All Art Must Be Anonymous and Free

Creativity is one of humanity’s most fundamental needs, essential for leading a normal life. The primal creative impulse (PCI) comes as naturally as hunger or the need for sleep. Creativity is a self-sufficient process that doesn’t inherently require a tangible outcome other than quenching the thirst for expression or realizing the PCI. It is a process that needs no cause or condition. Everything required for creativity is innate in every individual from birth. Everyone is an artist, even if they don’t realize it. And yet, the creativity of one person cannot truly serve anyone else but themselves—just as you can’t satisfy your hunger by looking at someone else’s feast.

What is Creativity?

Creativity is what a person does with heart and interest. It is a process. It doesn’t exist beforehand, nor does it remain after. Before the process, there is only material, and creativity is independent of it—because as long as there is only material, creativity has not yet begun. Therefore, the material can be anything or even nothing at all. After the process, there is the result. Creativity is also free of this, for once a result appears, the creative process has already ended. Thus, the result can be anything—or nothing at all. The result is inherently unattainable because creativity is self-sufficient and therefore without purpose.

Creativity occurs along the path from material to result. Anonymous and free (unpaid) art encompasses all the creativity in the world. Striving for monetary reward is a naive utopia. It would be nice, of course, but things don’t work that way. Every sex worker knows this. A patron can find countless ways to turn any talent into an obligation, but there is no way to pay for what you truly want and can do. Such currency simply hasn’t been invented. After all, anything done for pleasure is something you try to prolong—preferably for a lifetime. On the other hand, anything done for profit is completed as quickly and simply as possible because otherwise, it isn’t profitable. Outwardly, you might not see the difference; even if you pour ten lifetimes into it, the price will remain the same.

Why, then, bother with anonymous and free art at all? Wouldn’t it be better to dedicate your life to productive, paid work? That’s simply not possible because humans are creative beings. Their creative abilities and needs cannot be suppressed or turned off. If these abilities are blocked in traditional artistic forms such as music or painting, they will manifest elsewhere—in cooking, gardening, or even fighting.

All Art Must Be Anonymous and Free

Some might object: “What kind of art is that? It’s just hard times.” From our perspective, any activity can be considered creative if it is done with passion and interest, while any fine art can devolve into mere routine if it is done begrudgingly or out of necessity. Art itself might contain nothing soulful or interesting—nothing truly creative. Art, in its essence, is merely the skillful application of available habits toward a specific goal, and this can take many forms. You can curse creatively, like a master performer, or play the violin (even well) as if reenacting a ghost doing laundry. Simply belonging to a so-called creative profession doesn’t guarantee participation in creativity. Work, rest, and indeed every moment of existence can be an act of creativity—or it can be mere artifice. If there is no creativity or art in existence, it becomes mundane. Creativity is an engaging process, art is a good result, and gray daily life is useless tedium.

There is one clarifying term: state of being. This refers to a free and harmonious existence within circumstances, a state unbound by subordination and at one with the environment. When a person is in such a state, circumstances cease to exist for them—they themselves become a circumstance, just like everything else, though they do not perceive it that way. Everything a person does in this state—whether gathering hazelnuts, choosing a tie, engaging in street flirtation, or watching television—is what we call anonymous and free art.

Why “anonymous” and “free”? Because in the life of a social being, two considerations often disturb this state: “What do others think of me?” and “What will I get in return?” In this state, no one thinks anything, and nothing is received—neither good nor bad. If you are anonymous and free, you can exist in this state. Strictly speaking, anonymous and free art is the state of being itself and its traces in the world.

In moments of such a state, every person becomes an artist—an unknown artist, the most unknown artist, because even they are unaware of it. Everyone is an unknown artist: artists, plumbers, and sea captains alike—and that’s a good thing. We are also unknown artists, but we recognize this and cultivate it in others.