How do we move on beyond navel gazing, choose a question to answer and answer it in depth?

I’m going to start by saying the answer to this question is not an either/or scenario. So in lieu of an answer, I’ll make some diagrams.

It seems we have five basic component parts to this question. To make things easier lets call them:

Artist = (Navel gazer)
Public = (Beyond navel gazing)
Q = Question(s)
A = Answer(s)
AD = Answer in Depth or the Artist’s Death
///// = Artwork

1. The artist is a pure navel gazer without any desire to show their work to the public. If the public finds out about the work, it is usually discovered after the artist’s death (AD). Think Henry Darger here. He was a really creepy navel gazer that made very interesting art that the public just loves, even though they weren’t supposed to see or love it.

2. The artist is your standard navel gazer who likes to share the product of their navel gazing with the public. Basically, this covers most art. Some good and bad stuff in equal proportion comes from this.

3. The artist chooses a beyond-navel-gazing question to answer and answers it without much depth in the public. Basically, this covers most socially engaged art. Some good and bad stuff in equal proportion comes from this.

3.1. (The reality for number 3) The artist chooses a beyond-navel-gazing question to answer and answers it without much depth, primarily for an art public.

4. The public asks a question that they would like an artist to answer for them. This is your old school public art model still in heavy rotation. The answers are often boring because the questions are often narrow.

5. The artist chooses a beyond-navel-gazing question to answer and answers it in depth in the public. This seems to be what the original question is promoting, but is this really the best way to go about it? Maybe, but all this focus on answers usually leads to dead ends and much boring art. Let’s remove answers from the rest of the charts.

6. The artist and public have questions; the work is developed and presented in the space where these questions overlap. This could be really good or really bad.

7. The artist works in the public and develops a question that is brought back to the public via the work. New questions and responses continue in a call-and-response loop with the public. Additionally, certain questions might open up new navel and non-navel-gazing directions of exploration for the artist and/or the public. This sounds good in writing and looks good in a chart. With more time and space this might lead to something.

X. It’s incredibly hard to see the difference between the artist, the navel, the questions, and the public. This is probably the closest thing to the truth if anyone was willing to admit it. We are all a bit lost. We make most of it up from scratch every time, without a reliable compass, directions, or map.