We The Toxic - In Order To Form A More Perfekt Nation_0019

 

  

 

Unrecognizable United States flag - Old Glory. Digital collage by Rick Arthur.

"'We The People' used to mean the entire group of us, collectively..."

F%$#& Around Find Out.

What we are living through is the strategic, decades-long dismantling of the justice system and the obliteration of the legislative branch of government. What is so impressive is that this campaign to crush justice/legal fairness is always advanced by lawyers who get paid to do the bidding of their clients, wealthy clients who use them as attack dogs set loose to rip and tear at the flesh of the law.

What is government for? 

Hammer. What kind of tool is government and how is it supposed to work? Note: I once used a hammer to smash scorpions sunbathing in my living room. Image from internet for teaching purposes. Rights by creator.

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This is the fifth draft of this blog post. I have wiped the previous ones. Too dark. Too cynical. Too depressing. AND not really what I want to focus on with the overall theme of my blog space. I want to talk about creativity and process. After this post, I am going to try to leave overtly political stuff to my other accounts. I am not giving up on America but if I feel so passionately, I will just write more CAPTAIN AMERICA posts to explore my ideologic interests. Here, in this space - the Billion Hero Blog - I will refocus on the truly important stuff in life: ART, which gives everything else meaning.

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Scribble. Cross outs. Arrows. Rewrites. Full digital trash cans of writing efforts, wasted. Image from internet for teaching purposes. Rights by creator.

Now, without ado, the sixth draft - a day after a sitting U.S. president and vice president foisted a photo-op ambush on a man who needs our help killing a deranged Bear who broke into his house.

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HEY! Look at MEEEEEEEE! I eat CHEEEEEESEburgers in the White House and TEXT non-sense in the middle of the night! Yes, we all know. As a matter of fact, the whole vulgar act is rather dull and boring except that the bully who weaseled his way into being in charge of other bullies, now has real power at his disposal.

We got into this predicament because a ton of people WANTED to tear down government for a long time. By people, I don't mean the mislead, deliberately disinformed voters. I mean people with money. They funded think tanks, lobbying groups, and political action committees. They built radio and TV empires. Bought up newspapers. Marched legions of lobbyists to Washington. Wrote OP/EDS and white papers. Peer reviewed their own "science". Took over boardrooms. Bought and sold shares and bet on things to fail and break. Secretly penned legislation. Created smear campaigns against opponents. Engaged in soft and hard "leverage" to influence outcomes. Among other things, perfected the art of, gasp, deception in the political and business arena by creating something called The Wedge Issue. Divide, conquer, and distract seemed to work pretty well in other facets of business life so it has been applied vigorously to politics for at least fifty years, and we are seeing the fruits of all that relentless labor.

What is really kind of insane, is that during this multi-decades-long run up (I see you Mitch McEvil), the world has changed and changed rapidly. As a matter of blunt fact, change has accelerated so quickly that society as a whole has shown very little wisdom in terms of how to manage this change. We can't even keep track of all the innovations that are popping up. There is no time to think and absorb. The "innovation" that the current office holders wield is something that takes The Wedge Issue and puts it on steroids. The strategy that has found its purest disciple is - Flood The Zone. Basically, stir up so much controversy that people's heads spin. Aided by new tech and algorithms, The Wedge Issue AND Flood The Zone have simply obliterated what passes for reasoned or even impassioned debate. Those who care about civility have been left stammering and flat footed.

As always, we are presented with the question of what to do now. How do we move forward?

If WWIII broke out, which side would the United States be on? Things don't begin and end on certain dates like they do in textbooks. Out in the ever-changing, messy world, The Cold War never ended; Vietnam never ended; WWII never ended; WWI never ended; the goddamn Civil War never ended; the stupid Crusades never ended... They just took a break and then morphed into something else.

