Yesterday I went to see my hand guy.
Good news: I've been so proactive about my carpal tunnel syndrome, the nerve damage is minimal and easily contained.
Fun news: As I was cooling my heels in the waiting room, I saw an issue of National Geographic (Sept. 2006 issue)with the intriguing article title on the front: "Every Shoe Tells a Story", by National Geographic senior writer Cathy Newman on page 78. I picked it up and started reading.
It was in an orthopaedic department, so I assumed it was about how you could tell something from the wear on a shoe. There was a little of that. Examination of bones from prehistoric people show their feet were more stolid and strong compared to our modern feet, which have been coddled by footwear for millennia.
And I really mean "millennia". Did you know that some of the world's oldest known examples of prehistoric clothing are shoes? Sandals, to be more specific. Though it's believed hide shoes were the first shoes, the ones that have survived the best are handwoven grass/straw sandals. You can actually see how the person's foot wore through some parts of the sandal more than others, and also note the variety of sizes and shapes (within human norms, I mean. Nobody had twelve toes....) (Okay, the article didn't SAY nobody had twelve toes.)
The bulk of the article was about modern shoes and the "psychology" behind the high-fashion shoes I would normally know nothing about except for "Sex and the City" episodes. It was fascinating, a good read.
But this is the little part that tugged at my heartstrings: Every single pair of known prehistoric sandals, even those from the same sites, are different. You would think they were "just shoes" to these people who certainly had a lot more important things to think about, like how to find enough food to make it through the day, or how to outrun that saber-tooth tiger that considers THEM food. But that is clearly not the case.
Newman quotes Jenna Tedrick Kuttruff, textile expert at Lousiana State University. Kuttruff says, "The wearers of these shoes lived a subsistence existence, she says. "They didn't need to make each pair different."
"But it's human nature to make things visually appealing, to make one pair a little more complex than others to set it apart from someone else's."
Newman adds, "The desire to wear something different, distintive, and decorative--that is to say, the instinct for fashion--has been around for a very long time."
I love that sentence!
The desire to be different. Distinctive. Decorative. It's not "trivial", it is part of our nature.
The instinct for fashion.... Not just a girl thing--the shoe shown is thought to be a man's shoe.
It is another thing about us that truly defines us as human.
So there you have. Ladies--go buy shoes! It's our nature!
All kidding aside, I think this idea says something profound about why we make our art, especially our limited production and one-of-a-kind work, and why people buy it.
As powerful as our herd instinct, our desire to fit in, is the desire to be different, to stand out. We are hardwired for individualism.
As I looked at the picture of a beautifully woven sandal, I thought about the wearer--and the MAKER. Surely it crossed her mind that it would be quicker and easier to just weave the same design over and over again. But she--or her "customer"--didn't want that. They wanted something that said something different with every pair.
An old artist statement, originally written by my potter friend/mentor Barbara Sansing, talked about these ancient craftsmen when she said, "Hold this clay pot in your hand and feel that connection to those ancient artists of the distant past...." I loved that sentence so much, when she rewrote her artist statement without it, she said I could have it (minus the clay pot part, of course). There's something about it that truly does make visible to me that long, fine thread that winds its way throughout history and prehistory, that connects our hands to the hands of so many others who have come and gone before us.
I took the luxury of blogging early today because I snapped out of bed with a wonderful idea. I'm making a magpie necklace for my artist friend Lee's girl friend Maggie. It will be a true "magpie" necklace, with one of my new beautiful blakc soapstone birds and a melange of trash and trinkets, beads and pearls.
Now go to your studio today, and make something that will astonish someone living ten thousand years from now.
