THE ART EXCHANGE, an experiment



Local painter Andrew Turman knocked on the hotel door one day with a passionate new idea, "How about an Art Exchange, where everyone puts some work of art on the table, explains it, and then gets to pick someone else's work?"

So, we ran with it. It was a great success. It took place last September here in the hotel. The first floor Beat Room was ringed with about twenty participating artists (including singer Damian Youth, actress Maggie McOmie, cinematographer Baird Bryant, poet Manuel Ibarra, among others). Everyone's work was championed. And everyone left with a free work of art of some kind. It was a pretty interesting afternoon.

We learned about the masks and painted works Maggie McOmie creates. We learned about Mike Yanisov's two daughters, the reason he picked someone's jewlery creations. We learned all kinds of little secrets behind the creation process and what was important to each artist adding something to the table. The stories people told behind each work suddenly tripled their value. Some people added additional works, signed books, old photographs, unique bric-a-brac, original handwritten letters from key events in our mythology, you name it. There was so much additional cool stuff on the table that we were able to grab others in the hotel to come and take their pick regardless of contributiuing. It was wonderful.

Ironically, Andrew himself was the only person who didn't make it to his own event!!!

____________________________________________________

What Being Beat Means to Me
by Andrew Turman

My first exposure to the Beats was when I was 17 and in high school. I was living in Texas and went to a church camp. Of course, by this time I had denounced my religion, but hoped to reconnect to something I had lost. Little did I know that I was about to undergo an awakening, a life-altering experience that would change the way I viewed the world forever.

I met a guy in my cabin by the name of Alan. He was a real loner type, apart from the crowd at every opportunity. He always wore chinos, even in the Texas heat, and a white "wife-beater" t-shirt. He was thin, with a sharp angular face. I don’t know why he chose me to talk to, or what hidden potential he saw, but as I reflect upon it, he came to me at a time when I needed it most.

It was obvious to me that he was queer, not that it mattered, but that was the focus of many of the poems he shared with me. Perhaps he was coming on to me; I have always been a bit naïve about that sort of thing. He gave me a worn copy of Jack Kerouac’s "On the Road," and said I could keep it. It turned out to be one of the most influential books I have ever read.

The only other time I saw Alan was at one of the parties I held at my house. My parents were gone, we had a pool…do the math. He showed up with a few of his fag-hag friends, definitely stand-outs compared to my crowd. He got me high for the very first time and left shortly afterwards. I never saw him again; he was out of my life as suddenly as he entered it, but he left a lasting impression that I still feel strongly today.

I read and re-read "On the Road," and had to buy a new copy when I went off to college. There were stacks of them in the student bookstore. It must
have been required reading that semester for some course. It was at this time that I didn’t just read about the Beat Generation. I was starting to live it.

I had only smoked marijuana once before going to college, and that was with Alan. It didn’t really do much for me then. I was more of a beer drinker. Then I had the opportunity to smoke a lot, as I became good friends with a dealer of the stuff. Anytime I wanted to get high, it was not a problem. There were weeks at a time when all I did was smoke pot and go to class, drink some beer and get high again.

The situation got so bad that my folks made me transfer to another university closer to family and friends. Geography cannot change one’s behavior for long. Soon enough, I had found other pseudo-Beats to hang out with, drinking coffee, smoking cigarettes, solving the problems of the universe around a café table late at night. Naturally, drug use soon followed.

I never did any hard drugs; mainly, I smoked pot. I did acid 3 times and mushrooms a handful of times. I would drink, as it was most convenient way to get out of my head, but my drug of choice was pot…and pot…and even more pot.

Our favorite activity during the summer of drugs was to go on "Fear Trips," or to take my ’65 Chevrolet Biscayne out on the back roads of Middle Tennessee. Half out of our heads on drugs and all out of our heads in the ecstasy of living, we roamed the countryside, tap-hammering around curves in the days of cheap gasoline.

School was just a formality. It provided some structure to our otherwise chaotic, bacchanalian lifestyle. As I read more Beat literature, and studied
Beat culture, I realized that this was more than just a mere fascination:
something about the philosophy touched me deep inside. Being bohemian was more than a lifestyle; it was an attitude and outlook on life.

I began studying the Beats in depth. I learned that I shared the same birthday with James Dean and Neal Cassady (the notorious Dean Moriority character from "On the Road"). William S. Burroughs and I were distantly related through Robert E. Lee. Allen Ginsberg did a poetry reading at my college. I learned so much during those days, about how I wanted my life to be, and how to get there.

Needless to say, things never turn out as planned. As soon as I graduated I wound up entering a mental institution (not something unusual for me; I
had been in quite a few before). Not long after being released, I met my future wife, Nicole. After a whirlwind romance, we were soon married and had our child, Harper.

I started graduate school, and continued my habits I picked up early in my college career. I never had to study, as school came easily to me. Nicole and I realized that something just wasn’t quite right about how Harper was developing. It turned out than he had Corneila de Lange Syndrome, a rare genetic disorder. I was devastated, and spent many years grieving over that loss. My faith took another blow.

