Thoughts on… Good People and Good Art [by Jannat Ahmed and Jonas David]

A good person does not equal good art. There, I said it. 

Goodness is subjective, I know – that’s kind of my point. For this piece, I’m not necessarily concerned about explaining what I think makes a good person, or good art, but I’ll share examples of how this thinking behind ‘good’ and ‘bad’ art and ‘good’ and ‘bad’ people manifests, and my personal approach in the current climate. 

As a publisher of new and emerging talent, two of the most consistent hurdles I see in new writers is their expectation that their work must immediately be good, and that they must be worthy people to make good artwork. To that I say, everyone starts somewhere, and a good person does not equal good art. 

While I like to believe Anne Hathaway was always aware of her husband William Shakespeare’s emotional non-monogamy, let’s use him as our first example. In his contemporary context, Shakespeare’s sonnets are fruitful examples of emotional cheating. Yet, they are good art. Michaelangelo, the guy who was commissioned to paint the Sistine Chapel, ran away from the job, and had to be forced back. A more modern example might be the author of ‘The Salt Path’. Here, absolute truth and the author’s relationship to it, did not prevent the book from being good art. I think you see what I’m getting at. 

We are human. We are all human. We are all capable of good and bad behaviour. We are all capable of producing good and bad art. 

I recently saw a quote from Vince Staples on Instagram saying ‘We gotta stop comparing creativity and commerce. They’re not the same thing.’ If you’re on the same page there, you’ll understand why my real problem with bad people making good art is that they profit from never being held accountable, and, more troublingly, profits from their ‘good’ art somehow cushion them from taking meaningful responsibility for their actions. This, in turn, bolsters others who engage in bad behaviour, who will also find ways to escape taking responsibility. 

But there is something more naive, I feel, behind those who conflate ‘bad’ art with ‘bad’ people. Somehow, we have not accepted the unfortunate truth that human creativity can be sourced from anywhere, including the most depraved, inhumane, and harrowing places. There is a reason why war advances technology. Torture is a creative act, and its tools were imagined by somebody, somewhere – as well as the stories that preceded and followed. Here, my examples are Hugo Boss and Coco Chanel. Their respective legacies are rooted in their connection with the Nazis. Brad Pitt, who faces allegations of abuse, is director of ‘The Voice of Hind Rajab’, a film that received a 23-minute ovation at Venice Film Festival. 

From the other side, there is an opposite truth. Good people can make mediocre, bland, rubbish art. If being a good person and being good at art had a direct correlation, then the most pious, lovely people in your life would be the best artists in the world. They’re most likely not because art is a skill, a practice. It isn’t predicated on whether you are good or bad, but your approach to the craft, and approach to the world. Are you willing to do art or not? Maybe good art comes down to perception and self-assured expression. From what I’ve witnessed, those who want to be seen as ‘good’ people and/or ‘good’ artists tend to be least self-assured at the start. Meanwhile some really awful, manipulative people don’t deny their perception skills and their own self-expression. They read their chosen targets so well, it makes sense they can channel these abilities into their artwork, and produce great works. 

Isn’t that encouragement enough for all of us to make the art we want to make? Knowing we can improve over time? We will improve over time, if we are minded to prioritise improvement. That’s really the only way we do get better. Humans aren’t designed to be perfect, neither in our behaviour nor in what we create for one another. We make one meal, and then must make another, and another. We lash out, then we apologise. We put on one load of washing, then comes the next. Progress isn’t linear. We can get more efficient, more fluid, more flashy, over time, but whether we choose to is in our approach to the task at hand. 

We know cancel culture isn’t really working, because bad people profit regardless. Those who publish the news stories about people being cancelled are themselves generating revenue to platform them later down the line. It’s an inherently shit system, where those who are most capable of holding people to account, don’t. 

So, what do we do about ‘good’ art from terrible people? Chuck it, cancel it, don’t engage, personally. Or perhaps we call everybody to chuck it, cancel it, not engage, collectively. I see the value in both. But their art exists, and will not stop existing. The people who platform that art, those books, this music, these films, all exist. And we all co-exist, on this giant, tiny planet. 

My approach is first to acknowledge that creativity can be fuelled from terrible places, from terrible people, terrible money, and acknowledge that we can henceforth choose not to give them our time, and energy, (money being one manifestation of this) and to feel good about that. Find other art, from better people, to enjoy. 

However, when something exists so publicly, I appreciate all work that comes after will exist in relation to that work and to those people. That’s how the world works. People can compare you and your art to anything they want. Even that one guy. I know there’s a sense of guilt amongst writers and artists admitting to liking or having liked work by ‘bad’ people, in fear that this is akin to being sympathetic to, or co-signing, someone’s bad behaviour and immoral actions. But I think my approach is to stomach the reality, because we, and they, are human, even the worst of us: frame your worldview with self-assurance. The person who made this is X, Y, Z but made this piece I loved and has been influential to me. I’ve been emotionally and financially invested. 

