So I’d say, it’s GREAT to use advertising in art! As long as you are subverting it and jabbing it in the soft underbelly! 🙂

I’ve mostly avoided pop culture references, after reading poetry from previous decades that seems stale now, almost quaint. And yet contemporary cultural references creep into the work, as the world changes faster in the embrace of technology. But for me, if the reference won’t last as long as I hope my poem will, it seems an anchor that might drag the boat down. Of course, work that is based on pop culture references is a different animal. And who’s to say what part of pop culture is destined to be recognized as high culture in decades to come?

I’m drinking a Starbucks coffee right now.
I’m loving it, and how.

I’m not anonymous.
My address is all over the web.
Kick my cat and I’ll kick your ass
and pour my coffee on your head.

What do you think about artists…who drop pop culture references …in their poems?

Love them when they do it well. The Barbie poems have moments that couldn’t be achieved as neatly or universally with any other imagery.

What role do you think pop culture plays in the “high arts” ie painting, poetry, music, etc? Should it play a role?

Why should pop culture be any different than any other source, unless it is just a different set of inside jokes meant to isolate the work? Meaning: As long as it isn’t the vehicle that leads the poet to pander to a particular audience (for example, what the less-memorable works featured in the Def Poetry Jams default to), refer to The Odyssey or The Office, as long as it works.

By the way – I’m of two minds of the phrase “high arts” – who’s to say modern classical music requires more craftsmanship than the last Bare Naked Ladies CD?

Has advertising language penetrated our minds and souls?
Is there a way to subvert the culture while participating in it?

Advertising’s not different from any other media stream – information and language come at us so fast today that we cannot help but be penetrated somehow. And there’s no way to avoid participating in the information-age media-driven culture, yet the quantity and availability of differing opinions on ANYTHING grows exponentially.

Are superheroes the new Greek myths?

(Here’s where my ignorance may shine brightest) No, in the sense that the myths provided things to believe in and things to explain the universe. Modern superheroes are much more internal, psychologically-driven explorers who blow things up in their spare time while figuring out how to survive among humanity, rather than survive above it.

By the way, what is the role that TECHNOLOGY (non-media, that is) should play in the arts? And the creation of superheroes, too?

Those others are fools. Writing your poetry with what “future generations” might think of it is a great way to write safe, awful mush that no future generation would want to remember. Besides, anyone who thinks they can predict what future generations will think is delusional.