When is Art finished?

The ultimate question for every designer, composer, choreographer, writer, poet……the creative process is never done.

A book or play can be rewritten and edited and rewritten again. Dance moves can change on a beat. A poem might be put down and come back to later with a different inspiration. A painting can be painted over.

Artist, like all the rest of us or maybe more so, change what they like. Artist can change media, materials, or even methods of expression. A painter may start with watercolors and move to oils or silkscreen. A writer may start with poetry and move to novels or screen writing. A dancer may start with classical and move into free form. A musician can learn popular rock and roll only to become interested in the roots of blues or classical. A musician may turn to weaving or a weaver may turn to stain glass. It is all a process of growth and experimentation.

So the question is “When is Art finished?”

When does the artist put the pencil down or the writer leave the keyboard? In some media there is a limit to space or materials and when they run out, the art is finished.

Deadlines can finish artwork due to the time has run out. Whether for a show or a commissioned piece, there is a deadline. A publisher has deadlines to guarantee printing and distribution. Concerts have deadlines of when the performance starts and ends.

Yet any artist continues to create. The former ideas and thoughts may lapse into new expressions or may be a rework of previous expressions. Composers will write variations on a theme. Painters will make several paintings of a subject, even changing media and materials. Writers will continue with a theme to make a series of novels with similar characters.

So “When is Art finished?”

It is never finished.

A song is covered and redone and covered again and each has their quality and originality. An idea from a poem can be transformed into a book or a movie with a different point of view. A color or a statement can inspire another’s thoughts to a new presentation.

So borrow my idea and increase the thought and give a variation on a theme to create something new. Creativity is a fluid process and must continue to flow.

Hallucinations

What makes an artist see something no one else’s see? What is in the artistic eye or ear to catch something the proletarian missed? Does an artist see or hear the same reality as the rest of us?

When reality becomes blurred with conscience but which is real?

Does the artist experience apparent perception of something not present?

Creativity is a phenomenon whereby something new and somehow valuable is formed. The created item may be intangible (such as an idea, a scientific theory, a musical composition or a joke) or a physical object (such as an invention, a literary work or a painting).

Creativity involves a number of disciplines: psychology, cognitive science, education, philosophy (particularly philosophy of science), technology, theology, sociology, linguistics, business studies, songwriting, and economics, covering the relations between creativity and general intelligence, mental and neurological processes, personality type and creative ability, creativity and mental health; the potential for fostering creativity through education and training, especially as augmented by technology; and the application of creative resources to improve the effectiveness of teaching and learning.

“Are you sure that what you saw wasn’t a hallucination?”

A hallucination is a perception in the absence of external stimulus that has qualities of real perception. Hallucinations are vivid, substantial, and are perceived to be located in external objective space. They are distinguishable from these related phenomena: dreaming, which does not involve wakefulness; illusion, which involves distorted or misinterpreted real perception; imagery, which does not mimic real perception and is under voluntary control; and pseudo-hallucination, which does not mimic real perception, but is not under voluntary control. Hallucinations also differ from ‘delusional perceptions’, in which a correctly sensed and interpreted stimulus (i.e., a real perception) is given some additional (and typically absurd) significance.

Hallucinations can occur in any sensory modality—visual, auditory, olfactory, gustatory, tactile, proprioceptive, equilibrioceptive, nociceptive, thermoceptive and chronoceptive.

Hallucination symptoms are illusion, figment of the imagination, vision, apparition, mirage, chimera, fantasy; delirium, phantasmagoria; informal trip, pink elephants, etc.

The other night as the sun was going down and a soft summer breeze was causing the trees to dance, I rocked undisturbed by electronics or noise and watched the show. I’ve lived through the 60’s and 70’s with a bit of a reference to hallucinations. I’ve stayed awake for several days and understand the brain trying to compensate the lack of rest.

