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Making the World's Largest Ball of Paint

2017-04-11 · letter vlog · John · 3:05 · watch on YouTube

Topic: Philosophy & meaning (also: History & curiosities) · mode: Personal essay

John uses the world's largest ball of paint in Alexandria, Indiana, painted by thousands of people since 1977, to argue that the worship of individual genius is misguided: art and life are layers added to a shared sphere, and your layer matters even when it is painted over.

What is said

The parts of the video and what is said in each (★ — how much it matters to the video).

00:00:00 — America's world's largest balls; the history and size of the ball of paint in Alexandria, Indiana

  • ★ John jokes it can't be a coincidence that so many world's largest balls are in the US: popcorn in Iowa, stamps in Nebraska, competing twine balls from Kansas to Minnesota. (playful) — 00:00:07 · United States
  • ★★★ The world's largest ball of paint, in Alexandria, Indiana, began in 1977 when Mike Carmichael painted a baseball with his three-year-old son. — 00:00:23
  • ★★★ After neighbours, friends and then strangers joined in, the ball has more than 25,000 layers after 40 years, weighs two and a half tons, has its own house, and draws over a thousand painters a year for free. — 00:00:38
  • ★★★ John says we usually imagine art as a story of individual geniuses, like Shakespeare or Leonardo da Vinci, using innate brilliance to expand the human landscape. — 00:00:57

00:00:58 — Against the worship of individual genius: art and life as layers of paint on a shared ball

  • ★★ John says we sometimes credit circumstances: Mark Twain had to grow up on the river that divided America during the war that divided it; but mostly we credit heroic individuals. — 00:01:11 · United States
  • ★★ John believes in genius: some artists, from Mark Twain to Jane Austen to Toni Morrison, are uncommonly great. — 00:01:26
  • ★★★ John thinks genius is not a simple trait like brown eyes but a continuum, like empathy. (hedged) — 00:01:33 · empathy
  • ★★★ John thinks the worship of individual genius is misguided: Edison didn't invent the light bulb, which many people were inventing around him, and Newton didn't discover gravity but pushed our awareness of it further. (hedged) — 00:01:39
  • ★★ John says many people, himself included, worry their work won't matter because it won't be remembered or reach genius; maybe that makes individuals too important. (hedged) — 00:01:55
  • ★★★ John suggests art and life are like the ball of paint: you choose your colours, add your layer as best you can, and it is eventually painted over until almost no one knows about it. (hedged) — 00:02:05
  • ★★★ John argues a painted-over layer is not irrelevant: it permanently, if slightly, changed the sphere, so even a little-seen YouTube video or little-read story shapes the ball we all live with. — 00:02:25 · YouTube
  • ★★★ John says you add your coat of paint, hoping you made the world more beautiful; you will eventually be painted over, but you still matter. (hedged) — 00:02:45

00:02:53 — Thanks for VidCon Europe in Amsterdam; a short vacation; sign-off

  • ★★ John thanks Hank and all the VidCon staff and volunteers for an amazing weekend (8-9 April 2017) in Amsterdam at VidCon Europe. — 00:02:53 · Hank Green, Amsterdam
  • ★ John will enjoy a couple of days of vacation and then get back to painting. — 00:02:58

In the description and comments

  • ★★ The description says art, writing and most human endeavours are best imagined as huge, sprawling collaborations rather than the efforts of a few geniuses: creativity belongs to everyone. (hedged) — video description

Threads in this video

Where the stories that moved here went next

Mentioned

Central: great man theory · World's Largest Ball of Paint

Also: People: Isaac Newton · Jane Austen · Leonardo da Vinci · Mark Twain · Michael Carmichael · Thomas Edison · Toni Morrison · William Shakespeare

Projects: VidCon Europe

Organizations: YouTube

Concepts: empathy · Gravity (concept) · roadside attraction

Places: Alexandria, Indiana · Amsterdam · Iowa · Kansas · Minnesota · Nebraska · United States

Events: American Civil War

Only in the description or credits: Artland

Also centred on great man theory: I Gotta Go: Signing Off and Thinking about Inspiration · The Myth of Greatness · Redefining What it Means to Matter · On Immunity, Inoculation, and Individuals

Also centred on World's Largest Ball of Paint: I Need to Get Myself Away from this Place

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