6/27/13

A Call To Chalk

With all the stories in the news lately about people being arrested for sidewalk chalking I had a realization. The reason it makes the news and spreads around Facebook so well is because everyone thinks it is ridiculous. Everyone has fond memories of making art on the ground in a state of freedom that no adult really understands. Evidently. Because side walk chalking your most passionate deepest feelings is now an arrestable offense. Or even a serious vandalism charge. 

As we all know sidewalk chalk washes off with water. That is why you are allowed to do it. Well if you are a good parent you leave it until the rain washes it away because you love your child's artistic side and you are glad at least kids still get to experience that for a little while with as much as we try and control them. 

Sidewalk chalk is the answer. We all need to connect to the child inside of us who just wants to draw on the earth. Whether it be a stick in the sand on the beach or drawings on the walls. I believe children communicate in many ways adults overlook. If we can't understand what they say we act like they are not developed enough instead of seeing Our inability to connect with them.

When they draw they are writing. They are telling a story. Our language is the language of children. Words use to BE art. They were drawings. The people who could write were the most important, those of knowledge and skill who could communicate to future generations what we had learned. 

There are some shapes and symbols that occur in children's drawings that are universal. Did we teach them that or do they have the images inside them from our collective knowledge?

We teach them how to hold a pen. We teach them how to communicate in a more uniform manner assuming that makes it easier to really know how another person feels or sees. 

Even the most handicapped of bodies and minds can create somehow. I have an aunt who has taught art to handicapped adults for most of her adult life. Their life has meaning because art exists. I believe that is true for all of us, it is just more obvious to those who have lost all their money or their health and can see that all we have is art. 

Art is about communication. Everything that is not for the sake of profit is for the sake of art. Games even are an overlooked form or art. Someone created the rules and the apparatus for all games. Just because we take basketball hoops for granted doesn't make them any less of a beautiful universal invention. 

Who was the first person brave enough to fall forward flipping over towards the water and point their hands and feet so that there is no splash? Art. You have to choose to see it. You have to choose to create it. 

So grab some sidewalk chalk. In the event you don't have sidewalk chalk, any medium will do. Garbage makes great art, and in the land of consumption there is plenty of that. 


You need the world to understand how You feel and sometimes text and technology just don't have the same feel as sidewalk chalk. Sometimes they do. Sometimes I feel my Facebook is a complex modern art piece. That's why they call me insane. 

If you are too afraid to make art alone, as it can be frightening to face the demons inside, our unbridled connection to everything, and the emotion that comes with it. Befriend a child. They will be excited to teach you how to sidewalk chalk and thrilled someone is listening.

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