In Pandemic Times, Appreciate Artists

Dear people who keep writing long articles telling artists to stop making stuff in Corona times, and/or shaming them for sharing their work online when the world is in such bad shape,

There is literally only one way to do pandemic times wrong: And that is, to tell others how they are doing pandemic times wrong.

If your grief is manifesting in a way that does not inspire you to make stuff, you are doing great.

May you grieve in peace, may you feel nourished in your safe cocoon as long as you need.

But the second you start writing wierdly judgemental, toxic articles posing as “think pieces” that are essentially shaming artists who are processing this differently then you, folks who are healing their broken hearts and loneliness and sense of desperation by creating and engaging with others online, with music or with writing, even through the lense of an imperfect iphone lense, even without a full orchestra and pretty costumes, even without the header post of The Atlantic or The News Yorker Magazine: if you come for us for doing it different, I will tell you, with all love and respect, that you need to sit all the way down.

If you are overwhelmed by the sheer volume of content, maybe that’s a sign you need to spend less time on social media?

If you wonder about the appropriateness of posting songs or vignettes or monologues in the face of death around us, know this: The people in historical times of great trauma still sang.

They. Still. Sang.

If you read in a history book, that one inmate in a concentration camp demanded that another stop singing or playing violin because it was inappropriate in the face of so much misery or—my personal favorite—snapped at them that they should stop self-promoting, what would be your reaction?

Here is mine: maybe, just maybe those who insisted on singing and writing developed a resilience they needed to survive. And maybe they helped others survive.

If you are currently lamenting that so much of the online living-room music content “just isn’t that good”–maybe you should reflect on your own need to sit in judgement and then reflect why humans make art in the first place?

I don’t make art so that others can applaud my perfection. Humans cannot fall in love with perfection. We can at best admire it, but never love it.

I make things because it keeps me alive.

And if there are some people who also smile because of what I made, well, that’s the creme anglais on my tarte tartin.

Years ago I made a big decision to chose authenticity and connection over perfection. My life and my career and my art-making are about a billion times more satisfying and flourishing from this vista, then from the old one.

I know. Perfection is very hard one to break up with but I swear it’s worth it.

P.S. The gatekeepers who you are so worried about looking not perfect in front of, here online with your not perfect offerings? They desperately want the authenticity and connection too. Even if they don’t know it.

Wishing that everyone finds the peace and clarity they need right now, whether that means doing absolutely nothing, or watching that godawful Tiger thing, or eating, or not eating, or recording and posting a song or a story or a monologue or a dramatic reading online every single damn day.