{"id":1788,"date":"2008-12-03T11:52:58","date_gmt":"2008-12-03T15:52:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/?p=1788"},"modified":"2008-12-03T11:52:58","modified_gmt":"2008-12-03T15:52:58","slug":"ars-gratia-artis-driftart-of-cape-cod","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/?p=1788","title":{"rendered":"Ars Gratia Artis — Driftart of Cape Cod"},"content":{"rendered":"

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“Home with a View” Driftart on Cape Cod Bay<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

L’art pour l’art<\/em>, the French expression and philosophy that transformed itself into the haughty Latin ARS\u00c2\u00a0GRATIA\u00c2\u00a0ARTIS<\/em> encircling the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer roaring lion,\u00c2\u00a0championed the purity of art solely for art’s sake.\u00c2\u00a0 Within this philosophy,\u00c2\u00a0a work of art possesses inherent and intrinsic value distinct from any moral lesson or utilitarian purpose.\u00c2\u00a0 Art is simply art.<\/p>\n

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Anonymous Driftart Scattered Along Deserted Beaches<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

While it may\u00c2\u00a0prove a difficult challenge to maintain that purist philosophy in the\u00c2\u00a0chic galaries and trendy studios of SoHo, the abandoned beaches of wintry Cape Cod afford the lonely pleasure of artistic\u00c2\u00a0expression\u00c2\u00a0beyond the smothering\u00c2\u00a0glare of\u00c2\u00a0adoring fans and nattering\u00c2\u00a0critics and without any thought of commercialism.\u00c2\u00a0 In fact,\u00c2\u00a0ephemeral driftart goes unseen and unappreciated by anyone except its creators, transient flocks of waterfowl, a stray seal or two\u00c2\u00a0that may haul up to bask nearby, and a few layered, bundled, wind-blown and eccentric\u00c2\u00a0hikers.<\/p>\n

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Click Here to View Video in High Quality<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

No Place Like Home for the Holidays<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

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The Turtle Journal calls\u00c2\u00a0these creations\u00c2\u00a0driftart, a contraction of drift and art.\u00c2\u00a0 When we first explored the winter beaches of the Outer Cape,\u00c2\u00a0wandering miles from the nearest landing, we were surprised to encounter driftart scattered randomly along the Great Back Beach from Chatham to Provincetown, and the long, lonely stretches of bayside beach from Provincetown to Jeremy Point in Wellfleet, more than 45 miles of sand, surf, wrackline and little else from each November through March.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

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“Home Sweet Home” Driftart<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Where nothing had been yesterday, a collage of flotsam and jetsam springs to life, created first by the inspiration of a single artist, then augmented by other hardy designers and shaped into a unique community artwork.\u00c2\u00a0 Every few days until an Atlantic storm erases the entire masterpiece, someone adds a touch here or links existing objects there to invoke a new effect.\u00c2\u00a0 Located quite literally in the middle of nowhere, seen by no one, shaped for the pure, simple pleasure of anonymous artists who create it, and\u00c2\u00a0vanishing into unnoticed oblivion within a blink of\u00c2\u00a0the storm god’s whim, these driftart works are a true manifestation of arts for art’s sake.<\/p>\n

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Click Here to View Video in High Quality<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Blackfish Creek Driftart<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Sightings of actual driftartists are as rare as credible photographs of\u00c2\u00a0bigfoot or glimpses of urban\u00c2\u00a0graffiti\u00c2\u00a0taggers.\u00c2\u00a0 They\u00c2\u00a0create their works\u00c2\u00a0outside the view of civilization, during times when fleeting,\u00c2\u00a0summer civilization has returned to its mainland roots and when the Outer Cape has resumed\u00c2\u00a0its natural state of raw, uncontrollable\u00c2\u00a0wildness.\u00c2\u00a0 We suspect you’d be surprised by their identity and they’d be equally surprised to be\u00c2\u00a0viewed as\u00c2\u00a0artists.\u00c2\u00a0 Yet, we like to think of these individuals as kindred warriors\u00c2\u00a0to those prehistoric cave artists of 30 millennia ago who created masterpieces of expression in cryptic, inaccessible\u00c2\u00a0underground locations unlikely ever to be\u00c2\u00a0seen\u00c2\u00a0by a fawning public.\u00c2\u00a0 And so it is with Cape Cod driftartists who build their creations along\u00c2\u00a0equally inaccessible winter beaches with the sure knowledge that their work will soon disappear unseen and unnoticed\u00c2\u00a0into the ocean depths.\u00c2\u00a0 Art of art’s sake.\u00c2\u00a0 Ars gratia artis<\/em>.\u00c2\u00a0 L’art pour l’art<\/em>.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

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“Home with a View” Driftart on Cape Cod Bay L’art pour l’art, the French expression and philosophy that transformed itself into the haughty Latin ARS\u00c2\u00a0GRATIA\u00c2\u00a0ARTIS encircling the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer roaring lion,\u00c2\u00a0championed the purity of art solely for art’s sake.\u00c2\u00a0 Within this philosophy,\u00c2\u00a0a work of art possesses inherent and intrinsic value distinct from any moral lesson or […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[287],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1788"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1788"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1788\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1803,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1788\/revisions\/1803"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1788"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1788"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1788"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}