Arkotong Longkumer
The Edinburgh festival every year attracts millions of people from all over the world. Performers—art connoisseurs, writers, poets, musicians, actors, acrobats, comedians, the riff raff and the occasional drunkard—from all over the world congregate to make this festival a unique experience. As a spectator one is forced to choose (or not) from thousands of performances through the one-month period of this festival. The barrage of information—the ubiquitous circulation of promoting pamphlets by obtrusive acts as you try to get through the streets—often makes the whole ritual trite and sometimes irritating. For a person caught up in this whirlwind of performances, the experience can be overwhelming but rewarding.
Walking down the street and seeing the various street performers and the huge numbers of people the spectacle attracts, one constantly thinks what inspires artists? Do all artists suffer to produce narratives of emancipation? Or is that simply a romantic notion of artists and their art? Rainer Maria Rilke, that profound German poet, provides us with an insight that might help us understand the mystery of art. He says, “Art is always the outcome of having been in danger, of having gone right to the end of an experience to where no human being can go further. And the further one goes, the more peculiarly personal and unique does an experience become, and the art-object is but the necessary, irrepressible and most conclusive utterance of this uniqueness”.
Regardless of whether one agrees with this or not, it, eloquently, provides us with some understanding of the connection between expression and the “unique experience”, to which Rilke refers. Art (in a general sense) is a constant relationship between these two elements—expression and experience— it is safe to say that art has a context. Art does not exist in a vacuum, nor does is it devoid of any relationships. Art emerges from life experiences, from a vision of the world that is married to the dynamic medium of expression. To elucidate this point let us take two examples.
We know little about William Shakespeare’s view of his life. What we know, through his various writings, is that Shakespeare’s art is unique in its portrayal of the experience of Elizabethan England. The stories are interlaced with moral insights that give us a sense of the pathos, irony, joy, betrayal, jealousy, love, hatred, which relates so profoundly to our own lives. We use Shakespeare’s work as a mirror into the inner recesses of our own times. And every era, probably, read Shakespeare according to the context they were living in, reflecting upon their own experiences of betrayal, power, jealousy or love. Yet there is little biographical evidence that might point to any of these elements in his personal life. Was he the classical artist who suffered at the hands of the tempestuous and often cruel audiences like William Blake or Van Gogh did? Was his work recognised by the people, or did it gain prominence only after his death? From the portraits we have of Shakespeare, one hardly gets the image of a tortured artist, under the twilight of Elizabethan England. Rather, one gets the impression that Shakespeare was under the tutelage of wealthy patrons. So what was unique and dangerous about his experience?
Many of us have heard of Eminem as the troubled person who has managed to rap his way into stardom. He is seen by many as one of the greatest rap artists of his time. Just by looking at the popularity of his persona that translates his albums into millions of dollars we can see what makes him both loved and hated. Why does his work appeal to the masses, especially the disgruntled youth? The answer lies in the vivid account of his upbringing in a unique context—in the ghettos of downtown Detroit, where survival was the norm. The broken family, the harassment, the violence, the drugs, teenage pregnancies, the parental abuse, make his social commentary feel like an episode taken from the Jerry Springer Show. The proverbial white trash. But why does he have a huge following? The social context upon which his art is based, sometimes overrides the other aspects of his music. It is the delirious delinquency of his life that so often generates attention.
These two instances, perhaps extremes, give us a context by which one understands how great artists are made. Shakespeare has to be admired because his plays are used in almost every English speaking secondary school throughout the world to better grasp the power of language or to spice up our conception of the theatre, sometimes rehashed in our own local school play. This makes his work popular, and to this day, his works are seen as classics—a merit bestowed upon great art. Or, is it the narrative depth of Shakespeare’s stories which produces great art? Can we say the same of Eminem? Does he transcend the proverbial white trash, or does the depth of his narrative sustain and decipher a particular society making his art all the more pertinent for budding Jerry Springer fans?
The popularity of these two artists can be understood by the different contexts in which they are operating. But are we able to say the same about Eminem as we can about Shakespeare? Even if we were to understand Shakespeare’s possible suffering as we do Eminem’s, can we urge the reader to appreciate the former better? Suffering, in the case of artists—or to follow the maxim “the poet needs the pain”—is important in understanding where the artist is placed, but it is not the only ruler by which we can measure great art. Perhaps we only see the value of artists in hindsight, creating role models for society from history, or can we appreciate the works themselves in their particular context? Certainly, one can say that Van Gogh did not have the luxury of his art being appreciated in his time, neither did Blake. So, yes, the artist does suffer, but that cannot be the only measure of producing great art. Artists produce great art because it is necessary, or as Rilke reminds us, “irrepressible and most conclusive utterance of this uniqueness”. The audience may identify, or not, with this uniqueness but for the artist it is only natural. The grand vision of Shakespeare’s art, transcends space and time, can we say the same of Eminem? Or, is Eminem’s art simply populist cosmopolitanism?
An artist asks society to appreciate his art regardless of his existential relation to society but by the merit of his work. Then, Eminem and Shakespeare, both have an equal standing in terms of their art—the only measure of difference is the way the eye conceives it. That is up to the spectator. Naga artists should hold this in mind and Naga society should not repress their narratives because each narrative is unique. It is not mere happenstance, it is bestowed. And like any great art, it is meant to be told.