So in the silence I stare at the leaves move with the shadows and light. There is a face. That is a landscape. There is a body and another face. Like watching clouds and deciding what the shape represents, there was this slideshow of shapes and activity in front of me for the viewing.

Theme Of The Day

Today woke up to snow. A fluffy pretty snow hanging on the branches but not freezing on the roads. After a couple of cups of coffee I listen to This American Life. It wasn’t their best show but I enjoyed the shows title: “Something Only I Can See”.

I thought about that title for I have written about hearing voices that may not be there and hearing a song after your turn off the radio. I might also see things only I can see? It is called the ‘artistic eye’.

Some folks take the time to observe and others are too busy with their daily lives to miss it. Luckily there are photographers and artist and dancers and writers and musicians who can see it and tell the rest of us about it.

When school budgets get tight, the arts are the first in line to be cut. What would we do without our art? Would we have hit tunes? Would we have museums? Would there be any concerts? Would there be any dances? Would there be any movies? Who would design new fashions? Who would write the books? Who would learn the classics and make new ones?

I personally believe everyone has the ‘creative eye’ or the ‘creative ear’ or the ‘creative thought’ if just take the time to use it.

So what was my theme for the day?

As I watched the snowfall trying to decide if I wanted to venture out in it, I got my theme for the day.

You have to take chances are there is no excitement to life. I strapped on my jeans and walked out into the falling flakes. It is not as cold as I thought but the streets are wet. I took my ride slowly avoiding snow traffic and enjoying the scenery. The same bad traffic was in the store but the game didn’t start for hours and I just coasted. The rest of the day was pretty routine for a winter afternoon as I settled into the norm.

So what was the theme of the day?

The theme was to take the chance. Go into the unknown with eyes open accepting whatever you find. If we bypass these chances we lose the opportunity for an adventure and perhaps a memory.

These memories may turn into a sheet of music or a book or a dance or a painting or just a legacy. For art is a legacy of a time when the ‘creative eye’ was being used.

What do you want?

I am here to please you

Not really, I am creating art. My art. My ideas, thoughts and passions are created for me. My feelings expressed in paint or sound or movement.

You, the viewer, are a participant in my experiment to show or tell my inner most wonders and hope you understand.

If you appreciate it and applaud, don’t forget to drop a few coins in the tip bucket.

An artist doesn’t work for minimum wage. An artist does not have an insurance plan. An artist does not have a 401k or a pension. An artist does have a passion to create and present their feelings where few where venture.

To make a living wage or at least a means of sustenance’s, an artist must conform to the general public’s whims. No matter how extreme or revolutionary an artist might consider their work is, to earn a living the works must sell.

The public can be persuaded to appreciate radical ideas and with enough positive critical response believes whatever the artwork is worth the price. If the artist can make a name or an icon of themselves, anything after that can be thrown together and sell.

For the rest of us, we must cater to the public’s whims. If they want flowers or unicorns or swan dances or Bach tributes, we will comply. A background dancer on a Beyonce video or a oboe player in the Boston Pops or a mural painter in Milwaukee or the bass player for Paul Simon will make a sustainable living wage without pleasing you…the public.

The most creative ideas and thoughts must be put aside for they might appeal or might not and to feed a family and afford travel the artist or performer or musician or creator will put aside personal passion to present art to please you.

Try This...

We use our eyes and voice and smell to recognize and establish items to tell the brain what it is, but what if one of those senses was not there?

Take a look at a painting.

Now describe it to another person without them seeing it.

Sounds easy?

I challenge you to do this. Why?

It will surprise you and to the one you are trying to describe the image without viewing it.

Take this example of the Mona Lisa.

