Here is one of my favorite art pieces:

Created by Damien Hirst, it is a shark preserved and suspended in turquoise formaldehyde. It is entitled, "the physical impossibility of death in the mind of someone living." It is probably one of the most hated pieces of contemporary art, and it often comes up in the debate of the validity of conceptual art. Personally, I love it. Perhaps I don't respect it so much, or aspire to it, but I certainly love that it exists, and I most of all love the fight to understand it. I can long sit thinking about its implications.
And there is a connection between my "people piece" and this. They both are the product of intention, and they both happily fail to convey that intention. However, despite, or maybe because of this casual failure, the intention becomes much more. The stronger I think about this piece, the deeper it slices into my consciousness. I feel like it has wormed its way in, tunneling a cold, wandering path through my frosty apple mind. It imbeds itself in a fresh core of now. It rears, taps on a frozen hard seed of my existence.
I'd like to think that my pieces could do that. But of course, those who fear being seen as pretentious, who wouldn't dare "pretend" that anything they think or feel is exceptional—word worthy, metaphor worthy, art worthy—those people will say, "This is worthless. Anyone can do this."
Sam, I would agree that the piece you did of faces (the crowd of people) is your very best piece. I was so impressed by the way you handled pastel and when I saw your piece of work all finished, I was beyond impressed. All the different coors you used popped out of the paper and I don't even know how you had the patience to draw that many people. In the end, the piece came together very well.
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