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=> Re: conversation with Narsai....

Re: conversation with Narsai....
Posted by parhad (Guest) - Wednesday, October 27 2004, 6:41:12 (CEST)
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...but if we don't at least begin to see..."we can never begin to change"....(don't know why that got cut off).

One more thing about this professional business...when you place you life and the lives of your family and their well being on the line...on whatever it is...whether horse racing, golf or Assyrian Monuments and Art...you HAVE to give it your full undivided attention...like Narsai gives onions and oil and waiters and sauce and the retaurant business his FULL attention...because his life depends on how successful he will be..it doesn't mean success is assured...but it won't come if you're slipshod or hesitant or don't know what you're doing.

Now there are LOTS of people who have made it in restaurants and catering etc...but to give Narsai his due...he was there at the very beginning of the food revolution and was a major innovator...so he had to break some new ground...on the famous other hand there WAS no Assyrian sculptor who'd ever attempted to inspire Assyrians, of all people, into giving from their own pockets anything like the amounts we needed for public monuments..and all of it brand new territory for us. Till I came along the price and appreciation for art was low...it isn't bragging...somebody was bound to do it sooner or later as we too follow the typical immigrant curve. But at least I'm pretty.

My point is that I had to be as spot balls on at what I was doing as Narsai was at what he does...only I had to contend with his jealousy...envy...his sense that HE knew best and the usual attitude our people display towards art and artist...that anyone can do it..that it's a silly passtime really...nothing as serious as owning a STORE or being a DOCTOR. It's tiresome but what can you do?

It seems to have escaped these people that the only positive press and slight indicator of what we had is our ART...treasured by the world today..and looted by America. Who remembers a restauratuer from 4000 years ago...or his pie a la mode?

What I COULD do was defend the integrity of my work against them all no matter WHERE it took...even into court on a two million dollar lawsuit brought against me AND Jeff...by Jackie Bejan, because I wouldn't shtupp her.

I lost what customers I had built up slowly over 20 years of mostly poverty level living..as anyone must endure if you would work in this community...only I managed to turn it around towards the end and that's when they ALL went nuts!!!

Here was an ASSYRIAN...making all that hallowed MUNNY...and from doing ASSYRIAN THINGS...not catering things or video store things or even doctor things and then Assyrian things on the weekends...but all the time and exclusively...and that would necessarily mean that the standard just got kicked way upstairs and that unnerved them even more.

And so when I come to discuss the plight of "Assyrians"...or is Saddam really a WMD..and is America "liberating" Iraq....I run up against AMATEURS who haven't had the passion....not the stupid hot blooded ravings we're used to honoring as partriotism...but something far more thoughtful that comes when you risk your LIFE for something...when you go far more deeply into it than any priest or nationalist ever did.

People say they haven't the time to watse discussing these things with me...also that I should stay in the kitchen and make sculpture...and even Narsai cut the meeting off on the oft used ploy that he had a TON of things to do...but I know better...the real reason is that they can't bear to discuss with anyone who knows his or her stuff...who's thought about this very hard...as hard as I have.

They want a fast, snappy, easy analysis..."Muslim BAD...me GOOD...you JANE."...And their productions and art shows and fashion shows all reflect that same shallow level of input, or caring, of standards etc. Though, again, Narsai brings a high level of sophistication to his fund raiser...because his name is attached..which is perfectly fine..as someone said, "So what if it's all ego so long as they do SOME good"?

While they all accuse me of being extreme and off the wall...they have done worse behind my back and ours. I come out and say it up front...and they all talk about suing me for it..and Jackie played at it a bit before flicking it in, like we knew she would...it isn't WHAT I'm saying..it's that I'm saying it out loud...not over the phone to each other as they all do...Narsai included.

But then an artist had better be honest...a caterer???...well....



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