See a trend? The problem with "WWIII" is that an enabled, entitled, elitist man who has the attention span of a nine-year-old is not mouthing off to classmates at a military prep school. He is willing to hold the world hostage with his finger on the nuke-you-ler button just to get people to say that they love him. The more pain he inflicts and still gets people to say they love him is where he gets his rocks off. AND this powerful combination may kill us all.

What kind of danger are we in?

Grave danger.

Is there any other kind?

Cheeseburger. Ah, charred meat, melted cheese, onions, and maybe some bacon... Some say gluttony, others lunch. Who is to say? Image from internet for teaching purposes. Rights by creator.

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Saw a post which tried to gaslight what happened during the Zelensky meeting and somehow spin it as "high-level chess," which coincidentally is the SAME talking point FOX News was trying to inject into media discussions in weeks previous to this event in an effort to spin ANYTHING that happened as a bold move. My reaction was as follows - and I chose not to hit the send button and just copy it here. Re: "Alleged High Chess Moves"

Stop. Stop now. Stop if you can. Stop sharing these excuses. There is NO MASTER CHESSING PLAYING going on. Period. Full stop. If you feel he, JD, and Elon are ten moves ahead, you could not be more wrong. The action he took squarely and unequivocally weakened the United States and the World last night. I take no glee in this. Having even a rudimentary understanding of how evil and dangerous Putin is makes playing with the lives of people in such a cavalier manner totally unacceptable. Please block me. I do not want to ever hear these kinds of excuses for this kind of behavior again. This is not a game. Quit pretending that it is. Lives are at stake. I am flat out ashamed and embarrassed for anyone that keeps falling for these things.

In the back of your head, I want you to tuck away the idea that TAX CUTS are coming, and they are NOT going to be for you, but you will be paying for them with cuts to programs you never saw coming and consequences that are going to make your head spin. Face reality, there is no "master stroke" of genius behind what he does. He saw an opportunity to try to humiliate Zelensky on live TV and he took it. That was the extent of the plan. He is not sitting around hashing out pros and cons, he is tweeting 45 times a day. He is winging it. Has always been winging it. Because that is what a con man does. He tells you what you want to hear.

I stand with sovereign nations.

I stand with Ukraine.

I stand against hostile aggression.

I stand against Russia.

Not a hoax. My feet are firmly on the ground.

High-Level Chess. Nope. Nadda. Not in a million years if a million monkeys were moving the pieces on a million chess boards. No way. Image from internet for teaching purposes. Rights by creator.

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Doomsday prep in the modern era.

Snippet from a post discussing buying guns and stacking up MREs in order to feel safe. My response as follows:

Best of times. Worst of times.

The current round of fear will be nothing compared to what happens in the NEXT 50 years as society at large is transformed beyond recognition by technology. This wave is coming whether we want it to or not, whether we wear red caps or not, whether we complain or not. There is no "going" back to a better time. No "Great Again." No safe places. No comfort zones. AND, people convinced that we are headed in a "good direction" right now are fooling themselves. They WANT to be lied to because it makes them feel comfortable.

Society will be wrestling with a steep influx of technological advances we cannot now comprehend. People have a limited ability to absorb changes, but change is going to come at an accelerated rate from now on. We are at the very, very starting point of massive upheaval on grand scale. Slogans won't stop the future. More guns and some MREs won't make you safe.

Side note, the rule of law has been chipped away for decades by THE RICH who have always ignored it except to protect themselves from lower classes. The RICH have their own clubs and organizations devoted to reinforcing their wealth and dominance. This is not new at all. This is old and well known. Old boys' networks. Money. Self-interest. Law "makers" and law breakers are predominantly lawyers. Lobbyists are lawyers. The fifty-plus year plan to transform government was hatched by lawyers and used the law to gerrymander, disenfranchise and block voters, craft legislation, push agendas that were/are unpopular, and divide people that otherwise agree.

Eggs for Breakfast. Technological change will/has outstripped our ability to control or understand what we have created. And the pace will do nothing but accelerate. Rights by creator.

Meanwhile, the march of technology continues.

