my avoidance of creative block
In a conversation I had with my friend D last night, and as part of an ongoing conversation we're having, I was made to consider how I've been producing as much work as I have the last few months, if not the last year. He's currently trying to write a chapbook, and is finding it impossible to get the pen moving. I have been really lucky (or unlucky, inspiration wise) to have lots of drive and inspiration to create lately. I've settled on this explanation as to why.
All of the art that I enjoy the most and seek out is marked by imperfections. Or rather, I find that imperfections point to passion, the kind of passion that freezes over when you let ideas churn around in your head too long.
In the zine library, the best zines I've read have been the ones that are someone's stream of consciousness splayed out onto the computer paper, riddled with typos, hastily glued down images and collages, xeroxed in the cheapest printer they could find, and sent out into the world for everyone's viewing pleasure. It's a direct message from the author to the reader, written in first person, letting just a little too much information free in the public sphere, simply because the format lends itself so well to intimacy.
The fact that I love simple, effective work like those little zines so much tells me that there must be people out there who search the world for work like mine, and some might even have it land in their hands. Even if no one sees or enjoys it, I create the work that I look for. In an on-topic and a little egotistical vein, I find that I often read over my previous blog or journal entries just because I enjoy my own writing! Many of the bloggers I keep up with write very similarly to me: diary-esque, lists, jot notes, findings.
My key that has worked for me for the last while is simple: create the work that you seek to see! That must be a fairly obvious conclusion to come to for any artist though.
As I was reflecting to D, I think that explanation is part of the reason I didn't choose to pursue fine arts of any kind academically (arch. doesn't count!). As soon as I need to cater my work to fit someone else's eyes, I feel completely detached to it. Granted, half the battle of creative fields is maintaining your own perspective amidst and in spite of higher judgement, but writing and art are far too personal to me to subject myself to that. This is something I've been learning to work around in my arch. studios still, as there is a massive personal aspect to design as well.
PS. Another thing I enjoyed on this topic was watching Lauryn Hill's speech on various notes of art. Specifically, that you simply cannot have art without life. There must be a balance between producing vs. experiencing the life that influences art.
If it may be a little analytical, in the ebb and flow of life vs. art, I'm definitely rolling towards the bottom of the art hill after being through a torrential rainstorm on the life hill. I'm ready for another storm, I've already survived the last one!