Mediocrity

I read somebody's views on mediocrity yesterday. And I agreed with her. The main point that she was driving was that there's nobody who can truly judge mediocrity. The intellectual elite of the society have made it a norm that whatever is popular is mediocre. And this is what she was vehemently arguing against.

Although I agreed with her in the spirit of the argument, I have certain views of my own on the subject.

Mediocrity does exist. And I do feel that a certain amount of taste and intelligence is required to see mediocrity when it happens. This doesn't mean that only obscure and pseudo-intellectual stuff is non-mediocre. Even popular stuff is mediocre and most often is.

The sole reason for art to exist is for the artist to leave an impression (of any kind) on the viewer/listener. It is a manner in which the artist leaves a bit of him or her onto the recipient of the art. If that happens, then no matter what the subject matter of the art is, it is not mediocre.

The best illustration of my point is of course, Mark Knopfler. He always writes songs on the most mundane things in the world. But they affect him. And he conveys his own feelings through his songs in a manner that doesn't fail to touch the listeners.

Another example is Calvin & Hobbes. A simple cartoon strip but with huge insights into human nature and can almost give one a philosophy to live by.

There are countless such examples. All in all, according to me, mediocrity in art happens when the artists try to please someone or anyone other than themselves while producing the art. To that extent popularity if sought for the sake of popularity leads to mediocrity. However, everything that is popular if termed as mediocre would reek of pseudo-intellectualism. And that is as bad as or worse than being mediocre in the first place.