I have been reading Ben Shahn's book "The Shape of Content". I found it laying around my apartment, and I don't read enough. His paintings of current events are stories altered by his personal history and his emotions. He said that good art has a universality that comes out of deep specificity and individuality. To be universal it would seem that something should be simpler- a generality, that it should contain a little bit of everyone. But actually to make a universality, something must be completely unique. It is one of those visual contradictions I love. He said if you could make the "average American" it would become no american at all. It is what makes us unique, what makes us individuals, that inspires us and draws us together. This is what makes men and women feel like human beings, what makes us feel close to each other. But most of all I like Ben Shahn because he painted these pictures that have inspired me to make new work of clapping politicians.
