Tonight I had a pretty weird dream. I purchased the entire life’s work of a failed artist. They were in financial trouble and wanted to start a new life, so they put everything they ever made into one big dufflebag and sold it to me. The crazy part is that what I just described only took place in fabricated memories. The actual dream was set quite some time after the transaction took place and I had already forgotten many of the details. I didn’t remember why I chose to purchase it and I didn’t even fully remember what was in the dufflebag. What I can say is that I didn’t necessarily treasure this person’s life’s work.
I found that dream weird for two reasons: first, it’s pretty weird for a dream to have significant events take place only in memories. The main part of the dream was just different people asking me about it and me struggling to remember stuff. But the second reason is that it’s a weird side of the story to be on. If a character decides to turn their life around, that’s usually the main character, not the one who literally purchases their old self, which is also a weird thing to do, come to think of it, especially if they don’t even remember why they did it afterwards.
Don’t get me wrong, it does sound like something I would do. If that was a person I really cared about and I had the money for it, I’d probably want to enable them to reinvent themselves. I would look through the dufflebag, maybe frame a few pieces to hang on my wall and tell them that if they ever feel like giving a particular piece away was a mistake, they could get in touch with me and have it back. This would be about the human, not the art. Of course I wouldn’t necessarily treasure the art. If it was actually worth anything, they wouldn’t have had to sell it to me. In a world filled with masterpieces, it would just be a dufflebag full of mediocrity.
But that gets me thinking: what are we paying for when we are purchasing art? Usually we’re paying for a thing that has value to us because we like it. We want to put it somewhere where we or other people interact with it in some way to achieve a certain effect. We put that nice carpet in our living room because it makes everyone using the room feel more cozy. We hang that photograph in our bedroom because we want to be reminded of it in private. Or we put a garden gnome into our front yard because we want our neighbors to know that they can always count on you to borrow the lawn mower but only if they give it back in mint condition.
But none of the above is anything I actually like doing. I understand that this works and that it is a form of communication but I … kinda wish it wasn’t. I don’t care about things. I mean, I do care about things when they have a function that improves my life. I love my dishwasher, because it washes my dishes instead of me having to wash them. But I don’t love this particular dishwasher. If it breaks, I throw it out and replace it with a new one without mourning the old one. But I can’t attach value to a thing, just for the thing’s sake. With one crucial exception: I value things if they serve as reminders of people or interactions with people.
I do not understand commercialized art. I truly couldn’t see myself buying an art piece to put in my home if I don’t know the artist. And if I have to buy something like a carpet, a pillow or a lamp, because I need them for the function they serve, I treat them like the dishwasher. Clothing is particularly bad. I hate buying clothing because it’s all meaningless. I know that I could make a better impression in some situations by dressing more appropriately, but I just can’t bring myself to it.
I know that capitalism has a lot of other downsides, like how badly it handles climate change and disease prevention, but emotionally this is my biggest beef with it. I would absolutely love it if I had more relationships with people who made things and, in return, would own a lot more things that people I know have made. You can’t imagine how happy I would be if I could have a personal relationship with a tailor who made all my clothes. Giving them my money would be so much more meaningful than giving it to some giant faceless store with self-checkout registers.
But it’s not all bad. I have a few items that were made by friends and I love them very much. Also, my favorite way to sponsor creators I like is to buy their merchandise, which is an excellent compromise. Those are items which you can associate with people you at least have the illusion of knowing personally, which makes them feel just a little less meaningless. But it frustrates me that there’s so little merchandise which is actually good. I don’t need dozens of cups or pens or notebooks or whatever item is easy to customize. Also, it is often quite expensive.
Wouldn’t you also love it if you could tell a story about the chair you’re sitting on right now? Other than “I moved and needed a chair, so I went to this store and bought one”? Or is that just me being weird? Do you have ways to assign value to a mass produced object that exceeds its function? Or do you think you don’t need to? I find it sad that we throw away so many items without second thought, not just for the ecological impact but also because of how empty it makes our lives.
