I have recently added the intention of using the simple thing of color to turn the American culture around…
One of my archetypes that I call upon for inspiration and guidance is Mahatma Gandhi. At the end of WW2, President Harry S. Truman considered the greatest threat to democracy to be the British Empire. But without firing a shot, Gandhi led the nation of India to independence by using simple things. He encouraged the people of India to make their own cloth, to make their own salt. This took from the Empire things that they were using to enslave the people. He removed things that were benefiting only the Empire, therefore making India less valuable to keep…
The American Empire’s culture is not a culture of the people, it is corporate culture. It is a culture without flavor, without color, that seeks to remove the unique and replace it with what Henry Miller called "the mentality of the herd". The mom and pop store, the unique bohemian coffee house, the corner diner, is being replaces with the ubiquitous Starbucks, Jamba Juice, and 7-11. Everywhere one goes, more and more there is a sameness to America…
This no truer than in regard to residential communities. The newer communities are manifesting the tendency that will dominate all of America in the 21st Century. When a family buys a home in these newer communities, they must agree to paint their homes only specific colors. Therefore, to buy a home in such a community is to sell your right to personal expression. Why is this? It is to create a situation where no one’s aesthetic is offended, so that the highest resale value for a home may be achieved. For America has adapted the poisonous value, reason for having a home. It is not to live in, but to sell. This value is poisonous because it abandons the value that a home is to rest in, to have identity with the community, to entertain family and friends, to express one’s self… to live…
In the 30 years that I worked in the motion picture industry, my wages rose 7 times the original. But during that same time, the cost of a single family dwelling rose 17 times. The rise of my wage can be attributed to inflation, the rise of the cost of living. But the rise in the price to purchase a home can only be attributed to greed. If the trend continues, this will result in the end of private property in the US. For real property will become so expensive that only corporations will be able to afford to purchase property…
American culture is now so intertwined with corporate culture that it seems that the knot is too hard to untie. Corporate culture is doing things around the globe that are creating enemies, destroying the environment, endangering food supplies, as is exemplified by the corporation Monsanto. The pursuit of gain has become the only American value. The founding fathers of the US would be appalled to see that America has become like the Empire that they were resisting. Gandhi resisted British forced farming of crops that did not directly benefit the people of India. In a similar manner, Monsanto’s BT cotton is causing a sharp rise in the suicides of Indian farmers, as their crops fail…
Monsanto has a firm grasp on the American government, rotating employees of Monsanto into the government and back again. Supreme Court Justice, Clarence Thomas is a former Monsanto employee. The bribing of officials of other nations has been well documented, as well as the firing of whistle blowing scientists. Monsanto corn is currently cross breeding with indigenous corn in Mexico that the people depend on…
So what to do, what to do? Armed uprising is an option that no one wants to see. The weapons to overthrow such actions of the corporate culture must be subtle, un-attackable. We must look to the example of Gandhi and his simple weapons, arms that can not justify a counter force. I have chosen "color" as my weapon. To encourage people to not forsake their right to free expression of their personal taste. Living in Tijuana Mexico, I am surrounded by this free expression. Color combinations are used here that are bold, in your face, with no regard for others aesthetics. If a movement is created that values personal expression over what will cause real estate to move at top dollar value, it is my belief that this will have far reaching effects on the American culture…
It is to create a situation where no one's aesthetic is offended, so that the highest resale value for a home may be achieved. For America has adapted the poisonous value, reason for having a home. It is not to live in, but to sell. This value is poisonous because it abandons the value that a home is to rest in, to have identity with the community, to entertain family and friends, to express one's self… to live…
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Michael,
The same is happening in Lisbon, where ample city areas are sistematically bought by large corporations and stay closed for years until they reach the desired area for some pretentious so-called luxury houses and hotels de charme.
I am an arquitecture photographer, and very much concerned with the fast destruction of period very habitable spaces in order to create market assets and prestige somethings.
So, it is needless to say that I support your defense of individual expression with all my self.
let's keep in touch, shall we?
love, catarina
Ah, Michael, please come to Alaska. Not Anchorage where I live (they say Anchorage is not Alaska but you can see it from here) because we do have a some of what you are describing. But, Alaska, where we are still quite wild and free and people often don't paint their dwellings at all.