My friend and co-editor Jonas David makes the valid point, ‘I think people often assume that a bad person can only create art that is specific to their badness […] those opinions can’t help but bleed into the art a bit, but, in my opinion, that is part of what makes it interesting, if you are looking at it as an artifact, and not as something to agree or disagree with.’ I agree with him that ‘if you go back far enough almost everyone was a racist or religionist or classist or some kind of -ist or -phobe, and when their prejudices show through the writing in subtle ways that they weren’t even aware of, that can also be interesting.’ To clarify, Jonas’ opinions are centred on dead authors: ‘all this is only for the dead. If someone is a living piece of shit spreading vile filth, I am not going to give them a dollar, no matter how good they are.’ 

This comes back to mixing creativity with commerce. In the overlap, buying/selling art implies agreement with the person, because investing in their work gives people (the artist and the infrastructure that platforms them) resources to do more potential harm in the world. It’s down to us whether we are comfortable feeding the beast. We all face the consequences. There are ways to avoid it if you aren’t concerned with ownership: borrowing from other people, not libraries. On some level, people must engage with awful things to address them, in life and in art. 

I believe it’s my personal responsibility not to promote tyranny, but I won’t accept a narrative of shame around my humanity. That song was a bop. Those books did save my life. Maybe their association now makes me nauseous, but why am I feeling the shame or disgust that would be better housed in the artist, the publisher, the music label, the production company? Because I accept the reality that certain things have real-life harmful consequences. I see my part in that, retrospectively. And then what? I fear liking something again because the person who made it might be my enemy? The enemy of someone I love? Turning all that emotion inwards is a waste, I fear. A classic case of overthinking. I give myself permission to love what I love, knowing I am capable of change.

One thing I’ve observed in bigger artists and authors is a belief that audiences liking their work means we must automatically support and like them, or that we owe them our good graces. I’ve spent many teenage years attaching my whole sense of self to someone else’s art, usually for the sake of emotional survival. I can tell you right now, apart from Jane Austen, the author was dead to me. I didn’t care about the person who made the art. Just the art. I felt and learnt something, different from what I felt and knew before. I know the author is indivisible from their work, but I’d like to collectively reach a place where artists (it’s their egos) stop believing the people who engage with their art aren’t also allowed to hold them to account, or dislike them. The worst of them are fuelled by attention. 

My second approach is to focus on the people who profit from the artist (you know, the people in the machine, the infrastructure). All of you, stop prioritising profit from that artist’s work. Surely you have other people on your books you can throw your weight behind? Why do you insist on rewarding bad behaviour? We have seen it time and again, where ‘bad’ authors of ‘good’ art write worse and worse books because in this tussle with their audiences, they lose what made them good artists to begin with; they become defensive (i.e. lose their self-assured expression, don’t accept notes), and lack perception (i.e. deluding themselves into thinking they are above reproach, make dull art). It’s sinister, isn’t it? The invisible people behind the scenes who keep adding fuel to the status-quo fire. What are they doing? I feel similarly about civil servants who do all the research and proposals that ministers at government endorse and sign-off on. It’s all the invisible people who are actually in power. 

If you want to be a good person who also makes good art, know you can use your influences, all those dingy sources of inspiration, to create better things, for yourself or for the world. You’re allowed to claim your past, inclusive of the bad things. Please, do. They’re yours. We needn’t shy away from our versions of our truths. When I look at the way certain artists maintain relevance, despite the harm they’ve caused, I do feel uncomfortable. And that’s all I feel I need to acknowledge. Because by acknowledging that discomfort in myself, I can make choices that feel right to me about the art I want to engage with in future. 

Importantly, when I take a gentler approach, it doesn’t feel like everything in the world is poisoned. It’s not someone outside saying I don’t have permission to like what I like, watch what I watch, read what I read, listen to what I listen to. I make room for choices to arrive from inside, authentically. I am more willing, with this approach, to work harder to find art from places that are less complicit in active harm. 

It comes with age, but I am less concerned now with wanting to appear good. I no longer fear losing my place in the world. I know I have a place in the world because, well, here I am. It was decided for me, so let me get comfortable with it. I feel the energy I used to spend trying to be seen, particularly to be seen as good, worthy, important, funny, smart, is better spent just being those things imperfectly, and (in my case) writing from a new place of potential. If they can do it, so can I. In the process of imperfect action, I will become the kind of person I want to be. 

All that to say: a good person might not equal good art, but good art can certainly make us better people.