Our ability as a whole, as a group, to understand what is coming next is limited at best. Our imagination has been deliberately dimmed. We fear each other and fight amongst ourselves. COVID should have taught us something important. We are all connected in deeper, more complex ways than we believed. We need other people in ways that are more profound than we can express. There are problems in front of us that need to be solved AND we cannot solve them in isolation. We need to cooperate, collaborate, and build consensus. We don't make good decisions when we are afraid, or angry, or exhausted but here we are, right now, and there is a tsunami of problems and opportunities growing we are not ready for. Meanwhile... shower, shave, walk the dog, eat breakfast, breath, think, dream...

Just my opinion.

RICK

Billion Hero Studios

The Power of Storytelling

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SUCCEEDING AT COMICS_0018

 

  

Question - Is it possible to make money use POD to print comics? Not DJ money. Not limo money. Enough to scrape out a living or side hustle?

"Shake your fist at the universe. Curse. Fail."

Financial profitability? Get used to the idea that you will fail. Almost all fail. You will too. The learning curve is nose-bleeding steep, vertical-cliff steep. The obstacles are so numerous and will come at you so fast it will make your head spin. You cannot compete in any area or aspect of the process - writing, drawing, inking, coloring, lettering, production, marketing, fulfilment, or financing. After you have been working IN the business for ten years, THEN you will realize how little you know.

"What is an artist/writer to do when the odds are so stacked against them???"

Work. Work tirelessly. Work feverishly. Work until you are bleary-eyed and then work some more. Take your craft seriously. Read. Study. Learn. Ask questions. Listen. Absorb. Be curious about how everything works. Fail. Get rejected. Get ripped off. Get disappointed. Fail. Shake your fist at the universe. Curse. Fail. Fail. Fail. Pick yourself up. Dust yourself off.

To be profitable, you must devote yourself to a simple proposition - consistently provide MORE value to the customer than the price they pay at a cost to you which allows you to pay ALL expenses in time and money. Artists forget about the "time" part. I have seen artists charge $5 for a book that cost $3 to print and they think they are making a profit.

"What's ONE thing every indie comic creator should do to be more profitable?"

Take the time to learn the basics of finance and marketing and apply those principles to all your work.

On the flip side...

Now is the very best time in all of human history to be involved in creative work. There are more tools, more resources, more tutorials, more groups, more information, more markets, more platforms and more possibilities available at your fingertips than in the last two centuries combined. The present and the future are dazzling. Still, you will fail. It is hard. There are no short cuts. No single answers. There are no sure-fire pathways. Some success is just dumb luck, being in the right place at the right time.

Be kind to yourself. There will be many bad days and bumps in the road ahead. Keep your head down and chin up. Continue working and learning. Good luck.

The world needs more storytellers.

Share.

RICK

Billion Hero Studios

The Power of Storytelling

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WILL A.I. CRUSH US (IN OUR SLEEP?)_0017

 

  

 

Not understanding how Artificial Intelligence worked, most people treated it like a genie that granted wishes. Not understanding what power had been unleashed against them by governments and tech giants, they wished for a pile of Big Bills, hoping that AI would somehow conjure every material thing they could ever want for free - at the push of a button and at the cleverness of a prompt. Note: The girl in the middle figures out that she is NOT getting a pony. Photo collage by CoPilot Designer (2024_0602) with additional work added by a human.

"Yeah, we're kinda doomed."

Before I begin talking about Artificial Intelligence, I need to confess that I am of two (or more) minds about it. When I think of AI, I think of my dog. She is currently just a few weeks away from being 19-years-old and is losing all of her brain power, sight, smell, and hearing. Her hips and spine hurt. She naps a lot. Soon, a decision will have to be made to put her down to keep her from suffering. It is a hard choice. I love that dog. We communicate primarily through body language and a few voice commands which are mostly dependent on my tone. I "speak". She "listens." While I have spent a good deal of time with my dog, love my dog, and am invested in her happiness, comfort, and success, my dog definitely evolved from wolves. She will always have that as her prime background and context. She has physical and behavioral limitations. By comparison, what are the physical and behavioral limits of machines using artificial intelligence?

