Interesting Meeting

This afternoon I got acquainted with a local Swiss person who seems to be excited about art. We had a brief chat after which I was invited to see his apartment located in the vicinity of Zurich where he lives with his partner. The apartment was tiny cozy type decorated with art pieces from different artists. There were paintings with different genre. Not only he was interested in art in the sense of buying some art pieces but also he was quite well informed about the different types of art.

We then had a little chat over coffee down the street not far from his place. He was seems to be interested as well about my background and a little bit of history of Asia.

The best part of the conversation was when he asked me if I was thinking of selling my art. I was quite surprised and at the same time flattered that one person is thinking of buying my art. I am sooooo happy. Now the problem is I have no ideas how much my painting would worth. I really dont.

Time

Just recently I was in an exhibition by Philip Camens entitled Non Stop. The exhibitionist was my best friend teacher back when he was a graphic designer student in Luzern. The exhibits were stuffs that created or put together describing how modern civilization seems to be running out of time.
The exhibition flow starts with a big white room with floor that luminates and on which speakers are attached. The room is just cubic in shape and the wall was covered with some kind of white clothes or sound absorbent material.

It starts with the sound of the water, the leaves, the forest, the bird which gave some kind of relax feeling for about 8 minutes and the sound changes to the sound of ticking clock, beeping digital watches, answering machine, telephone ringing, car honking. The sounds then got louder and louder got mixed and intertwined to one another making such a fuzz when it then stops. Then the people exit the room and proceeded to the next exhibit.

The next exhibit was more like a lounge with four big screens showing people of different positions talking about their job in German, Swiss German. Although I did not understand a bit of what was being said and that I disturbed my friend once in a while to briefly translate what was said I quite get the irony and sarcasm that the exhibitionist tried to convey from it. Basically it attempted to show how people wasted such resources to build such state of the art mechanism to produce a final good which values did not add up to the better life for the consumer in terms of happiness and feeling of content.

The next one was more like a spacious room with computers each in which there was videos of motion which was captured in different pace. There was a video of an eagle catching its prey from the water which paced had been slowed down and there was a video with speed up pace showing a construction of skycrapers and changing seasons. It tried to show us how we perceive time and the change that goes with the running time. There are many things that could happen in a blink of an eye just as many can be witnessed in the course of our life time. For me this was the most memorable exhibit.

One level up, There was a bar and a dj awaiting with a set of black plates cased in covers of different color and arranged to form the word "Non Stop". The DJ asked us which of the story that was written in a card we would like to hear. Unfortunately all of the story was narrated in German.

One more level up, I was in a dark room with torch and papers on a table. These papers are to be used to write some of the anwers to the question that was asked in each row in the room where it has like six rows. The questions were:
What did you spend most of your time?
For what you wished you had more time for?
What stupid things you wasted your time for?
and etc
These papers are then hang

Networking

It is naturally natural that we strive for the better. A more comfortable shelter, a more assisting tool kit, a more systematic government these are among the few things which has evolved in the course of evolution of human beings. Our cognitive ability is designed to survive and pass on the "surviving" traits to our offsprings. Natural selections sort out the more prefered traits from the less prefered ones due to which the entity deploying this trait is extinct.

In the world of commercial and capitalism, where goods are valued with nominal, those with the most money will win in this natural selection process. They will grow and get strongger and eventually pass on these traits to the offsprings. Although once in a while we hear stories of millionaires who hit the rock bottom. As much as the law seems to be clear cut and self evident just as much as it is not factual. It is unfair and baseless to say that everybody needs to get rich in order to get richer. This theory is legitimate to the degree that people who are surrounded by rich peolple tend to absorb and adapt the mentality and attitude of these billionaire people and thus tend to generate the same amount of the result as the person from whom the example was followed. To lesser degree is that it provides more possibilities within this network which might bring benefit to one or both party linked to the network.

While many of the rich people are born into networks of the rich and famous, fact is most of the rich people are not. In fact, they get their way in to this network by establishing their names, their brand, and their persona.

Why would you pay so much for a Madonna concert whilst you can pay half for a better singer in a local night pub. Madonna is a classic and cliche example of a person who seems to have that great amount of luck. Not much of a singer as she is, it did not hinder her to top the chart and to out sell her ticket concert and thus cashing in piles and piles of cash. Because she has contacts, because she has a group of support system and network which is solid strong. That is the key. How do you build your support system and network?
By building your name, by building your brand, by building your integrity. Stick to something which represents yourself that makes you memorable. Be charming. This group of people who like you will introduce to other group of people who like who then will want to work with you, collaborate with you, and thus help you building your empire. And that how it works and has been.
People have different expertise and people are prone to be subjective, if we are not,... Trust me Madonna would have not been famous for being a singer.