I Am Not a Content Creator

The rebranding of artistic pursuit as content changes art into Slim Jims found at a truck stop in Flagstaff

I came into the adult world as a trumpet player. I played jazz, orchestral work, Sousa, and I got paid a pittance to do so. Next up was working as a professional actor (predominately performing in musical theater in regional tours). I landed in Chicago and started a theater company with some friends. That venture lasted nearly fifteen years and resulted in hundreds of original works. Then came the storytelling thing. Then the podcast stuff. Now I'm a writer of essays, short fiction, and books.

None of which I'd consider 'content.'

In the digital world of platforms, NFTs, autotune, and the increased presence and availability of art combined with the decreased attention span of the audience for it, we confront the absurd category of 'content' rather than 'art.'

I will never be famous or wealthy for creating art in part due to my motivation for its creation. 'Content' is designed to be sold and consumed. Art is created to do so many things for the audience than to be consumed. I believe if the pursuit of the ephemeral is your goal, chasing fame and money is a vacuous and sadly typical goal that is both empty and illusory.

Rather than how one creates art or what form the art takes, the operative question in determining the thing—the thing being defined as that creative endeavor you spend time to craft whether it is art or content—is why you create it in the first place. Yes, in a sociopolitical atmosphere that emphasizes impact over intent, intent is key.

Knowing why you do these things cuts to the heart of intent. In the crafting of artistic expression, the tendency to justify our work by its popularity or lack therein is commonplace. It's sadly typical to meet someone who has great talent combined with the drive to use that talent to become famous and rich. It is also sadly typical to meet that tortured soul who has talent but no hustle for the business languish in obscurity.

Regardless of the commercial success or failure of a work of art (or body of work), I'd argue that the why of creation is far more important in determining the intrinsic substance of the thing than any amount of talent or craft, more important than any degree of fame or material gain. The intent is paramount. And if the intent is on money or fame or material success or status? The only guaranteed outcome is mediocrity.

Mediocrity isn't defined by production value or retail price or social media reach any more than your essential humanity is not defined by your credit score. Mediocrity is defined by the ideas behind the creation of the art. It is framed by the intent. You can spend a shitload of money on marketing and costumes and a really nice proscenium theater but if your motivation to create the work is focused on appealing to everyone, the hill you must climb to be exceptional (or even remotely interesting) is gonna be too daunting.

Watching old episodes of Kitchen Nightmares on Hulu (I'm a Gordon Ramsay junkie and definitely enjoy 'content') and the one constant is that these people invite him into their restaurants with the expectation that what they are doing is perfect but no one knows about it and Ramsay's fame will jumpstart their already perfect business. The delusion is that each restaurateur is doing a bang up job and that the only thing in their way to fortune is some good old fashioned marketing and maybe some nicer wallpaper.

What ultimately comes out of the narrative is that each restaurant owner is thinking about profits over food. Bodies rather than quality of experience. And it's true that about sixty percent of the restaurants Ramsay saves go under inside of a year later. My guess is that the realization that creating a truly interesting product is really hard and mediocrity is just easier.

Mediocre art is easier to dismiss. It is easily replaceable. Think back: can you actually remember any of the plot details of any Transformers movie? Can you sing any single Justin Bieber song?

We are sold on the idea of mediocrity from the first days. We give attendance awards to children. We push them to regurgitate facts (and most often facts concerning history that exclude all but the whitest, landownerist information). We push each child to accept conformity and obedience to authority as virtues, and that meeting Minimum Basic Standards is good enough. We buy them McDonald's as rewards and train them to see material things as the highest form of happiness.

Mediocrity is the acceptance of doing just enough to get away with it without rigorous interrogation of value. By placing monetary value over experiential value, we reinforce the idea that success artistically is defined primarily by commerce and popularity.

The sweet spot resides in intent when the passion for the creation is motivated by the passion for the completed work without an outside factor coming in to play.

I bake a cake and can declare it is a good cake because I tasted it and it was good. If seven other people taste my cake and are nonplussed, it is still a good cake but it seems my taste is not in keeping with the popular opinion.

You bake a cake and in spite of how you feel about it, the cake is only deemed a good cake if those seven other tasters pass favorable judgment on it. It's only good if each of the seven buy a cake from you.

Yes, we are, all of us, whores selling our most precious parts and skills to the highest bidder, sucking cocks in alleyways and humping strangers in the back of a van for a C-note desperately hoping that Richard Gere will one day buy us a red-sequined dress. Dancing monkeys scrambling for a peanut, the system we live in is rigged to favor those who know how to make a buck rather than those who can create things that edify, educate and inspire ideas.

Thus, a landfill of pointless Tik Tok videos, bikini influencers, memes, time-filling Netflix shows, true crime podcasts, Instagram stories, OnlyFans accounts—content. All of it designed to get attention with little regard to what value it has once that attention is gained. A mountain of face slaps followed by the promise of more slaps if you subscribe.

Create art for the sake of creation. Write the book you would want to read. Sculpt the figure that captures your mind's eye. Take the photograph that inspires you. Write the poem that flays your flesh. Dance from the electric heart within you. Anything less than this is a pander. Anything less than this is 'content.' Anything less than this and you might as well be selling zit cream or yogurt.

Ignore authority. Better yet, create art that defies authority, that spits in the face of the system that dictates monetary value and popularity over purity of intent and authenticity of idea.

Work hard to make a living, to feed yourself, to pay your rent but work harder to create that which feeds your soul.

Surprise yourself. Shock your own mundane sensibilities. Push beyond what you think is acceptable or in good taste or part of a genre. Scare the shit out of your parents and teachers. Art is a sledgehammer that destroys the convenient trappings of the now and a glue that pieces the broken shards together to form the new.

Art is the Magna Carta written on a roll of toilet paper — seek not permanence of the art but permanence of the ideas behind it.

Content creators have already become commodified. Artists can never be.