Artificial intelligence. Computing power sufficient to "understand" people. What was once long relegated to pulpy science fiction novels has now become a reality that will be rapidly changing every single aspect of life on the planet in real time. Machines "learn" to be more independent, and humans "teach" themselves to become more dependent. This shift in the balance of power is something that is happening right before our eyes.

The first chunk of this post is copied from a response to a discussion I recently had to my pal Ben who is a gifted filmmaker and runs Runic Films in Los Angeles (Hashtag, Cowboy Creed). The discussion was about the use of seals or logos to indicate "Human-Made" products or services in the film industry. As follows -

Benito,

I might go for the "real" approach. No QR code. Definitely not. If I look at the rest of the world and ask myself what really means anything, a seal of approval is a form of social proof.

Think about it.

What is more compelling? A signed document OR a signed document with a picture of a group of people standing around it (think Declaration of Independence)?

You will have to come up with clear instructions that are easy to follow for someone to apply to use the seal. You will have to come up with clear rules about how, when, and where the seal can be used and in what manner. You will need to devise a way to make the process as self-sustaining as possible and work at scale - probably the most impossible task.

Your best bet is simple.

Use an internal seal. This is branding that you ALONE use to distinguish your products and services. You may even want to incorporate it into your mission statement or even parse it out as its own manifesto. You use the seal whenever and wherever you need to remind people that products made by real, creative humans are a damn good idea.

Now if someone approaches you about your seal and wants to use it, you will have to come up with a permission system and go case by case. In this manner, the best way to go is to convince an organization or group to adopt the seal system that you are ALREADY using and extend it to their members. It is easier for the group to see how it works after you have been first with it. Plus, they can take on the role of administering the seal and enforcing it with their members. Seals don't mean anything unless they are used, understood, and stand up to economic and social challenges. Seals only carry value if they stand the test of time.

"The purpose of the seal IS SOLELY to create awareness."

I recall when the words - Made in USA were added to most clothing. It was in direct response to floods of knock offs from foreign shores. Consider the "AI wave" to be the knock offs. The Made in USA label worked, until it didn't. Longer term, there is nothing to hold AI back. Nothing. It will be used and abused in ways we cannot imagine and generally follow the trend of the big subjugating the small. AI is inherently anti-Democratic and anti-competitive.

In the case of "Made in USA", that pivot by business made cheap foreign brands look exciting, low cost, and grab market share. Consumers held up two blouses. liked them, and then looked at the price tag - a comparison of fanciful wishes that is then checked by the terminal reality of cost (and then instantly justified in real time to create or negate a purchase). It is happening right now with the clothing site Temu for example. Market share is a nasty way of saying - we do NOT want competition. Business is about DOMINANCE. Period. And look where that got us in the world.

Back to AI. BACK to film and other creative tasks.

It is important to understand what AI can and cannot do in terms of filmmaking. Currently, AI is not put in charge of every aspect of the creative pipe. Comprehensive use can only be afforded by those rich enough to pay for the inlay of infrastructure. This is where we will find shocking, disturbing, and swift change if AI builds a total pipeline, ideation to financing to work product to marketing to merchandising.

"...the directive is simply to "maximize profits"..."

Imagine a "studio" where the directive is simply to "maximize profits" when making films and the AI is left to figure everything out. It will build a process that is dedicated to that principle, and we can expect marketing that pitches movies that are not even made yet and then creates them in almost real time to get "feedback" from consumers. It will do away with film as an event, a block of time, and turn it into a personal, mutable lifestyle. And suppose YOU like happy endings.... you will get those. AI will cram them down your brain. Most likely, this power will be used to generate CONTENT that makes you CRAVE CONTENT - psychologically driven wedges that manipulate you at every turn. This is real nasty mind "control" type stuff, and we are just at the edge of it.

