6 — Tuesday, December 10, 2019
Arts
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

“Arth”

Definition:
(noun) a piece of really, really bad art. 

Etymology:
Early 21st century, a Kerrytown porch filled with 
exhausted artists who missed liking their art form.

You are an artist. You are 
tired, and that cold you’ve had for 
about two months is still nestled 
in your nose and throat. 
It is December, and there are 
four collaborations due, two 
final performances, a surplus of 
overly-personal journals to write 
and turn in — and it all has to be 
done in three days. 
Every artist I have encountered 
in the past week has been utterly 
exhausted, creatively bankrupt 
and nervous. The pressure is on 
to show what they’ve learned in 
neat, shiny presentations. 
When looking at art, my 
mind generally breaks whatever I’m consuming into 
two evaluative categories: Technicality and heart. 
Technicalities are whatever can be taught, like if a 
charcoal drawing of an apple actually looks like an apple. 
Heart is whether or not it looks like the artist particularly 
cared. Or is “heart” too tacky? It’s that indescribable sense 
of enjoyment that you get from seeing something honest, 
if that’s not too overused as an art-related buzzword.
It’s the same honesty you get when seeing a cartoon 
version of someone as opposed to an oil portrait of them. 
When actors improvise on stage before sinking into 
character. When musicians throw together a slap-dash 

cover of a country song in the 10 minute break in orchestra. 
This element of honesty is driven by recognizing the 
people creating the art as people rather than “artists.” 
When this element is present, we do not see art as removed 
and polished, but as something a person made. There is an 
element of beauty and aesthetic spectacle in high budget 
ballets or a 100 piece orchestra; that is a fact. 
But my favorite pieces of art have always been those 
where you can see the seams, where the process is not 
only evident in the final product, but a part of it. It’s like 
speaking with an incredibly confident and self-aware 
person. You like them because they know who they are 
and they are comfortable with it. 
Often, this is the art that is 
the artist’s favorite to make. 
Particularly 
when 
you’re 
an art student, it’s easy to 
become overwhelmed by the 
pressure to commodify your 
art, to always be thinking 
about how to market yourself 
and how to make your work 
clean and palatable. These 
are useful skills, but they can 
suffocate unadulterated and 
experimental creativity and, 
in turn, an artist’s love for 
their art. 
You are an artist. You 
should make arth. 
Bastardize your own art form. Boldly leap into one in 
which you have zero skill or proficiency. Host a reading 
specifically for bad iPhone Notes poetry, fingerpaint with 
your friends or write a song about the neighborhood cat’s 
secret life. 
Arth is bad. Arth is not polished. It is experience based, 
personal, creative throw-up.
It is compost: It is the eggshells from your goat cheese 
omelette, the banana peels from those pristine pancakes 
you made last Sunday and the orange rind from your 
citrus scone endeavor. It is leftovers and garbage, yes, but 
it is also what helps your garden grow and stay healthy.

ARTH; or, on making bad art

COMMUNITY CULTURE NOTEBOOK

STEPHANIE GURALNIK
Daily Arts Writer

When I first read about “A New Brain,” 
I thought the concept seemed absurd. An 
autobiographical show about a composer 
who suffers a chronic brain injury before 
a deadline for a show he’s writing, and 
that involves a humanized frog? I couldn’t 
imagine how it would unfold.
The Department of Musical Theatre’s 
Studio Production of “A New Brain” easily 
put my concerns to rest. It was a simple, 
humorous and compelling rendition of the 
work. It was exactly what I’d hope for in a 
studio production: Minimal staging and 
costume, yet entertainment nonetheless.
The humorous tone was quickly 
established in the beginning of the show, as 
the main character’s order at a restaurant 
turns into a quirky song about restaurant 
food. This dualism between the characters 
experiencing 
and commenting 
on 
the 
plot 
continues 
throughout. 
When 
the 
main character, 
Gordon Michael 
Schwinn, played 
by SMTD junior 
Jack Mastrianni, 
collapses at the 
restaurant 
and 
is 
rushed 
to 
the hospital, the 
ensemble made up for the limited props 
and lighting in this studio production. 
From an ensemble member running 
around with a flashing headlamp (to 
represent an ambulance) to two curtained 
dividers constantly being wheeled around 
the stage, this work had a decidedly 
modest feel.
This simplicity allowed for some simple 
interjections of humor. A drill being held 
aloft by the doctor, SMTD senior Hugh 
Entrekin, during the operation scene, for 
example, added to what was otherwise a 
rather frightening scene of a man going 
into a chronic brain procedure. The 
doctor’s medical posters had a humorous, 
lightening effect, especially when simple 
smiley and frowning faces at the bottom 
of these posters were meant to signify the 
life-altering nature of these procedures.
The show featured Schwinn’s latest 
musical composition — a musical for 
children hosted by a man named Mr. 
Bungee, played by SMTD junior Matthew 
Sanguine, who dresses in a green sports 
jacket and frog hat. Bungee exists as both 

