Art and Culture

or: How I Learnt To Stop Worrying And Enjoy The Shit I Like

Like a lot of people, I’m sure, there came a time in my early-to-mid twenties when I discovered stuff. I don’t mean the stuff that you find in the middle of Oreos (although I did also discover that at around this time, too), nor the stuff that, seemingly lost, ends up cowering in a heap under one’s bed; I mean the stuff of untold riches, endless education, limitless learning: I discovered art and culture. I was turned on by friends and contemporaries to artistic and cultural gems, taking myriad forms, from art to music, literature to film. My mind was blown by books more learned and enlightening than I’d ever imagined; painting so exquisitely executed and conceptually multi-layered that it it hurt my noggin; sophisticated (and foreign) film-making that put the tawdry Hollywood churn to shame; and music, so much fresh, original music, with lyrics so meant and felt about topics I was new to, and tunes and melodies so intense and perfect.

I devoured it all. Whatever my contemporaries poured into my lap and, to a lesser extent, whatever I sought out of my own volition, I absorbed, yummed up, revelled in. I envied Bukowksi for his Bacchanalian excesses and his perfect way with words. I admired Boy Sets Fire and Propagandhi for fighting the cause, in the face of almost universally apathetic adversary. I mentally saluted Chomsky for doing his part in setting the record straight and holding people to account. I doffed my hat to Dali for capturing the stuff of dreams with only paints and a canvas. I loved it all.

A common story for a lot of people.

As the years went on, I consumed more and more. I felt I was becoming smarter with every politically-charged CD, every liberal/left tract, every French or German art house flick. I started to see a socio-political-intellectual hierarchy into which I fit – not anywhere near the top, for sure, but certainly not at the bottom. Oh no, there were those tawdry Daily Mail-reading, Oasis-listening heathens at the bottom of the pecking order. I was better than them, surely.

But what of those ahead of me in this hierarchy? What did I have to do to move up a level, to be able to look down on me at my current level as I looked down on the Daily Mail denizens and Oasis neanderthals. Maybe I just had to slog through a couple more Pilger and Monbiot books. A couple more painful abstract art exhibitions might be enough. That new, barely listenable, anarcho-vegan-hardcore CD? Yeah, that should suffice. A promotion up the ladder should be on the cards for me. And on it went, for year after painful, tortured year.

And then it hit me, like a wrecking ball to the chest. Holy shit, what the fuck am I doing? I was subjecting myself to all this supposedly highbrow, eye-opening art and culture, force-feeding myself seemingly against my will, all for the privilege of being able to say “Yes, I have read Baudrillard, actually. Have you?”, or “No, Kurosawa always struck me as a little mainstream, actually.”

What. A. Dick.

I instantly hated myself. Hated all the media I had devoured over the previous half-decade. I didn’t want to read another book. I didn’t want to listen to another CD. I didn’t want watch anything but the dumbest, stupidest, big budget, popcorn-chomping Hollywood movie. I gave up on art and culture in almost all of its media.

Time passed. Gradually, I started to read again. The odd novel here. The odd humour book there. I enjoyed them. I gradually started to check out foreign flicks again – nothing that didn’t appeal, though – Guillermo del Toro’s movies, or the odd Takeshi Kitano. Movies that were good because they were good, not good because they were foreign and little known to the masses. I watched and read and listened to what I though I might like, not what I thought might better me, or impress others. I learnt to stop worrying about ticking off items from the list of Things You Should Have Read/Seen/Listened To Before You Die, and I started to enjoy shit that I liked. I didn’t feel guilty about putting on Nirvana instead of a spoken word album, nor did hesitate in slipping the Die Hard DVD in, rather than subjecting myself to something with subtitles and no soundtrack. I didn’t feel in the least bit strange when Taxi Driver did nothing for me, nor when I had to stop reading Catch-22 about a third of the way in for fear of dying of boredom. Such is life.

It doesn’t matter that there’s shit art out there. You don’t have to consume it. The shit stuff merely makes everything else seem more enjoyable (“It could be worse. I could be watching Marley & Me.”). But if you do have a strange affection for Dan Brown or Friends, it really doesn’t matter. You lap it up, champ, if it floats your boat.

Likewise it doesn’t matter that there’s smart, high-fallutin’ art out there that the cool kids dig – if the very notion of it makes you feel slightly queasy, then it’s not for you. You don’t have to dig it. But, again, if that shit does rock your world, then fill your boots.

Consequently, I’m perfectly happen to be reading The Complete Jack The Ripper at the moment, whilst a pristine, unread copy of Norwegian Wood sits on the shelf. Likewise, I watched Grumpy Old Men the other night, whilst an unopened copy of Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance sits gathering dust on the media unit. Sure, I’ll come to these fine pieces of art at some point, but only when I want to.


Life’s too short to worry about this shit. Don’t be afraid to like what you like. Be proud of it*.


* Unless you’re a Daily Mail reader, in which case you should be thoroughly ashamed.