To this, I reflect on the decision to prop up the corn market and win votes in fly over states. Corn, the history of corn, and must notably corn syrup is public record. The government subsidizing corn production has had the consequence that products were introduced that target the consumer's cravings and we have an epidemic of people addicted to sugar made from corn syrup. This is what the AI will bring - among other unintended, unforeseen consequences.

On the other hand, AI is a tool.

How many times have you had shots or sequences that you wanted to do but could not figure them out, couldn't make them practical? I am not even talking about special effects. Wouldn't it be nice to be able to explain a movie shot to an AI tool, have it understood, and then map out or even create the shot? No lost time in pre-production or post-production. It can suggest the best ways to shoot the live principles and live sound. It would be an enormous step in the storytelling process. 

"The tool could act as a gigantic, untiring, assistant."

The tool could act as a gigantic, untiring, assistant. I think that computers were actually meant for this role - as servants and assistants. They are not equals. Why are we trying to make them "create?" For what reason?

On the engineering side, making machines that think and create is a natural extension of searching for how the brain works and what life means. To put this in Star Wars context... we should be designing R2D2 and C3PO rather than the Death Star. We should be designing AI as an assistant. That should be the default role. It should not be designed to be a "smart tool" that comes to life and crushes us.

"A.I. as a tool in artwork..."

Since AI art generating tools have been trained in an illegal and unethical manner, they should not be used for any reason. Human color flatters for comics exist. I have met a few in my time. I know that the pressure to use the new tools is enormous, but I am not in favor of stepping on the backs of artists who had no choice or consent in allowing their copyrighted materials to be batch sampled. I have spoken with several artists and creators in different fields including print, music, and film who want to use a seal to indicate that works are 100% human made. Not sure if this will catch on but the sentiment is that "dirty tools" should not be accepted by creative industries. Not now. Not ever. Pay for a human colorist or painter.

"we should not accept these tools until "clean" versions can be made from scratch using only public domain or compensated images as source material."

Part of the great appeal of artwork - even artwork prepared for mass consumption - is that it is authentic and the result of a creative process. The copyright offices are correct to not to want to protect AI generated works. As creators, we should not accept these tools until "clean" versions can be made from scratch using only public domain or compensated images as source material. If material cannot be protected against unapproved use, no intellectual property is safe.

"How does the use of AI imagery corrupt the art marketplace?"

One - illegal sampling, called scraping, of copyrighted material. The base images AI is trained on and regurgitates are scraped-without-permission-or-payment artworks created by flesh and blood creators. Not from public domain or "free to use."

TWO - floods the market - Human-generated content will get pushed out by AI-generated content in the marketplace just by sheer speed/volume alone. This is achieved because images can be generated in fractions of a second compared to the time it may take a human to create an equivalent image.

T H R E E - the ubiquity of images will coat the market and warp the expectations of audiences and viewers will not be sophisticated enough to tell the difference.

FOUR - FREE STUFF (not free at all...). AI-generated images will become so instant and so "free" that real artists and creators will be unable to compete financially. The audience does not realize that they are being roped into an "engagement" environment where they will be force-fed advertising and have digital psychological profiles built (and sold and re-sold) out of their behavior online. The use of AI images, video, chat, etc., is just the crack/fentanyl used by the corporations and governments to control minds and persuade passions.

If you don't think this is a real concern, ask yourself how often you get pop-up windows now that beg for your attention. How bad will this be in five years' time or less? Is AI-generated imagery unethical? YES. Anything that scrapes copyright materials without permission for any reason is BOTH unethical and illegal. Is it here to stay? Will it crush us in our sleep?

Just my opinion. Just a thought.

Buy HUMAN-MADE, now and for the future!

RICK

Billion Hero Studios

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STAN'S SOAP BOX MEGAPHONE_0016

 

  

There is no way to "solve" the riddle of who "created" the Marvel characters without understanding the power of the megaphone pulpit that Stan wielded. Digital collage by Rick Arthur.