a personification of Schwinn’s artistic 
work and as a character in his own 
right, demanding that Schwinn make 
his composition deadline despite his 
hospitalization.
Besides Bungee, many of the other 
characters integral to Schwinn’s life 
exhibit easily identifiable stereotypes 
taken to absurd extremes. There was the 
main character’s boyfriend, SMTD junior 
Luke Bove, a man so obsessed with sailing 
that he can’t cut his vacation short to make 
Schwinn’s surgery. And there was the 
main character’s mother, played by SMTD 
senior Madeline Eaton, a doting figure 
who gifts her adult son with a teddy bear 
and spoon-feeds him in an attempt to help 
him recover.
The hospital workers, too, represent 
a few key medical stereotypes. The 
operating doctor cannot help but react 
with excitement to every brain injury. At 
one point, as he learns of a chronically 
injured 
patient 
on another floor, 
he eagerly fist 
bumps Schwinn. 
The two nurses 
represent 
the 
two 
ends 
of 
the 
nursing 
spectrum: 
One 
pampers 
Schwinn, 
while the other 
frequently 
criticizes him.
One 
of 
the 
funniest moments in the show came 
right before Schwinn’s operation, as the 
nurses asked him about his family medical 
history. The ensuing song, “Gordo’s Law 
of Genetics,” pontificates on the genetic 
dominance of unfavorable traits. “Smart 
or dumb / dumb will predominate,” the 
ensemble sings. “Fat or thin / The fat will 
predominate.”
The 
choreography 
in 
this 
song 
accentuated the humor, the lines about 
“fat or thin” accompanied by an imaginary 
rounded-stomach gesture. This was not 
particularly outrageous humor but it was 
intelligent, unpredictable and incredibly 
well-executed. It wasn’t meant to offend 
or to moralize, but it was smart and 
engaging.
I left the theater impressed with the 
Department of Musical Theatre, the 
writing of James Lapine and the music, 
lyrics and story of composer William 
Flinn. It was amusing and entertaining, 
and for a studio show, if not a general 
University production, what more can 
one ask?

