Friday, July 17, 2015

The "Goth" mood was created by the fans who perceived the artists more than by the artists

It is striking how many artists were perceived as gloomy, morbid, and "goth" by the fans, but rejected that label.

Off the top of my head:

Sisters of Mercy

Siouxsie Sioux

New Order

Pop art is not a guru-teaching.  The artist is not a guru, and the fan is not a chela.  The people who come to a nightclub are making a very subtle, very powerless contribution.

The artist has a lot of authority, control, prestige.  People pay attention to the artist;  people try to ignore the fans.

Rather than making the fan unimportant, this makes the fans supremely important.  It is like the "yin" of Taoist philosophy;  it exerts no power and somehow it rules all things.

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