JOHN DOING // Lugano, Switzerland
What is art for? It is a signal of existence, since the cave age human beings have left traces of their passage. Why? To spend time creatively during the storm, or to defend themselves from danger. The cave was their habitat, the walls on which they could express fear and joy, what remained of their dreams. Now, just as then, we are in the same condition. In fear of a virus – identified, yet without cure. As we are all staying more at home, creativity manifests itself in various aspects. It might be baking bread, turning eggs into an omelette or soufflé, painting, making ceramic. One of the walls where we can express ourselves is the huge cave that is the internet: social media allows an immediate exhibition of whatever we may produce. We might receive some feedback on it, or pass on to oblivion, nonetheless we have expressed our signal of existence (“I AM HERE ON THIS PLANET”), thus completing our wholeness as a reactive being.
The art production of 7.7 billion people cannot end up in physical museums or galleries. It seems at present only 50 artists can make a living out of their art: not only are they famous, they put their art on sale at unimaginable prices – as if the higher the price, the more their artworks contain. Is this true, or just the result of a sophisticated marketing strategy? Nobody knows. Yet, the great capital of art and the software produced by unknown talents is excluded from the cultural scene.
