarily). and part of it is the actual site(s), because:
the attribution on that website fucking sucks. half the time people arent crediting correctly if they do so at all. pins end up not linking you to their sources, but rather to dead ends. sure, you could reverse image search, but who cares? its just an image. its not like theres an actual person or people behind it.
the discovery on that website fucking sucks. for a website whose whole schtick is being a gigantic database of images and videos with a gazillion million terashits per megaflop, it is wholeheartedly terrible at actually giving you solid suggestions based on searches and already pinned media.
so, what can we, as artists, really do? we can make our own pins, of course, but i think the solution is a more holistic approach to maintaining our own artistic databases. engaging with the references not as a disconnected fragment, but in its entirety - where it comes from, how its made, why it is the way it is. approach that shit with curiosity. ask questions. make your own observations and interpretations.
its keeping a list / links specific artists, websites, material you enjoy saved somewhere so you can go back to it and view more. its taking your own reference photos. perhaps its even going so far as to pursue more analog means of reference taking - going to art installations (or pursuing online institutions for those that cannot easily access art museums or art campuses), pursuing plein air work outside, diving into visual encyclopedias and photo books at libraries and studying those.
all this to say, fundamentally: it’s actually thinking about the damn thing! its actually approaching it and processing it and not just stuffing it away to use perhaps at some point eventually only to digitally rot in some server in god knows where. why is this image pleasing to the eye? why does this pose work? how does this pose work? how does the ripples of water warp the reflection?
it is then that the ephemera is no longer ephemeral - it is the art that it is.