Who Are You?”

Piece #13. In the pupil of an eye, an endless heaven. From 29 Pieces.

“What we are looking for is what is looking.” — St. Francis of Assisi 

I’m still processing last month’s “Who Are You” Masquerade Ball, produced by the Green Bandana Group to benefit the 29 Pieces project.  Over 400 artists and art supporters contributed their skills, time, and resources to celebrate and further the 29 Pieces mission.

There were beaucoups creative masks & costumes, and three of the best bands in Dallas – Ishi spreading Love like Dandelion seeds, the psychedelic swagger of Hello Lover, and the midnight groove of The Gritz. There was poet Will Richey bringing the Agape rain down on us, magical food by chef Richard Pratt, and an open bar (thank you Dewars, Dripping Springs, and Bacardi). There was the brain-and-body stretching Muscle Memory dance troupe, bright sound-spins from DJ B3, cool visual art displays & videos, the unique sound and shadow-puppets of Able Youth, Texas Fencing Institute sword-fights (!), and much more, all in a perfect and huge space provided by Life in Deep Ellum (see photos and interviews on the Art Star blog).

The raw power of collaborating artists in Dallas just blows my mind. They just keep making art and sharing it with each other and anyone who cares to notice, and they don’t wait for an invitation to the museum to put it out there.  

What an exciting time to live in! Art as a force of its own is a relatively recent concept. People have been making art for a million years or more, but just 200 years ago, it referred to a particular skill, and now phrases like “the art of war” sound terribly anachronistic, don’t they? Now Art has a capital A, and it is a creative force that’s moving culture forward right along with technology.   

Speaking of technology, there’s a great book I’m reading now - “What Technology Wants”, by Kevin Kelly. The idea is that technology has evolved now to become a little bit independent.  For example, the electric grid and the internet, are programmed to overcome obstacles on their own.  The products of technology, which are also the products of humankind, are getting lighter and lighter. It reminds me of the Vivekenanda quote in my first post here: “If you carry evolution to its logical conclusion, there must come a time when that power that was in the amoeba, and which evolved as man, will have conquered all the obstructions that nature can bring before it, and will thus escape from all its environments.”

Communication and software - ideas - are becoming more important than steel and fabrics. And who better to fashion the ideas that have value than artists?

— Kelly Nash

www.29Pieces.org