.TXT

[Wersja polska poniżej]

[Versión en español a continuación]

MANIFESTO, or a commentary on the government’s draft bill on social security for artists and the discussion surrounding this issue.

The role of artists in society is to make spectacular failures, to miss the mark, to create absurd visions and unimaginable figures, to generate incomprehensible messages, to stage uncomfortable situations, to make suspect performances, strange images, music that is hard to listen to. The role of artists is to question the established order, conventions, and accepted rules, and to reinterpret traditions. The task of artists is not to meet expectations, but to take risks and go astray, because that is how development and progress happen.

Innovation stands right next to error. Progress is failure's closest neighbor. Revolution and progress gaze with shining eyes into the festering eyes of defeats and duds. One does not exist without the other. There is no moving forward without falls, crawling, foolish steps, agonal convulsions, absurd moves, and pitiful stumbles.

We artists test ideas this way — ideas that haven't yet been assigned a place in everyday life. We create visions that do not fit what we know, what has already been understood. In her essay collection "The Bear's Moment," Olga Tokarczuk writes that "along with knowledge, the realm of ignorance constantly grows." "More knowledge by no means signifies that we know more, which is both paradoxical and logical." Artists – remaining open and receptive – intuitively explore these foggy realms of ignorance. Through their art, they file reports from visits to these folds of spacetime, folds created by the expansion of knowledge and ignorance.

Artists venture into those places where the rhizome of repressed content swarms, of undigested paradoxes — the scraps and waste used for growth, excreted in the process of transformation and nourishment. There they gather junk data, most often on their own, without the support of corporate or military infrastructure, molding from that noise, by hand, astonishing and surprising hallucinations.

This painstaking work – seemingly senseless and useless, impractical and unprofitable – is so very necessary for humanity to grow, to flourish, to expand consciousness and evolve spiritually. And aesthetically. Work often paid for with the material and psychological discomfort of the person touched by the spectrum of artistry, but also one that burdens others with that discomfort by the very act of exposing people to the products of their imagination, which so often offend order, traditions, and good taste — and even spoil that taste in their own tastelessness. No one of so-called sound mind, standing firmly on the flat of the earth, would want to expose themselves to such a risk of ridicule and condemnation. To grow, we need these sad clowns, the heretics contesting aesthetic dogmas, the deranged wanderers, the weirdos and renegades. There is no way around it.

And since without this creative neo-plasmus everything stands still — even regresses, withers, and wilts — these crazy social cells ought to be embraced, and supported by universal basic social and healthcare for all citizens, as the name suggests. Even if this work seems like nonsense, tomfoolery, a crime and a harm. It is work like any other, requiring devotion of one's health and time. Though it may seem otherwise, because after all it is harder to calculate its productivity using the same tables in which one counts the number of slaughtered pigs, parcels shipped, the area of mined terrain, or the amount of barbed wire strung through the forest, or the hours spent teaching minors.

Of course, there are artistic activities subject to relative measurability. Art is, after all, probably the most expansive of human domains — a land nearly impossible to capture within unambiguous frames. There are artistic activities that flicker at the borders of, let us say, entertainment, where it can be translated into the language of viewership, the number of ad impressions, clicks, tickets sold, or a rise in the bars of general satisfaction. That is beautiful too, and necessary too. Let us stay open to the widest possible spectrum of creative activity. And let us remember, like the society of ancient Greece, that the happy face always comes accompanied by the sad mask. Ecstasy and despair, the spiral of growth and the slippery slope.

It is very good that the government is considering taking all these artistic freaks, buffoons, vagrants and wanderers, clowns, rascals and scoundrels, and losers — celebrities included — under universal health insurance and providing them with social protection. Let it be so! At last! Maybe thanks to this, somewhat better conditions will arise to nourish these neglected tissues, surround them with care, integrate them – instead of negating them and pushing them out of society, rejecting them, thereby nurturing conflict and reinforcing imbalance, making universal growth and development impossible. Admittedly, there is some risk in this trick too.

One should not forget that the state gives nothing for free, and when the right moment comes, it will demand ultimate power over your life and body, sending them to the front or issuing other orders, depending on its needs — as those who give birth and those who do not wish to give birth already know perfectly well. The state is above all a military structure, subordinating natural and human resources and using them according to its own, of course, overriding needs.

