Staging Grounds

[Dialectic]

I have been thinking, and right now this is a fairly amorphous thought, that the Fighting 44s can function as something of a staging ground for the formulation of Art and Advocacy events/ activities where strategy (content, marketing, etc.), briefings, de-briefings, and informal (or even formal) "post-mortem" analyses can be conducted.

Now this idea is nothing new, and it's something we've been discussing from the beginning, but the "How do you deal with CCBs" thread (stickied under NC-17) and the reppin' of the 44 Gurls (and Seraph) on AsiaMs brought it back to the forefront of my consideration as a real, viable thing.

We can talk all we want (and I hope we continue to do) here on this forum about Art and issues, and that is a fine thing. We're constantly growing and bringing in bright, open people. But that's all us, here. If we could somehow have little groups going out and essentially spreading the word about how fucking cool we (North American Asians, not necessarily F44s, though that would be sweet as well) are, and talking about what you're up to here and what you've been doing (in real life as well as in other forums), well then we could really get the big yellow ball rolling.

You could use this site and forum as a resource for what I think are some very good Features and posts and debates, and really get people to start paying attention and seeing all the little dragons in embryo we have growing here.

[Taliesin Stormheller]

Yea that's what I'm talkin about homie.

[blue-kun]

Dialectic is addressing one of the core reasons I dived into thefighting44s.com in the first place. I will throw in my two cents.

Nearly every branch of art incorporates a way of conveying a message not necessarily related to formal beauty of art itself. The message could be anything -- political, romantic, social, cultural, you name it.

Unfortunately, not all genres of art possess the same capability when it comes to conveying such messages. I guess literature and other forms derived from it or adopting it (such as songs with lyrics, movies, cartoons/animations, etc.) are the strongest in this sense -- because they can employ words that directly carry the message. However, there are other forms of art at a relative disadvantage.

Paintings, for example, can depict some socially important subjects (e.g. Guernica by Picasso), but not without a drawback -- such depiction can harm the artistic value if it is not planned and presented carefully. Because of this, many artists avoid and even shun the approach. They resort to obscure and indirect ways of communicating their abstract thoughts; some artists even wall themselves into their own vacuum and refuse to associate their work with any sort of subjects from the real world.

Instrumental music is at even more disadvantage (IMO it is probably the most abstract branch of art). Composers feel like they are facing an endless brick wall when they think about how they could convey a specific message in their music without resorting to words, at which many of them are not so good -- not every composer is also a poet.

I am a composer myself (albeit an amateur one). However, I refuse to shun ugly facets of the reality, and would like to address them through what I can do relatively well -- yes, music. So I am in fact facing the same brick wall along with countless other composers, and I would love to see how others solved this problem in their own way. And, for this reason, it felt like seeing a paradise when I first found this website. Some of you might remember what I said in my Introlude thread -- that was under this light.

However, not before too long, I have found that much of art criticism circulating here was more from the media/art consumer's point of view than from the producer's. Movies, novels and songs were being evaluated according to how well they reflected the core values that we, as a camp of AA movement, espoused. But, little -- if any -- of the same criticism addressed how the subject of the criticism could do a better job. In a sense, it lacked a constructive quality.

This is an important deficiency if we are to function as an AA media/art hub and invite other people to hear us out. We should be able to tell the artists whom we criticize how we think their work could be improved. Otherwise, they will just shrug, say ``So you say my work sucks, so what?'' and think that we are just another group of whiny people.

Eugene

P.S. And if my understanding is correct, this concern is also valid from the POV of integral approach. We could just set ourselves forth and represent AA media/art consumers, but there is only so much we can achieve if we do not embrace the media/art producers as well.

[Dialectic]

Eugene, thank you for your comments, and you bring up a very valid point that Lopan and I have considered at length: our deficiency with regard to discussing, critiquing, and developing Art.

There are several reasons this has occurred:

1) We launched with a specific marketing strategy driven by a vigorous (but we believe healthy) ethnocentrism in an attempt to fire up and somewhat unify a generally dispassionate and fractured demographic. This had two major consequences with regard to our "brand perception": (1) we are the "angry" Asian site, and (2) we are a site primarily concerned with advocacy and issues. As a result, our subsequent audience tended to be more interested in enacting social change through direct advocacy, and they had no significant artistic interests.

2) We believe the North American Asian community is not deeply invested in the Arts. Because of the immigrant mentality, economic conditions, and cultural imperatives, it is very possible that a smaller percentage of Asian immigrants are artists than is the case for Blacks or Whites. Given that we make up 4% - 6% of the population, that doesn't make for a lot of serious artistic interest, ability, or drive.

3) We did not start the site with a lot of artistic material: visual, literary, musical, or otherwise. Our focus or passion for the Arts was therefore not obvious, and still isn't. We hope this changes over the mid-term.

As I'm sure you have seen, Eugene, this is why our 100 Flowers category is much more popular than our Beauty of All Forms category. We try to limit political agendas and critiques in the BoAF forums, but they still creep in here and there, and quite frankly the level of non-political criticism we have achieved so far is simplistic at best. We are aware of this, and while we believe this can change, it may take a while, and the upper limits for North American Asian participation in an Artistic/ Advocate forum may be fairly low. This remains to be seen.

I am going to go into this issue a little further when we formally announce Phase II of our development, but our ideas for change are at the moment raw and amorphous, so please offer any suggestions you may have.

[bluejives]

hey D,

i've noticed on a number of different occasions that you've express some concern about the F-44s site being perceived as an angry asian site. well, with all due respect, there is much to be angry about in the world. i do try to actively search for positive stuff to report on but sometimes even positive news have some element of bullshit to it upon closer examination. and quite frankly i wonder if the 'hellfire and brimstone' color scheme decor of this site plays a part in inciting some vague feelings of anger as well. just a thought.

[Dialectic]

Blue-kun, check out the "Vincent Chin Painting" thread under this forum for a very cool look at what LeaJade is doing with integrating Art and Advocacy (and using our fine asses too!).

This is actually more than I could've hoped for, and I'm very excited about seeing what more we can do along these lines in the future. I would ultimately love to have a network where F44s actively collaborates with its members across the globe by functioning as an inspiration and nexus of idea-evolution, encouraging autonomy, insight, and responsibility in whoever works with us.

We're setting up the Sleeper Cells, baby!

[Scowl]

i've noticed on a number of different occasions that you've express some concern about the F-44s site being perceived as an angry asian site. well, with all due respect, there is much to be angry about in the world.

I really don't think that the site would be the same without all the extra-angry guys who sometimes go overboard. Yeah, I know - I edit more of their shit than anyone else's. Doesn't mean that I don't want them around, or that I don't want them to say what they gotta say. It's just that there's a fine line, ya know?

I really do think that someone should go and set up the quintessential angry AM site. There's a place for that, just like there's a place for F44s - and they don't necessarily have to be in opposition to one another.

check out the "Vincent Chin Painting" thread under this forum for a very cool look at what LeaJade is doing with integrating Art and Advocacy (and using our fine asses too!).

Very cool.

Personally, it's always been hard for me to incorporate anything more than just purely personal stuff in my work; of course, I've never really tried all that hard. I'm still using it as a sort of personal therapy, ya know?

Still, stuff has been creeping in, and I think that there's something there that I might be able to tap into.

When I think about it, the possibilities are endless - and not just confined to myself, either. Damn, someone really needs to win the lottery and then throw some money into the site. Talking about artistic expression is good, but it can't compare to being able to provide examples of it. Artistically speaking, this could be a true fucking gateway. But, maybe I'm getting ahead of myself. Whatever. Rock on. I'm gonna get another drink.