"I felt that comics grew because they became the common man's literature, the common man's art, the common man's publishing" - Jack Kirby

Stan Lee was ahead of his time. There was no internet or social media back in the 60s and 70s, so he invented it on paper - by using a "soap box" to promote his company. Make no mistake that Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko and the rest of the artists were NOT equals. Stan held all the power in the relationships, and he "owned" the megaphone he wielded. Stan built the Marvel brand by hawking it to whoever would listen, as often and as loud as he could. The month that the Fantastic Four launched, Kirby penciled over 100 pages of content for Marvel. What captured the imagination of the reading public at that time was how different the Fantastic Four was from the rest of the comics on the stands. The images were bold, larger than life, and fresh takes with sweeping, dynamic, powerful action sequences.

What promises were made to Jack or Steve? We don't hear a lot about Ditko, in comparison, because he always remained relatively silent about his falling out with Marvel. The artists were (and still are...) treated like replaceable cogs by management. Stan built the Marvel brand, no doubt, but it was built on the backs of giants like Jack and Steve. I think of Stan as a cross between PT Barnum and Ray Kroc - but in the tiny, corrupt, brutal cage-match world of comic publishing. So, there is a talent in that, a kind of world-building/brand-building component-type of skill that Stan had which other comic publishers/editors did not have. Stan was a natural huckster, a self-made internet influencer, before the internet. Many picture Stan and Marvel as being interchangeable or Stan and comics as interchangeable, based solely on the wall-to-wall hype he created.

This picture was achieved in a variety of ways. Mostly, having the last and loudest word in terms of narrating the brand on a micro and macro level gives the impression that he created everything. It is a notion that is hard to shake for many and countless books, articles, and documentaries seek to delve into the inner workings of the early 60s Marvel revolution.

Hype started on the covers with bold, commanding blurbs directing readers to pay attention to what was inside. Stan wrote the cover copy and orchestrated how the covers looked. The writing all conformed to one vision and one voice. Popping a comic open, Stan's name appears prominently in the credit boxes and those, too, are playfully worded by Stan. Splash pages often also included introductions to stories that guided the reader into the experience and told them what to expect. Again, one voice speaking directly to the reader and creating an emotional bond. You can't fault Stan Lee for good, catchy blurb writing and brand building. 

Perhaps his biggest contribution was Stan Lee's Soap Box, a space in the early comics that allowed Stan to really connect with readers personally. He hyped an imaginary "bullpen" of merry but hard-working artists and gave them all colorful nicknames, a shorthand to intimacy. Lee touted upcoming projects and both social and personal topics that appealed to him. He did this by congratulating and conspiring with his audience. Each soap box column also ended with Stan's distinctive signature which again cemented the emotional bond readers had with him and Marvel. Excelsior! Face front, true believers! Stan even popularized Marvel with a distinctive series of catch-phrases. In effect, his voice became a giant, loud, consistent component of the Marvel brand.

The potential problem here is that of accepting the words coming out of the megaphone as true. Based on Stan's position in the company as a dialogue writer, editor, and company figurehead, it can easily be forgotten that freelance artists and writers had no voice and no power in the relationship. They could not speak out and were treated as replaceable, being dependent on a page rate that kept many chained to the drawing table for ten plus hours a day, seven days a week. Voicing concerns might see an artist lose assignments or even be black balled in a tiny industry chugging away at the edge of oblivion. 

There were no safety nets for artists. No health insurance. No ownership. No profit sharing. No cut of licensing...

...And the continued message was always that everyone was replaceable - which kept wages down.

Readers did not understand this economic and power dynamic. In their minds, the hierarchy was clear. Stan made the comics. Everyone else, no matter how talented, drifted in and out but Stan's contribution was outsized, ever present, and constant. This is what you believed if you read the soap boxes.  

I know this is a brutal take on the situation. My view has shifted over time. I still love Stan. He contributed mightily to the development and outreach of comics as a pop culture form. Comics would not have grown without someone tirelessly fanning the flames. Comics and other industries are piled high with companies that failed to connect with audiences despite having quality products. Stan's hype helped fuel the reader's imagination. I won't entertain how Stan positioned himself in lectures, magazine articles, print interviews, on TV, and even in cameos in Marvel movies. He will forever be connected to comics and Marvel in an indelible way.

