Wednesday, April 09, 2008

A million little annoyances

As I sat in the Marjane Satrapi talk last night, I realized how funny all these talented artists are. She was funny, as was James Turrell; Orhan Pamuk was very, very funny. Not silly funny, but smart funny. I wonder if there's a relationship between their humor and sensibilities and their creativity. And I also realized that I'm not funny. I don't mean that I'm not funny in any way, shape, or form, I'm just not funny when it comes to talking about my work. Which is how these other artists are, they're funny when they talk about their work. Here, on this blog, where I talk about my work, I write in fingerstothebone dry style; and my artist statements and blurbs are pretty humorless, too.

Just in case that there's a connection between funny and creativity, I'd like to try for some funny. Maybe funny and creativity feed each other. Today was a perfect day for me to practice funny. As the title suggests, it was a day of a million little annoyances. No accidents, no illnesses, but lots of those annoyances that, in the hands of a funny person, could make a really funny post.

I realize that it would still not be funny about my work, but it would be good funny practice. All day I've been thinking about this, thinking how I could phrase things, present things, or highlight certain things. And I came up with...nothing.

And now I'm just too darned tired to think about funny. I think sleep trumps funny.

6 comments:

margaret said...

Hey, you forget about Chicken Hat.

Chicken Hat is way funny!

fingerstothebone said...

Hey, are you still one...or two?

Anonymous said...

I don't think you can practice funny. The attraction of funny is because it came out so effortless and spur of the moment. I guess, if you started young, probably can make it that way after years of practice. As it is now, it's kinda late. But then again, a lot of great artists are not funny. Like Van Gogh. I bet a whole lot of them are really boring. Not that I'm suggesting you to go that direction, especially when I'm about to come visit! I think you're plenty funny, including your posts. Honest.

Shumei

fingerstothebone said...

Excellent point about Van Gogh! Although I do think you can practice funny. I think it's like everything else, you just need to figure out how it works. Once you know how it works, it can flow effortless and spontaneously. But thanks for the compliment!

gl. said...

re: chicken hat: it's true! and quirky is just as good as funny.

personally, i want to know about the million little annoyances. and does that mean you went to the satrapi talk before attending the secrets & lies show?

fingerstothebone said...

gl -- the Satrapi talk was Monday night. When I wrote this entry, it was technically Wed morning at 12:46am, which is why it says Wed; but of course, in reality, it was just a continuation of Tuesday night, so 'last night' was really Monday night. I hope you're really confused by now.

OK, a million little annoyances coming right up...