SMTD’s ‘A New Brain’ 
is easy & entertaining

COMMUNITY CULTURE REVIEW

SAMMY SUSSMAN
Daily Arts Writer

Harry Styles came out with the music video for “Adore You” 
just a week short of his upcoming album Fine Line’s release. 
The single’s release, however, was supported by an elaborate, 
meandering advertising campaign that spanned several 
months. Together, Harry Styles and director Dave Meyers built 
the fictional city of Eroda from the ground up, with the song at 
the very base. Targeted Twitter ads promoting Eroda emerged 
in October around the release of Styles’s “Lights Up” music 
video. Scattered subtly throughout the campaign were arrows 
pointing to a fine line (or, rather, Fine Line).
Extensive Twitter threads unraveled as quickly as details for 
the album, with conjectures and conspiracy theories running 
rampant. Eroda was immediately recognized as fictional, only 
a map drawing on its website to counter the case. The ties back 
to Styles were tongue-in-cheek once news of this mysterious ad 
campaign broke. Eroda spelled backward is “adore,” a direct 
connection to “Adore You.” This idea was further supported by 
a slogan on the website that read: “Welcome to Eroda! We Adore 
You.” A comment on the Eroda Twitter feed also claimed to 
have booked a visit for December 
for Dec. 13th — an option that is 
one, unavailable and, two, the 
same day as Fine Line’s release. 
Claims of the island’s notoriety 
for cherries, watermelon and 
strawberries also emerged, with 
songs from Fine Line’s tracklist 
also referring to these fruits. One 
of Styles’s new band members 
also has the same voice as the 
announcer for the Eroda ads. A bench seen on an Eroda Twitter 
feed is purportedly located in St. Abbes, Scotland, where Harry 
shot the “Lights Up” video — the list of references to Styles goes 
on and on, but you get the point. The ad campaign was clever 
and successful in garnering attention and interest in Styles’s 
new work, regardless of whether the targets were fans or not. 
The “Adore You” music video confirmed fan theories with 
Meyers and Styles’s elaborate and luscious Eroda landscape. 
The video spans seven minutes with the history of Eroda 
presented prior to that of Styles’s character. The video starts 
like the beginning of a “School House Rock” episode, an 
animated globe whirring before it pans into the Isle of Eroda. 
Located near England and “shaped unmistakably like a 
frown,” the island is home to a forgotten, bleak fishing village 
ripe with superstition. A perpetual spell of “resting fish face” 
is cast upon every native’s face until Styles’s character is born 
with a literally blinding smile. This casts him into solitude and 
isolation, forcing him to leave home until one day, he meets a 
literal fish out of water with a smile much like his. “Loneliness 
is an ocean full of travelers trying to find their place in the 
world,” the narrator puts it simply. From there, the music 
video details Styles’s relationship with his fish friend. The two 

eat tacos together, go for a bike ride and dance upon a hilltop. 
The fish, however, grows larger and larger by the day and its 
species races back to Eroda to find it. This leaves Styles with no 
option other than to release it back into the ocean. The entire 
village unites to help him in this endeavor. This effectively 
clears the clouds cast over Eroda, transfiguring everyone’s 
frown “into the unmistakable shape of a whale’s tale.” 
In all its cheeky, abstract glory, the music video echoes the 
song’s message on doing anything for the person you love. 
Styles may not “walk through fire” for his fish friend, but he 
does almost everything he can to show his appreciation for 
its company, from knitting it a sweater to frantically seeking 
fishbowl replacements to match its increasing growth. His 
relationship with a fish adds a quirky, lighthearted element 
against the gloomy backdrop — it’s a lot more fun than 
screencaps would convey. But that’s not what makes the 
music video so impressive or effective at consolidating Styles’s 
message on love and its freedom from isolation. The video 
tells a story perfectly in tune with the song, but its pithy layers 
beyond the song’s lyrics make it artistically captivating. The 
video gains the bulk of its meaning from abstract gestures, 
like the extended fish out of water metaphor and the shape 
of Eroda as a frown. But these symbols are not static and 
they’re not there for the sake of 
symbolism. Rather, the transience 
of these abstract visuals and 
explanations 
envisions 
them 
as complex assets to the story. 
We don’t care about the fish for 
what it represents; rather, we 
appreciate that it has an impact on 
the protagonist of our story and 
moves the plot along in tandem 
with the song’s progression.
The marketing campaign only took this clever video 
up another caliber. It not only heightened anticipation for 
Styles’s music video release and album, but developed a 
complex story arc for Styles’s art. Whereas most artists rely 
on their on-screen personality and overall effect on others 
to carry anticipation for their work, Styles developed an 
artistic marketing ploy to bounce off the anticipation of his 
fans for his new work. The social media ads were developed 
over a long period of time, with attention radared to the 
movements of fans and followers over the internet. “When 
they found (something) we adjusted and/or leaned on it to 
make sure that they could further go down the rabbit hole,” 
says Columbia digital media director John Salcedo. The social 
media ruse, more effectively than his robust Saturday Night 
Live double feature as a host and musical guest or Graham 
Norton performance, brought traction for “Adore You” and 
Fine Line. This tactic puts Styles’s artistic flare at the center 
of his celebrity. His artistry doesn’t strive for attention, but 
rather appreciation as complex and beautiful pop music. This 
separates Styles from his boyband past by putting his artistry 
at the core, not stifling and reworking his personality to better 
fit a strain or audience for attention.