For now, these awkward visions of heterotopia, of an anarchizing society cultivating mutual care, or of alternative social systems celebrating life and trans-species relationships based on empathetic understanding and cooperation – along with all the other hallucinations produced by these buffoons and renegades, heretics, and prophesying madwomen and madmen – the state tosses into a bin labeled "art," trying to spread a "protective" umbrella over them, keeping that revolutionary potential in sight, able to watch them closely. So be it, for now. Personally, I can agree to this, because I know that true art and authentic development no state gesture will ever fully tame, no "caring" eye will ever see through. And art – like water – will find its way and nourish every drought.

POLISH

MANIFEST, albo komentarz dotyczący rządowego projektu ustawy o zabezpieczeniu socjalnym osób wykonujących zawód artystyczny oraz dyskusji wokół tej kwestii.

The role of artists in society is to make spectacular failures, to miss the mark, to create absurd visions and unimaginable figures, to generate incomprehensible messages, to stage uncomfortable situations, to make suspect performances, strange images, music that is hard to listen to. The role of artists is to question the established order, conventions, and accepted rules, and to reinterpret traditions. The task of artists is not to meet expectations, but to take risks and go astray, because that is how development and progress happen.

Innovation stands right next to error. Progress is failure's closest neighbor. Revolution and progress gaze with shining eyes into the festering eyes of defeats and duds. One does not exist without the other. There is no moving forward without falls, crawling, foolish steps, agonal convulsions, absurd moves, and pitiful stumbles.

We artists test ideas this way — ideas that haven't yet been assigned a place in everyday life. We create visions that do not fit what we know, what has already been understood. In her essay collection "The Bear's Moment," Olga Tokarczuk writes that "along with knowledge, the realm of ignorance constantly grows." "More knowledge by no means signifies that we know more, which is both paradoxical and logical." Artists – remaining open and receptive – intuitively explore these foggy realms of ignorance. Through their art, they file reports from visits to these folds of spacetime, folds created by the expansion of knowledge and ignorance.

Artists venture into those places where the rhizome of repressed content swarms, of undigested paradoxes — the scraps and waste used for growth, excreted in the process of transformation and nourishment. There they gather junk data, most often on their own, without the support of corporate or military infrastructure, molding from that noise, by hand, astonishing and surprising hallucinations.

This painstaking work – seemingly senseless and useless, impractical and unprofitable – is so very necessary for humanity to grow, to flourish, to expand consciousness and evolve spiritually. And aesthetically. Work often paid for with the material and psychological discomfort of the person touched by the spectrum of artistry, but also one that burdens others with that discomfort by the very act of exposing people to the products of their imagination, which so often offend order, traditions, and good taste — and even spoil that taste in their own tastelessness. No one of so-called sound mind, standing firmly on the flat of the earth, would want to expose themselves to such a risk of ridicule and condemnation. To grow, we need these sad clowns, the heretics contesting aesthetic dogmas, the deranged wanderers, the weirdos and renegades. There is no way around it.

And since without this creative neo-plasmus everything stands still — even regresses, withers, and wilts — these crazy social cells ought to be embraced, and supported by universal basic social and healthcare for all citizens, as the name suggests. Even if this work seems like nonsense, tomfoolery, a crime and a harm. It is work like any other, requiring devotion of one's health and time. Though it may seem otherwise, because after all it is harder to calculate its productivity using the same tables in which one counts the number of slaughtered pigs, parcels shipped, the area of mined terrain, or the amount of barbed wire strung through the forest, or the hours spent teaching minors.

Of course, there are artistic activities subject to relative measurability. Art is, after all, probably the most expansive of human domains — a land nearly impossible to capture within unambiguous frames. There are artistic activities that flicker at the borders of, let us say, entertainment, where it can be translated into the language of viewership, the number of ad impressions, clicks, tickets sold, or a rise in the bars of general satisfaction. That is beautiful too, and necessary too. Let us stay open to the widest possible spectrum of creative activity. And let us remember, like the society of ancient Greece, that the happy face always comes accompanied by the sad mask. Ecstasy and despair, the spiral of growth and the slippery slope.