There is one last important area to touch on and that is the power of having the last word.

The Marvel Method ONLY works

if the artists are exceptionally strong storytellers.

A large part of the success of Marvel during the explosive period of the 60s was due to something called The Marvel Method. It sounds simple enough. A plot outline, often verbal and sometimes being just one or two sentences, would be given to an artist who would disappear and come back with finished pencil artwork fleshing out the entire story, all the visual elements, all the story beats, all the action. Having the story as artwork, the "writer", Stan, would dialogue the pages, get them off to letterers, inkers, and colorists then printing for the newsstands.

This was an important "innovation" for a variety of reasons. In a visual medium, it is a hundred times easier to stroke in dialogue with completed artwork in hand. The burden of crafting the story was shifted entirely to the artists. They did all the heavy lifting in terms of problem solving. There are many instances of the artists scrawling in key dialogue on the page margins of the original comic pages so that Stan could "read" the story before adding dialogue. This was a method that was custom suited to Stan and allowed him to say whatever he wanted over the top of the art and after the fact. In the comics' production line, he would have the last word.

It should be noted that there is a reason why this method was able to flourish during a certain period of time at Marvel. Stan held all the keys. Artists that he was working with already knew how to tell compelling visual stories. Kirby and Ditko in particular were products of art studios that encouraged independence. Kirby was already an innovator and large figure in the industry having invented or invigorated monster comics, horror, westerns, and romance comics before turning his sights back to his passion for science fiction/fantasy. Stan was not surrounding himself with blank-minded artists who needed their hand held. The early crew were independent, voracious readers, and brimming with experience in narrative storytelling. When given a chance to create, they stepped up to the drawing table and did.

This is the part that loses a lot of people in the conversation about "what is writing" in comics. Many people cannot wrap their heads around the lopsided contribution that the artwork makes in telling a story in a visual medium, especially if it is coming first in the creative process. It is totally misunderstood. Part of that misunderstanding is that the narrative about how comics are made, and the collaboration involved has been communicated solely by the writer, editor, or publisher. In Stan's case, he was using the megaphone of his soap box and other techniques to tell the story of "who" made the comics and how. He controlled every aspect of that message. It was a charming but wholly inaccurate representation and one that the artists never had the power or voice to rebut. The only options were to grin and bear exploitation by the boss or quit. Many quit.

This post is not meant to "prove" or "solve" anything in the debate about Stan, Jack, Steve, or early Marvel. It is an opinion, just a perspective and one that I have grown into over an extended period of time. Paradoxically, Stan's writing will always be overshadowed and indistinguishable from his hype and we can and should revisit his dialogue and determine how well he was able to write after the story was already there.

'Nuff said.

RICK

Billion Hero Studios

The Power of Storytelling

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VAN GOGH_ARE YOU EXPERIENCED?_0015

 

  

Noted painting pioneer and one-eared madman Vincent van Gogh. From the Sunflowers series. A new way of applying paint and communicating emotion to viewers cobbled together from a few different influences.

"Art demands dogged work. Work in spite of everything and continuous observation"

Vincent van Gogh believed that nature holds beauty out to us in abundance.

Vincent had well-documented challenges with depression, schizophrenia, and epilepsy punctuated by an incident where he mutilated his own ear. He could be very aggressive and argumentative and destroyed many of his relationships in life including with contemporary Paul Gauguin. He took his own life, succumbing to a pistol shot.

Vincent, dead at the tragic age of 37. He never suffered through social media, shared a video chat, or checked restaurant listings online and yet he was well ahead of his time. Perhaps Vincent's greatest achievement was producing a body of work that would continue to catch the imagination of museum goers and artists for a century. Vincent's use of bright color and bold brush strokes, in sharp contrast to the prevailing art trends during his lifetime, have continued to strike an emotional chord. During a concentrated period of ten years, Vincent created most of his whopping 2,100 works including some of the most well-known paintings in history. His art was dedicated to the proposition that one could find beauty in observing and painting nature, revealing it honestly even in exaggeration.

