Excess

A lot of what I believe to be grotesque deals with excess. I've written about it on the blog a couple times before, but I wanted to expand on the idea of excess here and perhaps give more of an idea of my qualms with excess and excessive people.

Before this, I have mentioned excess in reference to a youtube video, and a couple times in class as part of my silkscreen project. As I'm dealing with excess quite a bit in my book project, I've been thinking about what it means to be excessive, and was reminded this past weekend. This Thanksgiving I spent the weekend in Jersey in a house I do not usually spend time in. The dinner was quite delicious and I had a great time, but I was distracted by the large amount of "stuff" lying around. There were so many pillows on the couch that a person couldn't sit down. There were video games lying around unopened. And every couple hours or so, someone would make a mention of Christmas and the gifts stemming from the upcoming holiday season. I find it grotesque that people convince themselves that they need so many things, when millions of people actually need food and water (i.e. victims of the attacks in Nigeria this past weekend). I don't know when or how people will realize that this excessive reaction will end - when people will stop consuming at such a rate that the cost of the consumption is the health of the planet we're living on.

As a side note, a lot of these feelings are a result of me watching Wall E this weekend. You guys should watch it. It's really a good time. But maybe some people find the irony of me talking about excess and watching movies in the same breathe grotesque? Please comment, I'm very interested in the idea that all art may be naturally excessive.