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Sunday, Mar 18, 2018 - 20:37 SGT
Posted By: Gilbert

Skin In The Art (Part I)

Mr. Robo: *proudly* ...and then I successfully negotiated Mr. Ham down to just a 15% pay cut for myself! And, after that, he praised me for my hard bargaining, and mentioned that it reminded him of the GOD-EMPEROR himself! Why, I...

Me: Well, just as long as you're happy, I guess. Just remember, Mr. Robo, to look out for Number One, because sure as hell no-one's gonna do that for you in the business world. Myself, I'd settle for more time to curl up with unread titles, two of which I managed this weekend - Sonny Liew's The Art of Charlie Chan Hock Chye, and Taleb's latest Skin in the Game.


99 Red Test Balloons

You and I in a little toy shop
Buy a bag of balloons with the money we've got
Set them free at the break of dawn
Till one by one they were gone



Not once, not twice, but thrice at least...
fortunately, there are only 82 incumbent MPs
(Source: r/singapore)


Before delving into Liew's comic magnum opus proper, we can see that he has been pretty busy providing trenchant political commentary on Facebook, a scene that's been a teeny bit quiet since they got Demon-cratic Singapore's Leslie Chew. The incident in question was Workers' Party Sylvia Lim suggesting in Parliament that "there were some test balloons being floated out about the fact that the government needs to raise revenue".

And for this, incumbent party representatives insisted on a formal apology.

First off, cracking down on such a reasonable question is patently ridiculous to begin with, because if you can't raise queries in Parliament, then what is that body for? Secondly, since it is no secret that the government has a GST hike planned, shouldn't one expect them to have gathered some feedback from the ground, and factored it into their decision-making process? Certainly, one imagines that had they not made such a hoohah over it (guilty conscience perhaps?), nobody would have paid much, if any, attention to it.

Instead, their insistence on an unwarranted apology has instead herded citizens into the WP's corner, because people can recognize a clear case of bullying when they see one. Not only that, evidence soon came in that the government had, indeed, been floating a bunch of test balloons, whether through media articles or official NTUC surveys... which, again, is personally no great deal. Float just admit float lah! Meanwhile, their Ang Mo Kio Town Council general manager was found taking bribes, but, but *points finger* AHTC (yes, literally from Shanmugam)

Actually, the problem may not be so much the bullying, but the stupidity and incompetence that's creeping in - sure, LKY might have gathered his kah kias to metaphorically thrash his political opponents in a cul-de-sac, but he made sure that it was an actual cul-de-sac with no exit. Here, we have his sadly-diminished successor wannabes attempting the same tack, but without the requisite vision or surface logical thoroughness.

One might, then, understand my discomfort at the warning signs of encroaching censorship in Singapore, under the excuse of "Fake News":


Exaggerated? You laugh now, but history repeats
(Source: r/the_donald)


On to Charlie Chan Hock Chye. I have to admit, when I first heard of the title, that my first thought was of my high school physics teacher of exactly that same name (minus Charlie), and who drew a mean caricature into the bargain. To my slight initial dismay, it was not him who had hit the big time with his hobby, but that aside, the work can definitely be classed as a local comic awakening. And comics don't get nearly enough respect, I feel - got my own start with Beano, Dandy and Doraemon, and there's plenty of arcane philosophy hidden in the Hong Kong weeklies if you care to look. I mean, just because they can draw, doesn't mean they can't write, right?

Charlie Chan's own history neatly encapsulates the government's true attitude towards the arts and innovation. Recall, it received an S$8000 grant from the National Arts Council, which while not much, was something. And then, for actually looking at Singapore's political history with a fresh perspective, and not being plastered with panels of representatives of our four major races holding hands and dancing in a circle, it had the grant revoked. It went straight on to win the comic world's equivalent of the Oscars, proving once again that the National Arts Council wouldn't recognize true art if Picasso left an unsigned specimen on their doorstep.

Which allows us to slip Taleb's conception of skin-in-the-game in - the NAC pseudo-censors, being essentially honorary bureaucrats, have no actual investment in local arts. As with the common run of form-filling box-tickers, their default instinct would be to banhammer anything that pushes the envelope... which is not entirely unreasonable, because they personally don't reap the upsides of dangerous decisions either. The best, then, that can be said about them is perhaps that "the problem is higher than these agencies".

The eponymous Charlie Chan, in contrast, put all his skin in. Born about 1938, he pursued drawing as his hobby, and teams up with a friend and admirer (Bertrand) to produce and sell comics. After running the gamut of subjects, from giant robots to Maus-like commentary to lowest-common-denominator action heroes (Roachman, whom Charlie accuses Marvel of ripping off with Spiderman), Bertrand finally bails after eight years of middling success. He wanted to get married and start a family, and thus he had to have a stable job, a stable income (which he did). In short, Bertrand found that he put had too much skin in. He danced, in the Kierkegaardian sense, for a time, but eventually wearied of it, and sat among the spectators instead.


Some knights wear glasses.
(Source: epigrambooks.sg)


Such a domestic life was not for Charlie, however. He tried his hand at commercial illustration for a while, but while he was undeniably good at it, he gave it up due to displeasure at having to operate to the whims of the clients, and of compromising his own artistic integrity (in this, it is easy to see Charlie as Liew's alter-ego). Instead, he became a security guard, which afforded him - if not a decent salary - the peace and quiet he wanted, to simply draw what he wanted and tell stories.

Charlie's story doesn't have much of a happy ending. What small market he had for Roachman died out with the advent of television and the demise of the pavement libraries, and it was clear that his favourite political satire wasn't gonna fly with a certain strongman at the helm. Nor, it appears, was he able to attract a wife with his meagre income. If he regretted this, it was only when he wasn't able to afford overseas (and apparently better) medical treatment for his father, due to his lack of savings, which, it is implied, his mother blamed on him to an extent. This spurred him to finally try and make a name for himself at the San Diego Comics Con, at the age of fifty. That went about as expected.

Charlie always had, you see, real skin in the game, and he lived and died by his calling. As an avowed artist, he had what Taleb terms "soul in the game", or skin-on-behalf-of-others. In keeping the light of culture alive, he received no monetary reward (nor did he expect any, especially later in his career), and accepted near-certain impoverishment and obscurity.

And the bureaucrats, who're being paid to push new economy and innovation and risk-taking? One can only too easily imagine them telling their children:

This is Charlie. Be smart. Don't be like Charlie.


[To be continued...]



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Next: Skin In The Art (Part II)


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There And Back
Apotusgetics
Déjà Vu
Skin In The Art (Part II)
Oh, The Suspension!
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