XXI

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rt has nothing to do with anything. It doesn't exist to communicate or educate. It does not prettify or iconify. Those things can all be done with pedestrian craft. Art exists as a means to no end save one: Humanism.

If the Sistine Madonna matches your sofa perfectly then you ought throw that furniture out. It is not a picture that conjures up happy thoughts of wandering through a pastoral landscape nor does it encourage any fond reminiscences for whoever the models might have been. The merit of the masterpiece is in its craftsmanship. It is a great painting because it demonstrates the genius of Raphael Sanzio. It is executed with brilliance, subtlety and consummate skill. Why though should that matter a whit to any of us?

In manifesting genius, Raphael does exactly what Oppenheimer, Einstein, and Armstrong did after him. He has demonstrated for us all how great humankind can be. Art, being an act of making, pushes the boundaries of humanities accomplishments and it matters not if it remains beyond the ken of men. We do not make art in the interest of posterity. We do it because in the doing, we collectively are made more astonishing. What are the limits of mankind's ability to imagine and create?

Humanism is not about Hubris. We are not challenging the power of the Gods. Instead, we celebrate what they have themselves crafted when they made we peoples of the earth. We have been divinely granted life and intelligence so let us now see what can be done with that. It would be impious, at least ungrateful, to not utilize our gifts to the fullest.

Do not either imagine arrogance in the heart of the artist that seeks to advance our craftiness. We, the Humanists, know that we are but products of humanity and all that we do is owned by us each and all. Artists work on behalf of mankind and every Shakespearean sonnet or each Laocoon and His Sons is a thing that betters us by the acknowledgement of our being all members of that same tribe.

The greatest works of man should neither deter nor depress us as we confront the notion that as individuals we cannot conceive of similar contributions. Rather, these exercises in attainment must motivate. Witness what we, so much but flesh and bone, such feeble, flawed creatures, have wrought.

We can, as plumber or soldier, student or addict, contribute. We can, individually, encourage, support, and study the arts. More though, we privately can better enable the holistic by simply, humbly celebrating humanity every day.

Hope.

There can be no honest self-respect without also a general respect for humankind.

Love us.

Never, in my darkest or most dreary of days, did I lose my love for you and your ilk. Whenever I yearn for a better world, I want this entire world to come with me. If we are, in all the cosmos, in all past and future, the only planet and the only people that ever are, then that will be enough for we are marvellous indeed. As magnificent as man may be, I too am one of yea.

There was no question of finding the means to remove my paintings. Certainly some were too large to consider but even the modest ones required a small financial commitment that I could not rise to. To spend one penny on transporting them and so preserving them seemed wasteful. Worse, it would have been misguided pride. If I had learned anything from the works that were stacked now like so much miscut lumber, the physical objects had nothing more to teach me. They were less like old school notebooks than they were the yearbooks of yesterdays, fit for nothing more than reminiscences.

That was how I found myself tossing them upon a pile of garbage on a tiled side street, trusting professionals then to tend to their further disposal. Certainly I had fleeting fantasies of portly Italian garbage collectors gazing in wonder at their fortunate finds but those imaginings were early crushed mercilessly. I carved the canvases. So ruined, the refuse of local domestics was then piled atop the remnants of my art.

At one point it had been my scheme to skulk in the night to make this purging deposit but I decided at the last that this act deserved no Romantic service. They were cast away in the bright grey of that January day.

Salome, I spared. She was dispatched by post to Mathilde. This gesture, I intended, was an investment in friendship. It had nothing to do with art.

On the night before my flight, I similarly discarded my soiled sleeping bag, plates, and paints. I took small but significant pride in arriving at the departure gate with but one bag to check and a grimy carry-on to sling. In both body mass and baggage, I left Florence lighter than I had arrived.

Due to, and despite my experiences in Tuscany, I will forever cherish my nine months spent there. I had tested a lifestyle that, to an aspiring artist, resonates. I care not if it be dismissed by some as cliché. For me, at that time, this had been a necessary journey. By no stretch ought it be regarded as any kind of obligatory rite of passage. The merits of it are found in the memories, not the ritual. I had, over the course of the retreat achieved beauty. I could not claim that I had achieved genius but perhaps insights into my craft and my self were made that would later enable that title to be worn.

It is the title of genius, made an essential element of the artist by my own definition by my own devising that sharply stung any attempt I made to decide that I was indeed an artist. To call oneself a genius seems (and very likely is) guaranteed vanity. If only that label had some negative side to it. To call someone a genius elevates their faults to foibles. It also overwrites each and every of their other features. A genius need be nothing but such a one.

As I will not do it to myself, I will have to wait to be called a genius by others and when, after a decidedly lengthy interval has passed and someone indeed does use that title, I will positively and with honesty more than humility denounce it utterly. If I will not though allow myself to wear the word then I can never wrap myself in the coverlet that lets be named an Artist.

Farewell then to Florence.

In the bidding I was sentimental. On slow and lonely city tours I saw again sites that did ever, daily draw me forth and back across gentle Arno. In the shadow of Michelangelo, I wept for perfect David's marble flaw and in gilded churches gave in to awe that spanned the sublime to monumental. If ever I return to this city I must bear with me the courage and grace that sure comes of having learned lost answers to grant my art some dear ability. I can only again stand in this place when I stand beside Florentine Masters.

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