Chapter 7: My Thoughts

I had to keep rereading the second page of the chapter to actually realize what Douglas Mawson ( an Australian explorer) went through on his expedition to Alaska. What he did was so insane to not only go on the most treacherous route on the expedition, but to actually have limited people with you to travel on that route. He had one of his men die with most of the supplies, so him and Xavier Mertz ( an experienced mountaineer) to survive on only so little food. What would be the whole explanation behind all of this? It was all for art. Mawson chose the form of art that he would be remembered for doing by being the most brave to go to Antartica. If he survived the trip that he had all planned out, he would have one heck of a story to tell. One story that would be his own original creation, his own work of art that he wanted remembered. This turned out to be more dangerous than picking up a chisel to make a sculpture or painting on a canvas. A 35 year old man survived in the Antartic for more than a year with struggling to survive and having fellow workers die all for his orginal creation of art. Once he told his story, people had kept him remebered as the one of the greatest explorers that would be remembered forever. The thing that I do not understand is that why would he do this in the first place? To me, he may have done this to keep himself from going insane. Yet again, I could be worng. With other famous artists, they did complete certain pieces of art in order to go on the brink of being nuts. Well, would you look at what art does to you.