Taking control
My friend's band Golden Ears just released a video and I love both the concept and its execution. The house he was living in was set to be demolished, so they decided to turn the entire house into a piece of art — and then destroy it.
Initially, this creation and destruction of the art piece appears counterintuitive: why spend all that time investing in something, only to destroy it once it's completed? It seems it a bit drastic doesn't it; the nullifying of this creative act?
Yet, the reality is that all of our creative work is subject to destruction and such destruction can't be escaped. That is, it's not a question of if our art will disappear, but when it will disappear.
Of course, we like to imagine that the art we make and share will continue on for years after we're dead, but with the amount of "art" and "information" being produced and shared each day, our art will eventually be suffocated and will cave beneath the weight of all that comes after.
Does that mean we stop creating? Not at all. We continue creating in hopes that what we create explodes through the pile of "art" and "information," and when we can, take control of both the start and the end of our art's life.
We produce and destroy, then, to assert our artistic autonomy in the face of a world that often seeks to stifle, appropriate, control, or even destroy it. Then, the destructive act becomes as much a creative act as the creative act itself.