It is very good that the government is considering taking all these artistic freaks, buffoons, vagrants and wanderers, clowns, rascals and scoundrels, and losers — celebrities included — under universal health insurance and providing them with social protection. Let it be so! At last! Maybe thanks to this, somewhat better conditions will arise to nourish these neglected tissues, surround them with care, integrate them – instead of negating them and pushing them out of society, rejecting them, thereby nurturing conflict and reinforcing imbalance, making universal growth and development impossible. Admittedly, there is some risk in this trick too.

One should not forget that the state gives nothing for free, and when the right moment comes, it will demand ultimate power over your life and body, sending them to the front or issuing other orders, depending on its needs — as those who give birth and those who do not wish to give birth already know perfectly well. The state is above all a military structure, subordinating natural and human resources and using them according to its own, of course, overriding needs.

For now, these awkward visions of heterotopia, of an anarchizing society cultivating mutual care, or of alternative social systems celebrating life and trans-species relationships based on empathetic understanding and cooperation – along with all the other hallucinations produced by these buffoons and renegades, heretics, and prophesying madwomen and madmen – the state tosses into a bin labeled "art," trying to spread a "protective" umbrella over them, keeping that revolutionary potential in sight, able to watch them closely. So be it, for now. Personally, I can agree to this, because I know that true art and authentic development no state gesture will ever fully tame, no "caring" eye will ever see through. And art – like water – will find its way and nourish every drought.

ESPAÑOL

MANIFIESTO, o comentario sobre el proyecto de ley del Gobierno relativo a la protección social de los profesionales del mundo del arte y sobre el debate en torno a esta cuestión.

El papel de las artistas y los artistas en la sociedad es protagonizar fracasos espectaculares, fallar el tiro, crear imaginarios absurdos y figuras inimaginables, generar mensajes incomprensibles, organizar situaciones incómodas, producir actuaciones sospechosas, imágenes extrañas, música difícil de escuchar. El papel de las artistas y los artistas es cuestionar los órdenes establecidos, las convenciones y las normas aceptadas, y reinterpretar la tradición. La tarea de las artistas y los artistas no es cumplir expectativas, sino arriesgarse y errar, porque así se producen el desarrollo y el progreso.

La innovación está justo al lado del error. El progreso es el vecino más cercano del fracaso. La revolución y el progreso miran con ojos brillantes hacia los ojos supurantes de las derrotas y los fiascos. Uno no existe sin el otro. Es imposible avanzar sin caídas, sin arrastrarse, sin pasos torpes, sin convulsiones agónicas, movimientos absurdos y tropiezos lastimosos.

Nosotras, las artistas, y nosotros, los artistas, ponemos a prueba así ideas para las que todavía no se ha asignado un lugar en la vida cotidiana. Creamos imaginarios que no se ajustan a lo que sabemos, a lo conocido. En la colección de ensayos "El momento del oso," Olga Tokarczuk escribe que "con el saber crece sin cesar el territorio de lo desconocido." "Más saber no significa en absoluto que sepamos más, lo cual es a la vez paradójico y lógico." Las artistas y los artistas — manteniéndose abiertas y abiertos, receptivas y receptivos — exploran de manera intuitiva esos territorios brumosos de lo desconocido. A través de su arte, dan cuenta de sus visitas a esos pliegues del espacio-tiempo, surgidos a raíz de la expansión del saber y del no saber.

Las artistas y los artistas se aventuran en esos lugares donde se enredan los rizomas de los contenidos reprimidos, de las paradojas no digeridas, los restos y desechos de materiales usados para el crecimiento, expulsados en el proceso de metabolismo y nutrición. Allí recogen datos de desecho, casi siempre en solitario, sin el apoyo de infraestructuras corporativas o militares, moldeando con sus propias manos, a partir de ese ruido, alucinaciones asombrosas y sorprendentes.