“There is this lady, well a woman. She doesn’t look old or young but may mature. She’s got a long nose so maybe Italian but the eyes look like there is a lack of sleep. Here skin tone is sort of yellow or white and here eyes are dark. She is standing, no maybe sitting still. Her hands are folded on her lap. Her shoulder hair is straight and parted in the middle but with curly ends and her dress or whatever she is wearing is dark. Looks like she is wear a hoodie over a peasant’s dress with just a hint of cleavage. She might be plump or maybe pregnant. Behind her is some kind of winding road going to a lake or a river. There is a cliff and some trees and a bridge but it is very vague. She is looking over to the right side and has a somewhat grin going on.”

Can you visualize what I just said? Could you draw or sketch or paint the vision in your head?

Now try a Jackson Pollack or a Rodin or a Led Zeppelin concert. Unless you experienced the same feelings and discussed the reactions afterwards, it is difficult to explain to another.

The same is for a reading or a viewing or any personal influence to share with another who is a virgin to the thought.

Just let everyone enjoy or define his or her own meaning of the experience.

I Want Your Money

What is wrong with that?

I want your money. No really, I want YOUR money. What is wrong with that?

People grow up to start enterprises or join an already established business for employment providing them with enough funds for food and shelter. As families grow, more money is needed to live comfortably.

So we work for profit. The money beyond what is necessary to pay wages and other expenses to manufacture ideas, products, and other necessary items consumers will purchase.

Profit allows for growth of the company and more money for the owner. The higher the profit means children can go to better schools, bigger houses, fancier clothing, and fancy cars: all the items we aspire to. That is if all the workers get to share in the ‘profit’ of their hard work?

But if you are not an established business or have an excellent credit status, you need money. The banks have money. There are also others who have money and are available to acquire funds with the right presentation or begging.

That is right. Begging is necessary to get someone else’s’ money. You can also present false promises and broken dreams, but whether online or face-to-face it is begging.

What are the folks with the wad of cash in their pockets going to do? Are they going to part with their hard earned (even if not by them) cash for some foolhardy idea or promise?

Somehow this seems to work. Take a look at the political campaign contributions that are flooding in for an array of faces with false promises and silly rhetoric.

So with the right public relations and networking, you too can make millions from other people’s money. What do you have to lose?

Comments

As a person who types words on the Internet and also reads much of the nonsense out there, I preview the comments and wonder?

Who writes this stuff?

If someone, like me, takes the time to put out what might be informative or stimulating thoughts, why muck it up with comments of hateful or uneducated rants? 

A simple new story turns into a row of opinions and offensive agendas. My question is ‘Why?’

(Preface: I don’t chat or tweet or get into running streams that go nowhere and I rarely comment on post, but I do read many of them with amazement and thus my own rant)

Recently I read some article from an established journalistic news agency and reviewed the comments. The first few were somewhat intelligent review of the writing with some interesting personal reflections, but then came the blast against everything from the writer to the media to the government to religion to the man-in-the-moon.

How does this happen? Are we that distracted?

A comment (to me) should be like a critics review. Comments should be an intelligible intellectual discussion of the thoughts or actions of another who took the time to post for others to read and react to.

Most artist and writers and performers enjoy and learn from the comments of their audience. If a writer writes for profit (or survival) he or she appreciates the response of their readers. It is data from their audience that helps them perceive their better points for future efforts.

If the comments are full of hate mongering, it is like spraying graffiti on the Mona Lisa. Suggest start your own original blog to spew your filth. Like any civilized discussion, if you can’t add anything interesting, stay quiet.

With that said, and all those with strong idealism from politics to abortion to gun control to parking tickets, will wave the ‘free speech’ flag in my face. I’m sure we all have something to say, but it can be constructive or destructive and without the basics of fact version fiction, the Internet has become a pool of screaming memes. If your comment is nothing more than a selfie, I will delete it.

What I am asking is when authors, painters, musicians, and artist of every kind post examples of their creativity on social media, take the time to review it and say what you like and what you don’t like in an intellectual method?

Again my point is, when an artist posts something they would like to be responded to on the web, respond to it. Make a comment. It makes the piece grow stronger.

Comment?