Everyone should have the opportunity to see his work at a gallery as was intended. Recently, there has been a movement to re-think what a gallery should be and how an audience interacts with artworks. New exhibits tinker with the boundaries between artist, work, and audience and a movement toward interactive exhibits, utilizing multi-media techniques, has taken hold. This provides a new way to absorb artwork.

Still life, portraits, and nature painting consumed van Gogh. He strove to see and paint the beauty that was everywhere around him. His more expressive works utilized bold color, quick brushstrokes, and observed compositions rather than relying on imagination.

Not everyone will have the opportunity to go to either Amsterdam or Paris where a majority of van Gogh original paintings are housed. His works can be seen at important museums around the world in a variety of collections and traveling exhibitions. It is to be noted that van Gogh worked on canvases that were "portable" in scale as he commonly set himself up to paint in nature and carted with him all his materials. A keen look at his artistic development will reveal he was influenced by many sources including Japanese block prints, known for bold use of color to evoke symbolism and emotion.

A recent visit to the Vincent van Gogh Experience in Schenectady, NY was billed as an immersive experience and the exhibit featured sculpture, music, light shows, voice-over narration, a virtual reality "tour" and dozens of reproductions of Vincent's work projected onto 3-dimensional objects such as a bust or a giant vase. The overall effect was stunning, particularly the giant 360-degree room where his paintings were projected on every surface. Combined with detailed information about Vincent's short life, the exhibit-goer was indeed treated to a comprehensive dive into the art and the artist. You come away feeling engaged with Vincent's philosophy about painting and life.

A good experience at a museum will leave you feeling inspired and this was no exception

Inevitably, you start to ask questions. What if he had gotten the treatment he needed? So little was known at that time about epilepsy or mental illness and we take for granted medications and treatments that are available today. Could he have painted for another thirty, forty or more years? What might his work evolved into? Many artists explode with energy in their youth but find their artistic footing much later in life after spending time observing and creating. He was just 37 went he died. Could he ever find calm or happiness? Would being more "stable" have destroyed his ability to channel nature onto his canvases?

There was a controversy tucked away in the exhibit that I had not known before. Was van Gogh color blind? It boggles the mind to think that someone who used such powerful color combinations could have a deficiency so cruel. Art historians do not fully agree and the website for the van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam which houses many of his original works suggests that he followed a more deliberate path with using contrasting color to add additional vibrancy to his works. See link:

Looking for Contrast - Van Gogh Museum

While there are many positives about the virtual, immersive van Gogh experience, you might be left with additional questions. Many of the reproductions of Vincent's work in the exhibit were printed out onto fake canvases and to be honest, not well. Especially having seen many of the originals close up in Amsterdam, the reproductions felt dark, flat, and cheap - like decidedly poor imitations. For someone not familiar with his works, this might be a limited introduction to his use of color. Color is primarily what van Gogh is known for and yet not as evidenced by the reproductions. Additionally, while it was a tremendously visceral to have paintings and color swatches projected onto walls and objects, this kind of multi-media display also waters down and drowns out the color of his works. I am not sure that projecting images fifty feet high has anywhere near the impact of the original canvases.

Apples and oranges. The immersive experience is recommended because it creates a strong feeling about the man's life and philosophy. To get the real experience of van Gogh paintings, visit a museum that has originals on display and get as close as security will allow you so you can get a good look at the intimacy and warmth van Gogh's work communicates.

Despite his emotional struggles, Vincent believed that the world around us is a beautiful place just waiting to be discovered. Explore van Gogh and other artists for yourself. Make museum-going a part of your own journey in life. Be inspired by nature. Be inspired by creative works of every kind.

RICK

Billion Hero Studios

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