There was an anecdote I heard once, I think it was at the Lincoln Center Festival’s Merce Cunningham retrospective six years ago, that put Merce and Jasper Johns and Robert Rauschenberg all together in a vehicle crisscrossing the nation. John Cage was driving. This was back in the early days of their careers, when few people were paying attention and even fewer were actually paying serious cash to see their work. Anyway, ever since then I’ve wondered: Did they end up recognized as great creative minds because they were all friends and moved in the same circles? Or were they friends because they were some of the great creative minds of their time?
From there I wonder about the next generation of remarkable creative artists and the networks they have formed. I look for these people. Has the internet changed any of this at all really? Does virtual connection really hold a candle to real-life feedback?
And then I get to the big question: Would Merce and Co., and by extension any artist, have been able to create as great a body of work as they did without the influence of those working right beside them? Even those with a flaming singular voice may need to feel the warmth of creation around them to do their best work. Maybe those who create great work in isolation would be able to reach even further if pushed by a fellow traveler. We often assume a sort of great man ideal when it comes to creation–yes, plenty of collectives exist and produce, but let’s just put that aside for a moment–but what about the surrounding community of creative souls? Where is that van full of art and ideas right now?
It hurts to write this, but I’ve found very little cross-discipline collegiality to this point in my career. The interdisciplinary work I have done has been great, but it’s rare. I’m disappointed by this situation, especially as someone who admittedly romanticizes the historical New York avant gardes of the 60’s and 70’s. I definitely blame myself to an extent for not reaching out to non-musicians more often. But these fertile milieu of the past seemed to spring up organically because of a genuine curiosity about each others’ work (living in the same zip code didn’t hurt either…). I find that the “tradition” I’m working in doesn’t seem to interest contemporaries in other fields as often as sexier, more vernacular practices do. Maybe that’s not fair, but it’s what I see around me. The Richard Serra’s of the world don’t seem to be hiring the Philip Glass’ as studio hands any more. More the Japanther’s and the Longstreth’s… which is cool because I think they’re totally committed musicians. Tastes are tastes, and aesthetics are mutable. Maybe indy rock has the ear of the visual cognoscenti because they’re more accustomed to the proverbial “van” of Cunningham days of yore??