I sometimes catch myself consuming beauty greedily. It is the sort of beauty that some might mistake for tastefulness, yet it is no different from shopping for shoes. The things I consume are ambient music, oil painting, and sculpture. I do not appreciate its craftsmanship through a lengthy study of its intricacies; instead, I am guided by intuition. Depending on who you ask, it is claimed that the attention span of the contemporary person is but a few seconds. That is how I appreciate art. If it doesn’t jump at me, it will be forgotten. Only if it scratches this momentary itch will it be given further consideration. And even then, that will buy it but a minute of my time. This applies to painting and sculpture.

When it comes to music, I always struggled to appreciate the whole. Oftentimes, it is an accident that I would listen to the whole song or album. And oftentimes, what makes me stick around is a collection of “happy accidents”. If a piece has enough of these accidents, I will listen to it through.

Apparently, that is where music is going anyway. Songs are getting shorter, albums are getting longer, and they’re released more often than before. This is at least partially explained by Spotify’s remuneration policy - to count as a listen, the song must be listened to for at least 30 seconds. Songs, in turn, often show their privates quite early on to persuade the listener to stick around.

I would be the happiest if I was into pop music. (If I want to get a rush of ecstasy from music, I’ll just opt for some dance “bop” that I heard at some point in my life). With ambient and classical, I often find that the section of the song that makes me “save” it on Spotify is tucked away somewhere at minute 7 of 36. I sometimes then listen back to these pieces and wonder for 6 minutes why I’m listening to the sounds of the underground with a light piano in the background. And then my trigger plays, and it is all alright then.

Similarly, with painting and sculpture, I often consume these treasures via picture format. (This makes it easier to get a quick fix). I sometimes stumble upon some images that I must have deemed worthy some time ago. They often still mesmerise me, and sometimes they invite further study on my part. Pastoralism comes to mind as a result of such study.

I sometimes lust for beauty and catharsis, and in the process, I become a glutton. Yet I often feel serene after this debaucherous consumption. I can then become a monk. I observe beauty in the day-to-day. I calibrate myself on the works of great masters just so I could live another day. I find it quite easy to forget the beauty around us. By saturating myself with “culture”, I feel like, at some point, I start to ooze it. Perhaps in the overindulgence, I also recognise the futility of my blindness to the surroundings. Like looking at a perfect marble sculpture, I want to see a world built without the cracks (though cracks in oil paint also mesmerise me). My occasional disenchantment with the day-to-day is rather droll.