THE STAIRWAY TO HEAVEN
For all creatives, making art and then exhibiting the work is an adventure unto itself. Yet, some take it even further, like a Nazaré wave rider. There is a small minority of artists who go fantastically beyond, creating outside the box of an artist's reality.
The case in point is best described by the Netflix documentary "Becoming Led Zeppelin." There are two historical and remarkable aspects to the film.
The doc shows the stunning, jaw-dropping reaction to their debut. I grew up in a time when Led Zep was already established. Can you imagine discovering this radical new sound for the first time? Without a trigger warning? Old footage shows a confused and speechless audience, and that remarkable moment when we realize we are seeing and experiencing something significant for the very first time. What a feeling.
Off the edges of the canvas, the doc focuses on the eternal dilemma: Who gets to make the artistic decisions? Artists quickly raise their hands and say "I do."
The silent ones are the vets, who know better. The museum curator, the cash-strapped gallerist and the music exec hold the power.
What is an artist to do? a) Kiss the ring and move-on to make new works. b) Blow up the chancellery. c) Outfox the overlords by kidnapping your own work and demanding a ransom they cannot ignore.
The true genius of Led Zeppelin's Jimmy Page went beyond his music composition. He rewrote the manual on how their work would be approved and sold. He presented the establishment with no room to maneuver. He gave no berth to gallerist notes, demographic opinion and the helping hand of executive overreach. Led Zeppelin cleverly smiled and said take it or leave it. You cannot change a note or a sound level.
Even today, such chutzpah is otherworldy. Most of us prefer to focus on the handiwork, like calculating how long it will take the paint to dry before we can add another layer. Most of us quietly seethe with resentment, shrug it off and move on. And a very few others, like Jimmy Page, play the Great Game on a whole different level.
"Becoming Led Zeppelin" is aspirational for a creative of every medium. Artists have no time to spare on righteous anger, but we do have ten minutes to kick the bricks of the foundation.
We are creators, not destroyers.
Art Report Today .com
