art is art is art is art: how to escape creative ruts
I was just having a conversation with my roommate. Really though, this is a conversation that I've had with a few people these past few days.
As a self-proclaimed artist, I used to feel a deep sense of guilt whenever I would go through stages of art block. Whenever I had a renaissance in my sketchbook, I would go through a dry spell in my music. When I was learning pieces in rates of handfuls at a time, I couldn't write a word to save my life.
What I've discovered is that the key is to not consider any form of my art as a monolith. My drawings are musical, my music is a form of poetry, my writing is visually appealing. Now that I've introduced film into the mix the lines have gotten exponentially blurrier. This current revelation has been gnawing at me for years in brief explorations, but I think I'm finally understanding what it is that I want out of myself creatively.
I've been trying out this thing recently of improvising things on piano to represent what certain spaces feel like. Very unstructured, very unpolished. When I listen back though, I can visualize these spaces. I might take that musical reference and add onto it with video clips, or a few sketches made alongside it. I believe knocking down those cold stone monoliths of sound, sight, touch into a crumbled beach of different senses is the key to breaking free of creative block.