Nitrocellulose & The Dumbest Generation

I'm half artist and half geek. I’m interested in how things work. I seem to live in the "geek world" when I'm gearing up to write, teach or do some kind of experiment with Collodion, or Collodion related things.

Having a certain amount of knowledge about a topic or an area of interest helps you to achieve your goals and gives you more opportunity for growth. I don’t believe that every artist needs to understand their materials like a research scientist, but I wouldn’t discourage if they were so inclined.

Wet Plate Collodion photography opens the "geek door" wide open for me. Most people working in photography today don’t even understand the basics of how a photograph is made (I’m not talking pixelography here, I’m talking about light energy and silver). Again, I’m not saying that you need to understand how electricity works to turn on a light, but you would have a greater appreciation for it if you did. This applies to photography as well. Knowledge and connections – those are important to me. If you look at the history of photography, or the history of art for that matter, you’ll find that both artistic movements and technical advances were made because of profound understanding (knowledge) and connections.

So yes, I’ve been "geeking out". This is how nitrocellulose is made (Collodion).

I was listening to an interview with Mark Bauerlein this morning on the radio. He wrote, "The Dumbest Generation: How the Digital Age Stupefies Young Americans and Jeopardizes Our Future (Or, Don't Trust Anyone Under 30)". If the statistics he used are true, we (people in our 40s) have a lot to be worried about when we get old.

It’s an irony so commonplace it's become almost trite: despite the information superhighway, despite a world of knowledge at their fingertips, the younger generation today is less informed, less literate, and more self-absorbed than any that has preceded it. But why? According to the author, an English professor at Emory University, there are plenty of reasons. The immediacy and intimacy of social-networking sites have focused young people’s Internet use on themselves and their friends. The material they’re studying in school (such as the Civil War or The Great Gatsby) seems boring because it isn’t happening right this second and isn’t about them. They’re using the Internet not as a learning tool but as a communications tool: instant messaging, e-mail, chat, blogs. And the language of Internet communication, with its peculiar spelling, grammar, and punctuation, actually encourages illiteracy by making it socially acceptable. It wouldn’t be going too far to call this book the Why Johnny Can’t Read for the digital age. Some will disagree vehemently; others will nod sagely, muttering that they knew it all along. From David Pitt (Booklist).

Part of the conversation this morning was about this generation (12-25 year-olds) reading and writing more than any other generation. However, only 23% of high school graduates are proficient readers! They also talked about communication. This generation communicates more than any other, too. Emails, Tweets, Texts, Facebook, My Space, etc. etc. However, they communicate about NOTHING! They drone on about what they had for breakfast and what when they went to bed, etc. meaningless to everyone except them. The explanation he had for this was very interesting and explained a lot about the “social network movement” and our mental health. And before you email me about my Facebook or Twitter account, I want to say that I’m making a concerted effort to stay away from them as much as possible. Eventually, I would like to delete my accounts – however, it’s a process, not an event.

Bauerlein mentioned two movies, too; Flunked and Idiocracy.

One more note; I had an interview Friday night (via phone) with an organization in NYC that operates private schools for underserved communities. They’re opening a high school in Harlem next year and may be looking for a fulltime art teacher – photography, digital media, video, etc. So maybe when I return to America, (sometime next year or the first of 2011) I’ll pursue something that will allow me to do my part in helping this generation live up to their potential.