If you record it, it's definitely art

As cool as some ideas are, I wonder if they are all art. How many steps in the process are required? If you have too much time on your hands and do something quirky is that really art, or just puttering around in the shop?

One line of thinking could insist, or at least suggest, that it has to be commodified first. Turned into a form and set into a process where others can consume it. If you can't get people to come into your shop to admire it (if not actually purchase it), then you have to get it into a gallery, craft-fair or cafe.

So there has to be an audience.

If this line of reasoning has merit, then every quirky person should seriously consider taking up photography. No matter what you decide to do with your morning, if you take pictures of it, it is instantly commodified. I suppose that film-making could serve the same purpose, but it is more expensive and the commodity is less compact and portable, YouTube aside.

I also contend that film-making is too much process, because people expect a higher degree of artifice in their films -- even the ones that are praised as being "gritty realism", "cinema verite", or "slice of life" to name just a few common descriptions of very different sorts of films. As Guy Madden recently noted, "No one wants to watch the security tape". Especially if it is just recording the static outcome of an artists labours. Or maybe that's just me.

So if you intend to spend your summer mending spider webs then you should take a photography course in the next few weeks. Your art will have more legs... er, so to speak.

Cheers