Jazz Funeral

I really enjoy listening to a young man in our class who is named Saul. He has so much to say and is so invested in this experience, when he raises his hand and waits to be called on to add to the discussion he holds up the number of fingers that coincides with the number of comments he wants to make. If someone else is talking, he will sometimes change from holding up 2 fingers to holding up 3. However many ideas it is, they generally elicit more comments from the rest of the class.

He was so dejected the other day in class because he said the more he thought about it, the more certain he is becoming sure that it really IS the death of Art as we know it. He says we need to have an actual funeral with "Art" in the casket - and someone in the class added, "A New Orleans style funeral!" I think this is a great idea.

My friends at Wikipedia say that a typical jazz funeral begins with a march by the family, friends, and a brass band from the home, funeral home or church to the cemetery. Throughout the march, the band plays somber dirges and hymns. A change in the tenor of the ceremony takes place, after either the deceased is buried, or the hearse leaves the procession and members of the procession say their final good bye and they "cut the body loose". After this the music becomes more upbeat, often starting with a hymn or spiritual number played in a swinging fashion, then going into popular hot tunes. There is raucous music and cathartic dancing where onlookers join in to celebrate the life of the deceased.

We could start our procession for "The Death of Art" at the DSM Art Center and march to the Pappajohn Sculpture Park. That would symbolize beginning at the old school and ending at the new. I was discussing this with Tom and Jordan when we met at the Pappajohn Park today for class and Tom suggested that maybe it should go the other direction and end at the museum, because "that is where Art goes to die". Hmmmm.

"What would go in the casket?" asked Jordan. I think each classmate should provide something that represents what we think Art is, thereby treating the casket more like a time capsule. Tom thought we should each make individual headstones. Maybe we need to all make an "Art" effigy, a representation of a person, especially in the form of sculpture or some other three-dimensional form.

"No one is going to let us bury that," I said, thinking that we would not really be walking to a cemetery anyway. "Someone might, if it is on private land" pointed out Jordan.

"Maybe we shouldn't bury it, maybe we should burn it. Give it a roaring Viking funeral, " I said. Then I volunteered the fire pit at my house. Hmmmm - the existence of that (actually a Victorian fish pond) and the use of it for a fire is actually quite illegal in the city limits of DSM. The Fire Department has been to my house twice and forced me to put out my "cooking fire" (I always have hot dogs in my fridge). If they stop a third time I think I will be fined. I officially retract that offer so it has been documented that I do not approve of fires on my property in my Victorian fish pond or anywhere else outside of a Fire Department approved Weber grill.

We could paint on newspapers our personal images or definitions of Art and send them up as Chinese fire balloons - you know, you twist the four corners of the newsprint into a knot at the bottom, so it is puffed up like a pillow, and when you light the edges of the knot, the heat carries it upward while it burns into ashes that dissipate and vanish. Very cool thing to do at night when there is no wind and you have lots of newspapers and no large trees overhead (best in winter when there are no dead leaves on the branches).

On an obsessive note, Saul, you keep referring to it as The Death of Art and I have to point out the class is titled The End of Art. It may or may not mean the same thing to everyone, but "Death" seems so much more permanent than "End". If it is "death" then we should all be considered Art EMT's - we need to resuscitate Art and make sure Art does not die.

So what can we do as a class to keep Art alive in Des Moines? We could keep brainstorming on the funeral idea, as long as a celebration is involved and we aren't completely macabre. I ate at Zombie Burger last night - that might be a good place to host a party or end a processional. Hey, I know - we could have a WAKE there and focus our attention on letting DSM know that they need to WAKE UP TO ART!