I got wrapped up in work for a while, and lost my way. I lost jobs due to my mental health issues, and my life took a real down turn. I started the
revolving door process with hospitals again, after a ten year run without
inpatient care. I was putting a huge strain on my family and was forced to separate from my wife and son for a while.

I spent that time on the streets and between flophouses, hustling for my food and drugs, doing a few stints in jail. I was totally out of my mind,
stark raving mad. Eventually I came to the realization that I could no longer exist in that manner. I went home.

My younger sister came to my rescue one Christmas. She gave me a series of books on Buddhism. Finally, a belief system that an existential nilhist like me could believe in. I studied the books, spending my time just sitting still trying to understand what I read and attempting to learn how to meditate.

There is a joke about Buddhists: there are those that are meditating and those that feel guilty that they are not meditating. I definitely fall into
the latter category. I have tried hard, and mastered the art of breathing, but the full-fledged meditation still eludes me.

A few years ago I met Blair Murphy, the owner of an old hotel in town, the Grand Midway. I was walking around my neighborhood and saw the "Beat Mobile," a travelling museum dedicated to spreading the message of the Beats to the present generation, who are unfamiliar with the philosophy that was present in the late 1950’s and early 60’s. As it turned out, for a few years Blair had hosted a number of beat KerouacFests over the years.

I was shocked that in the sleepy little coal mining town in southwestern Pennsylvania in which I lived, people from all across the country congregated to celebrate the spirit of the Beat Generation. I felt excited, rejuvenated, happy to remember the bohemian life I had led so many years ago.

I got in touch with the ideals I had held for so long, but had forgotten. I reread "Dharma Bums," by Jack Kerouac, a peaon to Buddhism. I started to find my center, although I still haven’t reached it. My life was settling down, finally.

At the gatherings at the Grand Midway, I met many interesting people. Sure, some were posers, neophytes and synchophants, just as I was when I was young. Some were true artists, amazing people that were filled with the creative juices I possessed. I drew upon the energy of others to create my own new master works of art. I met John Cassady, the son of Neal, who regaled me with stories about his father and "Uncle Jack," Allen Ginsberg, the Beatles, and the Grateful Dead. He helped me get over a traumatic experience I had over 20 years prior.

I experienced a "blow out" at the final KerouacFest and was unable to fully participate in an idea I had---an "Art Exchange"---where artists of all
types would place works in the middle of a circle, and pick one to keep. Instead, I was hiding in my house, a prisoner in my own mind, tormented by my personal demons, once again.

Today, I no longer party to the extremes that I used to do. Once in a blue moon, I will drink the occasional beer with a meal. More infrequently, I will get high. Everything I do, I try to do in moderation (but as Oscar Wilde said, including moderation). I spent an entire year in a self-imposed moratorium on my art. During that time, I spent most of my time sitting, just sitting, thinking about myself, and how to live.

When I was young, I fancied myself to be like my idol, James Dean; live fast and leave a good-looking corpse. I managed to escape death more times than I care to remember. By all rights, I should not be alive today. Too many car crashes, too many suicide attempts, too many dangerous situations; I am surprised I have managed to tell this tale.

Then for a while, I was the Kerouac figure in my circle, well-educated, disaffected, discontent with society and tired of the materialism and greed of the 1980’s. I was very much like the early Beats in that regard. However, I graduated college, got married, had a child, and forgot all about my early romantic ideals.

Nowadays, I see myself as a William S. Burroughs figure in the circle of friends I have. I am somewhat of a recluse, a hermit, swinging between
depression and mania. My illness, of late, has been controlled by medication and therapy. I have friends, but go for months out of touch, out of time. A drought of contact will be followed by a flurry of telephone calls, e-mails, and face time. Then I will disconnect and retreat into the prison of my own making.

I am learning how to face my demons, to recognize their signs and signals, but to ultimately ignore them, to get on with my life unaffected by them is sometimes too difficult. My wife helps me to do this (when I am at a place to hear her). Too often I am seduced by my mania, and reassure myself that this time it will be different, that I will not become depressed again. I will push myself higher, manipulating my mood with stimulants instead of using the cognitive-behavioral tools I have learned to manage my mental hygiene. It is a struggle to become wise enough to come in out of the rain.

So what does being Beat mean to me now? I got up this morning at 5:30 a.m. and drank the first cup of coffee, smoked the first cigarette of many, and waited for the light to brighten the Southern Alleghenies. When Harper woke up we took a ride to get doughnuts and a newspaper. After I finished my share, I stepped out on the back porch to smoke, warmed by the rising sun. As I stared through the kitchen window, my son, who is cognitively disabled and a better Buddhist than I am, read a Dr. Seuss book and finished his doughnuts, I finally realized what it means. It means being happy with yourself, in whatever situation you find yourself in, drinking in the Glory of some higher power beyond your comprehension. Blissful, content, finally happy…I might be on to something there…

____________________________________________________

This year we plan to make the Art Exchange perhaps the central event at Kerouac Fest '08 as it so exemplifies what we are doing here.