Este trabajo penoso — aparentemente absurdo e inútil, poco práctico y poco rentable — es tan necesario para que la humanidad pueda crecer, florecer, expandir la conciencia y evolucionar espiritualmente. Y estéticamente. Un trabajo que con frecuencia se paga con malestar material y psíquico de la persona afectada por el espectro del artisteo, pero que también carga a otros con esa misma incomodidad al exponer a la gente al contacto con los productos de su imaginación, que con tanta frecuencia chocan contra el orden, la tradición y el buen gusto, e incluso, en su falta de gusto, arruinan ese mismo gusto. Nadie en su sano juicio, con los pies bien plantados en el suelo, querría exponerse a tal riesgo de ridículo y condena. Para crecer, hacen falta esos payasos tristes, herejas y herejes que cuestionan los dogmas estéticos, vagabundos chiflados, excéntricas y disidentes. Sin eso, no hay manera.

Y si sin este neo-plasmus creativo todo se detiene, incluso retrocede, se marchita y languidece, entonces habría que abrazar estas células sociales descarriadas, rodearlas de cuidados básicos, sociales, sanitarios, universales para todas las ciudadanas y ciudadanos, como su nombre indica. Aunque este trabajo parezca una tontería, un absurdo, un delito y un perjuicio. Es un trabajo como cualquier otro, que exige dedicación, salud y tiempo. Aunque pueda parecer lo contrario, porque al final resulta más difícil calcular su rendimiento usando las mismas tablas con las que se calcula el número de cerdos sacrificados, de paquetes enviados, la superficie de terrenos minados, o la cantidad de alambre de espino tendido en el bosque, o las horas dedicadas a la enseñanza de menores.

Por supuesto, existen actividades artísticas sujetas a una medición relativa. El arte es, al fin y al cabo, quizás el más vasto de los territorios humanos, casi imposible de encerrar en marcos definidos. Hay actividades artísticas que parpadean en las fronteras de lo que podríamos llamar entretenimiento, donde se puede traducir al lenguaje de la audiencia, el número de anuncios mostrados, de clics, de entradas vendidas, o el aumento de los índices de satisfacción general. Eso también es hermoso y también es necesario. Permanezcamos abiertas y abiertos al espectro más amplio posible de actividad creativa. Y recordemos, como la sociedad de la antigua Grecia, que la carita alegre siempre va acompañada de la triste. Éxtasis y desesperación, espiral de crecimiento y pendiente resbaladiza.

Es muy positivo que el gobierno considere incluir a todos estos bichos raros artísticos, payasas y payasos, vagabundas y vagabundos y trotamundos, bribonas y bribones, perdedoras y perdedores, celebridades incluidas, en el seguro de salud universal y darles protección social. ¡Que así sea! ¡Por fin! Quizás gracias a esto se creen condiciones algo mejores para nutrir estos tejidos descuidados, rodearlos de cuidado, integrarlos — en lugar de negarlos y expulsarlos de la sociedad, rechazarlos, cultivando así el conflicto y reforzando el desequilibrio, impidiendo el crecimiento y el desarrollo generales. Es cierto que en esta trampa también hay cierto riesgo.

No hay que olvidar que el Estado no da nada gratis, y cuando llegue el momento oportuno, exigirá el poder absoluto sobre tu vida y tu cuerpo, enviándolo al frente o dando otras órdenes, según sus propias necesidades, algo que las personas que dan a luz y las que no quieren hacerlo ya conocen muy bien. El Estado es, ante todo, una estructura militar, que subordina a sí mismo recursos naturales y humanos y los emplea según sus propias necesidades, por supuesto, superiores.

Por ahora, estas torpes imaginaciones sobre la heterotopía, sobre una sociedad anarquizante que cultiva el cuidado mutuo, o sobre sistemas sociales alternativos que celebran la vida y relaciones más allá de las especies basadas en la comprensión empática y la cooperación, junto con todas las demás alucinaciones producidas por estos bufones y disidentes, herejas y herejes, y profetisas y profetas chiflados, el Estado las arroja a un cesto con la etiqueta "arte," intentando desplegar sobre ellas un paraguas "protector," con este potencial revolucionario siempre a la vista, pudiendo así observarlo de cerca. Que sea así, por ahora. Personalmente, puedo estar de acuerdo con eso, porque sé que ningún gesto estatal podrá nunca domesticar del todo el arte verdadero ni el desarrollo auténtico, ningún ojo "protector" logrará verlo del todo. Y el arte, como el agua, encontrará su camino y humedecerá cada sequía.