La Pensée Sauvage

My hapless friend David Schoffman's early attempts at systematic ethnographic research were costly though radiant failures.

Kaitabhuto Figurine - Java

As a young man, Schoffman spent months at a time trekking through unforgiving terrain in far flung countries looking for uncooked, untamed artifacts. Unlike a professionally trained researcher, David left the terra firma with a series of ideés fixes hoping to find confirmation in situ.

Chief among his biases was the assertion that any societal/cultural phenomena encoded in artisanal production has, at root, an instinctive urge for chaos and disruption. This hairbrained theory came from a dyslexic-driven misreading of Marcel Mauss' Essai Sur Le Don.

After fourteen years of sporadic dysentery, vague inflammations, assorted bug-bites and several near-death experiences, David returned to the comforts of cable tv and indoor plumbing without a single original thought but with a trove of wonderful drawings.

I'm told that in the United States, graduate school is an essential step for all ambitious artists. Though this idea is mocked here in France, perhaps David would have been better served by this more conventional rite-of-passage.