Campfire: 90 Day Jane - Where is the Line Between Art and Real Life?

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Permalink Reply by Matt on February 19, 2008 at 9:35am

There is definitely a fine line between an painting that is made, and a person committing suicide. When I saw this post, it blew me away for two reasons. One, this is the first time I've seen someone countdown to their day of death on a blog. Second, that Jane says that she doesn't have reason to kill herself, but that she just wants to. That's very hard for me and probably anyone to believe. People don't say things or do things without reason or an agenda. It makes me sad to see someone throw their life away, but there is one thing suicider's forget about committing suicide. They are not the only one that suffer. Everyone in that persons life: family. friends, and anyone they personally knew suffers.

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Permalink Reply by CrazyCheshireCat on February 19, 2008 at 10:14am

I'll reply properly to this later I gotta get to work!

I will randomly say however that in my first year of art college, someone killed a rabbit in class, a guest artist came in and showed gay porn to a class in the theater, and a group did a belemia awareness day. This last one involved the girls eating icecream from a bucket until they threw up, then continued to eat form the same bucket.

I think they are on the same lines, no? Anyway, something to think about until I can say what's on my mind about all this! until then.

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Permalink Reply by Derek on February 21, 2008 at 10:33am

Eating regurgitated ice cream - as art? Thank goodness I am in science! :-)

(were they at least "pretty" girls? :-D )

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Permalink Reply by Alex Moyler on February 25, 2008 at 2:54pm

Sounds more like a copy of Jackass where one of the guys makes an omelette.

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Permalink Reply by Moka on February 22, 2008 at 3:22pm

I see why we could call the belemia awareness day Art but for the two previous you mentioned...I don't see the point...

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Permalink Reply by Göran Wallin on February 19, 2008 at 11:46am

This reminds me of the Artificial Intelligence pioneer Chris McKinstry who posted his suicide note on a discussion forum entitled So what does a web suicide note look like? Just as in this case, some people didn't take him seriously, while others desperately tried to help him. Unfortunately, no one managed to find him before he was dead.

Wired recently posted an interesting review about him and Pushpinder Singh, another AI scientist who also committed suicide.

I think it's a bit macabre to do this without being serious about it.

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Permalink Reply by Elizabeth on February 19, 2008 at 11:46am

I recently had someone in my family commit suicide, someone I was extremely close to. The fact that someone would take the subject of suicide and classify it as art pisses me off! If I had seen this outside of Epic-Fu and just as a spectator ...I would have been greatly affected. I made a promise to myself that if I ever noticed anything about anyone ...a change in personality, withdraw from people, jokes of not living; I would say something. Even now I'm getting choked up...this is a serious subject and should not be something you play around with or experiment with. I often wonder what would have happened if someone had noticed my nephews calls for help over the internet...if someone had spoken up and said something...that "art" project was a slap in the face to any family member & friend who prays every day that they would have noticed....that they would have had a chance to say something to stop them. That blog would have preyed on the hearts of people who have lost someone....it makes me sick thinking of all the people who might of been affected by it.

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Permalink Reply by J. ech on February 21, 2008 at 11:15am

I couldn't agree more Elizabeth. However this project what actually does is bring attention to IT. To the people who are being driven in that direction. Granted, maybe in a cynical fashion, but it makes us talk about it, recognize the behaviors, patterns before it's too late. Art as a form of communication, like Picasso's Guernica, depicting the Nazi German bombing of Guernica, Spain WW2 in 1937.

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Permalink Reply by Derek on February 21, 2008 at 11:21am

Sorry to hear about the loss.

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Permalink Reply by Rupert on February 21, 2008 at 7:29pm

I agree, Elizabeth. I'm so sorry that this has happened to you, and I'm not surprised by your response. For me, it's not a question of whether it's art or not. My thoughts, on video:

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Permalink Reply by Lucy Ingham on February 19, 2008 at 12:54pm

Art should be there to have an aesthetic value and be appreciated by others.
I don't think that this has achieved either of those things

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Permalink Reply by CrazyCheshireCat on February 19, 2008 at 7:14pm

If you rely on aesthetics alone, you miss the whole point of art.
Although I myself do not think i would call it art so much as a common social delema. She said that she had no specific reason to kill herself, but that she just felt empty. She felt that there really was no reason for her existance; she was content, floating, with no real reason to continue to do so, so why not see what's beyond this? I am of course not agreeing with any of it, just trying to give some insight into what may or may not have been the point behind the "art".
Nearly everything we do can be considered an art in one way or anyother anyhow, so who are we to say it wasn't?

Many people now are coming away from their religion, coming away from our over commercialized society, then there is only emptiness. It would be the same if we were always given everything, because you have feel you have no path, no purpose, no reason to go on. We break away or we are given the world, but now what? You need to create your own purpose, it is not given to you.

I wonder if this was what she was truly going through. *shrugs* for all I know every word could have also been a lie! And if it was all a lie and not heartfelt and true, I would never even consider it to be art.

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