Take a little journey to Eroda. 
Meet my artist friend, Harry

DIANA YASSIN
Daily Arts Writer

YOUTUBE

MUSIC VIDEO REVIEW

But my favorite pieces 
of art have always been 
those where you can 
see the seams, where 
the process is not only 
evident in the final 
product, but a part of it

By David Poole
©2019 Tribune Content Agency, LLC
12/10/19

Los Angeles Times Daily Crossword Puzzle

Edited by Rich Norris and Joyce Nichols Lewis

R A Y
D J
S E T
S P A Y

E R A S
N A
I
V E
H O L E

P O R K B A R R E L B
I
L
L S

A U D
I
O
I
N L O V E

I
S A D O R A
U M A
N
I
P

N E G
H A M O P E R A T O R

T S E
O D
I
N
D A N E

G O O S E E G G S

M A A M
O R E O
M E D

C H
I
C K E N F E E D
A V E

S
I
R
A Y E
S K
I
T R
I
P

M O R E S O
V O
I
L A

M E A T O F T H E M A T T E R

O M
I
T
U L
T R A
E A S T

P O L O
L E O N E
L
T S

12/10/19

ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE:

Release Date: Tuesday, December 10, 2019

ACROSS
1 Chinese sauce 
additive
4 Olympic 
swimming star 
Ledecky
9 L.L.Bean 
competitor
14 Listening organ
15 Stereotypical Pi 
Day celebrants
16 “Drab” color
17 Handel’s 
“Messiah” et al.
19 Creepy film motel
20 *Fruity adult 
beverage
22 Put in the mail
23 Cowboys QB 
Prescott
24 Well-worn 
pencils
26 “Keystone” police
28 *Black-spotted 
orange flower
33 Prefix with center
34 __ Valley: 
Reagan Library 
site
35 Strand at a ski 
lodge, say
37 Pitcher’s stat
38 *Toy pistols used 
on stage
41 Prefix with natal
42 Asian food 
breadcrumbs
44 Novelist Leon
45 They, to Thierry
46 *Toy car brand
49 Artist Warhol
50 “The Good Earth” 
mother
51 Some SAT takers
52 Olympian bigwig
55 Canoeing 
challenge whose 
first word can 
precede the 
start and whose 
second word can 
precede the end 
of the answers to 
starred clues
61 Safe places?
63 Talus
64 Orange Muppet
65 Not tight enough
66 ER VIPs
67 Cockamamie
68 Beginning
69 Automated spam 
creator

DOWN
1 Cat’s cry
2 Indian cover-up
3 Concert 
keyboard
4 Rap on the door
5 Sleek, in car talk
6 75% of a quartet
7 Pop star
8 Ancient mystic
9 Position at work
10 Enduring work
11 Baptism or bris
12 Like Olympic 
years, 
numerically
13 “Wild” 1800s 
region
18 Oolong and 
pekoe
21 1921 play that 
introduced the 
word “robot”
25 Euphoria
26 Stay fresh in the 
fridge
27 Celeb with her 
“OWN” network
28 Andalusian aunt
29 Little rascal
30 Lively baroque 
dance
31 Red Square 
shrine

32 Give in
34 Grouchy look
36 Prone to prying
39 Often-
bookmarked 
address, briefly
40 Grafton’s “__ for 
Noose”
43 “80’s Ladies” 
country singer
47 “Yee-__!”
48 Surround, as with 
a saintly glow

49 Graceful steed
51 “Ni-i-ice!”
52 Cube root of acht
53 Merit
54 Forearm bone
56 Part of, plotwise
57 Boxing ref’s calls
58 “Anything __?”
59 Opposite of exo-
60 “Don’t play” 
music staff 
symbol
62 Date regularly

Adore You

Harry Styles

Columbia Records

SMTD

