Treasure in the Trash

I’ve been accused of being a hoarder at times in my life.

You could say it runs in the family: my great aunt had tall stacks of newspapers dominating one room of her house late in life, and I remember navigating the maze of archives from the prior 80 years with a mixture of dread and wonder. It was like the world’s most disorganized museum, and my great aunt was far from the only one who did this in my family.

I wrote a little about this phenomenon arising from a scarcity mindset in my own life, culminating in me collecting things since I was a kid. Used items people would otherwise throw away had some value to a collector, and I was there to rescue them from their unfortunate future in landfills (recycling paper in the 80s wasn’t a thing where I grew up).

A lot of the things I collected had some real artistic value, too. I look back today at some of the great comic book artists during the 70s and 80s like Bernie Wrightson, John Byrne, and eventually Todd McFarlane as fine artists in their own right. They turned something that was initially just a moneymaking venture into beautiful art, far surpassing what was expected of the medium.

Bernie Wrightson pushing boundaries during the 1970s. Layering, stylization, complex shading.

And: they influenced the medium itself. Comic books were forced to employ full-page designs to meet customer demand, meaning the artists got much more of a platform. More and more artists emerged; these original innovators had transcended the medium and insisted on change through their creations.

Much like my own inclination to find value in what others discard, there are instances in history where what was once viewed as trivial or disposable was later revered, significantly in the realm of artistry. That includes media from within my own lifetime, from comic books to films.

I had an interesting conversation with

Simon K Jones

of

Write More with Simon K Jones

regarding the original Transformers movie. Simon writes serial sci-fi and fantasy, but also writes about the creative process itself, and he has insightful views I like to consider every now and then. Check out his work when you get a chance. Here’s Simon:

That intersection, where artists are able to combine with huge corporations to create something resonant, is really fascinating. Is it the artists being clever and manipulating the corporations, or is it the corporations reading the room and being weirdly forward-thinking? Does it matter if a corporation's motivations are purely mercenary, if the end result is something artistically satisfying and culturally interesting/progressive?

I really like Simon’s take here, and I want to expand upon it here a bit by way of a very quick history lesson.

The Medici family, a powerful and wealthy banking dynasty, became synonymous with the patronage of the arts, and their influence was pivotal in birthing the Italian Renaissance—a period marked by a flowering of art, literature, and learning.

Florence, under the Medici’s influence, became a crucible for artistic innovation. Artists like Botticelli, Leonardo da Vinci, and Michelangelo were not merely contractors fulfilling the decorative whims of their wealthy patrons; they were visionaries who were given the freedom to push the boundaries of their craft. The Medici didn’t just commission art—they fostered an environment where artists were encouraged to explore, create, and transcend.

I was fortunate enough to go to the Uffizi Gallery in Florence to see some of this amazing stuff up close, but I mainly took pictures like this, where I was cynical of the grappling techniques used here:

Sometimes the Medici had noble intentions in creating their art, but other times they were interested in what all great patrons of the Renaissance were interested in: personal glory and image crafting. Flatter me once, shame on you. Flatter me twice and I’ll pay for you to create wondrous works of art that make people forget the horrible things they say I’ve done.

Not only did these great masters surpass the initial intentions of creating beautiful works; they transcended centuries, and many are widely discussed today.

Comic book artists of the 70s and 80s transcended the medium, creating an opportunity for artists to thrive and create lasting works. During the 50s, nearly every kid simply threw their comic books away when they were done reading them, but great artists and storytellers began to convince some folks to keep them and to collect comics.

Moneymaking ventures like Transformers the Movie turned out to have profound messages and a stunningly high level of artistic merit. Case in point, I’ve written recently about this film here, an critics and scholars seriously discuss the meaning and artistic intention of all sorts of movies.

And, the legacy of the Medici shows that turning the keys over to the artists means you might get something special and unexpected, even something people talk about centuries later.

For all of these groups of artists, seeing beyond the immediate commerciality of their work meant that their “trash” was destined to become treasure.

What things that we consider trash today might be considered artistic treasure in the future? What are we missing?