Ruminations on Art, Money and My Relationship to “Help”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i-BnGkjglGA

Ruminations on Art, Money and My Relationship to “Help”

Howdy Haunts,

At 3:35 PST will be giving an off-the-cuff ex-hex and vex about my current financial woes, how it affects my creative output and why my relationship with promotion, sales, or generally asking for help is so fractured. ALL PATRONS WILL BE AUTOMATICALLY MODDED ON YOUTUBE and of course, this ain’t about you – without you I’d be far worse for wear – so thank you!

Here are some of my messy stream notes only viewable to you patrons!

When is okay for an artist to ask for financial assistance from the public?  Is it ever expected? Not really.

The stigma between money and creativity still exist; what is my relationship with oft thought diametrically opposed goals? When is it okay to ask for donations to keep the muster and the gusto? Is it ever?  This is a specific artist’s quandary about necessity vs. expectation, a greater relationship with monetary means and “just desserts” – or in his case: JUST DESERTS.

TOPICS

1. The current woes – high rent, hours cut, Taos land, career change, “marketable skills” and the unbearable weight of debt.

A rumination about the term “deserve” –

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/acquired-spontaneity/201305/does-anyone-deserve-anything

“It is this very notion of “earning” anything that I am deeply committed to transcending. If someone took an action that harmed others, including many others, I want to shift from thinking that they now deserve punishment, or would better be dead. I want, instead, to recognize that this person did what they did because of conscious or unconscious attempts to meet their needs, often in internal, external, or relational conditions that don’t allow them to see the effect on others’ needs. I truly believe much of life as we know it would be entirely different if this one goal was successfully embraced by many.”

2. The hangups:  Pride? Shilling? Corrupting or polluting the works with monetary ads. Why promo sucks. And why, maybe, I should get over it.

3. Magick and money – if art is magick, then is there necessarily a monetary expectation? Us magicians should have it all figured out, right?! “SUIGNOSIS” vs. absolutism – or the continued, honest introspection of personal, metaphysical nuances vs. selling folks that I was elected to reveal the unknown for a small fee.

Alan moore:

https://www.wired.com/2009/02/ff-moore-qa/

I’ve got enough money to be comfortable. I live comfortably, I can pay the bills at the end of every month. I don’t want a huge amount of money by diluting something that I happen to be rather proud of at its outset. That pretty much describes my attitude toward the idea of any of my works being realized in another form, really.

Genesis P.Orridge:

https://www.documentjournal.com/2018/07/performer-genesis-p-orridge-on-transgressing-ones-self/

“When we had our big run-in with British culture—with “Prostitution”—at the ICA, and the Arts Council announced that they weren’t going to fund us anymore when they were only giving us about 300 [GBP] a year. We just thought then that we were lucky to be moving on to [earning money through the band] Throbbing Gristle, so that we’d never beholden, that we can be censored because we need the money. It was actually an old man who lived in the park that told me to do a band. It’s the same information, but it reaches more people.

4. How much does an unpopular songwriter make? What is the revenue for a podcast or running an art collective? The answer: PURE DEFICIT

5. The beauty of patreon – tight nit community not just based on donation, but tit-for-tat rapport. The anti-tithing.

6. I need help. I need help keeping afloat, and this is what I have and will continue to offer those that would like to help: Keeping the collective, the podcast, the music, the writing, the videosigils, the audiosigils, the livestreams, etc. going, mainly free to the public at large. If you would like to donate, let me give you something for it. If you don’t want anything for it then I don’t know what to do with you other than say I am absolutely appreciative of you. And it is times such as these when I remember that we lift each other up, as I would you, in times of duress if you needed.

I hope in addressing these topics I do not elicit any expectation or “deserves” – rather, that it allows me to burrow through my own deeply ingrained insecurities about routinely reminding that donations truly help. And if YOU need anything, please let me know.

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