The War of Art

achieve psychological security. They know where they stand. The world makes sense.
     
    Of the two orientations, the hierarchical seems to be the default setting. It’s the one that kicks in automatically when we’re kids. We run naturally in packs and cliques; without thinking about it, we know who’s the top dog and who’s the underdog. And we know our own place. We define ourselves, instinctively it seems, by our position within the schoolyard, the gang, the club.
     
    It’s only later in life, usually after a stern education in the university of hard knocks, that we begin to explore the territorial alternative.
     
    For some of us, this saves our lives.

 
    THE HIERARCHICAL ORIENTATION
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    Most of us define ourselves hierarchically and don’t even know it. It’s hard not to. School, advertising, the entire materialist culture drills us from birth to define ourselves by others’ opinions. Drink this beer, get this job, look this way and everyone will love you.
     
    What is a hierarchy, anyway?
     
    Hollywood is a hierarchy. So are Washington, Wall Street, and the Daughters of the American Revolution.
     
    High school is the ultimate hierarchy. And it works; in a pond that small, the hierarchical orientation succeeds. The cheerleader knows where she fits, as does the dweeb in the Chess Club. Each has found a niche. The system works.
     
    There’s a problem with the hierarchical orientation, though. When the numbers get too big, the thing breaks down. A pecking order can hold only so many chickens. In Massapequa High, you can find your place. Move to Manhattan and the trick no longer works. New York City is too big to function as a hierarchy. So is IBM. So is Michigan State. The individual in multitudes this vast feels overwhelmed, anonymous. He is submerged in the mass. He’s lost.
     
    We humans seem to have been wired by our evolutionary past to function most comfortably in a tribe of twenty to, say, eight hundred. We can push it maybe to a few thousand, even to five figures. But at some point it maxes out. Our brains can’t file that many faces. We thrash around, flashing our badges of status (Hey, how do you like my Lincoln Navigator?) and wondering why nobody gives a shit.
     
    We have entered Mass Society. The hierarchy is too big. It doesn’t work anymore.

 
    THE ARTIST AND THE HIERARCHY
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    For the artist to define himself hierarchically is fatal.
     
    Let’s examine why. First, let’s look at what happens in a hierarchical orientation.
     
    An individual who defines himself by his place in a pecking order will:
     
    1) Compete against all others in the order, seeking to elevate his station by advancing against those above him, while defending his place against those beneath.
     
    2) Evaluate his happiness/success/achievement by his rank within the hierarchy, feeling most satisfied when he’s high and most miserable when he’s low.
     
    3) Act toward others based upon their rank in the hierarchy, to the exclusion of all other factors.
     
    4) Evaluate his every move solely by the effect it produces on others. He will act for others, dress for others, speak for others, think for others.
     
    But the artist cannot look to others to validate his efforts or his calling. If you don’t believe me, ask Van Gogh, who produced masterpiece after masterpiece and never found a buyer in his whole life.
     
    The artist must operate territorially. He must do his work for its own sake.
     
    To labor in the arts for any reason other than love is prostitution. Recall the fate of Odysseus’ men who slew the cattle of the sun.
     
    Their own witlessness cast them away.
    The fools! To destroy for meat the oxen
    of the most exalted Sun, wherefore the sun-god
    blotted out the day of their return.
     
    In the hierarchy, the artist faces outward. Meeting someone new he asks himself, What can this person do for me? How can this person advance my standing?
     
    In the hierarchy, the artist looks up and looks down. The one place he can’t look is that place he must: within.

 
     
    THE DEFINITION OF A HACK
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    I learned this from Robert McKee. A hack, he says, is a writer who second-guesses his audience. When the hack sits down to work, he doesn’t ask himself what’s in his own heart. He asks what the market is looking for.
     
    The hack condescends to his audience. He thinks he’s superior to them. The truth is, he’s scared to death of them or, more accurately, scared of being