Real Faux Art

I must say, the title is app. This is my college essay. Please don't judge me on it; I really wanted to go to Brown. I meant every word of it, but would never have presented it like this, if I wasn't told it had to be an essay.
Essays, to me, are lists of details. Essays describe concisely, then move on to new thoughts: somewhat related; related enough to be in the same essay. This is my essay. The title is app, but seriously, don't judge me on it.

When I was eight, my mother asked me if Chris Ofili is an artist. Ofili is the famous painter, much sensationalized over for using elephant dung in his work. At the time, I said no. I didn’t understand his work. I hadn’t seen the infamous The Holy Virgin Mary, and couldn’t comprehend a painting with scat. I’m ready to reverse my answer.
Sometimes, it takes a lot of patience to see art, and sometimes great pieces leave the viewer shocked by the approach. The best artists spend hours rooting through what others dismiss as either mundane or crass, digging for the art nested within. Creativity lays in the ability to wallow in poor art or incomplete art, and sift out all the inspiring bits.
I learned this in a field often considered to be completely removed from art: science. Not just any science either, physics: the ultimate numerical simplification of beautiful things. In class, I made quick friends with the top of the class, Ryan. We shared two other classes, honors precalculus, and stage band, and worked together as lab partners. I discovered in him true inspiration.
To Ryan, equations and measurements were just ways to analyze. He could illustrate any equation as a simple picture. He could write out the steps to an equation’s derivation, and explain them not only mathematically, but verbally, in the simple physical terms anyone can understand. Ryan could see art where I couldn’t, and because of it, he outperformed me in physics.
It took more than just getting B’s in physics to drive home the point though; it took writer’s block. For two weeks, I found myself unable to produce new material for my creative writing class. The night before I had ten poems due, I searched my life for simple experiences, and turned out a batch of poems that I am especially proud of. The topics ranged from biting my nails, to being a mediocre guitarist. I managed to take a lot of things that most people would have passed over as boring, and breathed artistic life into them.
Approaching life as varying degrees of art lends me an optimism that others lack. I cling to difficult problems, searching for elegant solutions. There is always an elegant solution. New subjects draw me, almost magnetically, to search them for further inspiration.
This tenacity of spirit is a real asset, as seeing art can be very difficult. Rarely does differentiating equations in calculus class seem artistic, but deep down, the simplicity of it is engaging. Math is like Japanese poetry, laconic, and loose in meaning. It’s a passive object, waiting to be explored and interpreted. If one searches hard enough, there is likewise art to be found in the poorly tuned instrument, and even the most incomprehensible written material.
Now, I can see that Chris Ofili is a wonderful artist. To the eye wise enough to be indiscriminate, everyone is. While sometimes I feel like I’m straining my eyes, pushing them to hard to find art, I know it’s for their best. They’ll thank me, when they can stare unblinkingly at my own art. Until then, they’ll work hard to dissect the world, and find the beauty in even what seems obscene.