Replies: 47 Comments
on Thursday, February 14th, marjan said
"I used to be a cliche and then I became a statistic.:
Sorry, Walt, another 'deeply superficial'oneliner. Dig it! ;)
on Wednesday, February 13th, walt said
Jose, I have an excercise for my students who have all been strictly taught that cliches are out of bounds by someone along their educational paths...don't know if it is someone teaching at a lower level or possibly they get this in high school before they come to us. But I remind them that while brainstorming ideas for an illustration not to avoid the obvious as a starting point. Cliche falls into this category. So they bang out 50 to a hundred ideas, many of which are cliches. Then we begin to do a thing I call rotating the idea. Word play, image play, reversals, compare and contrast, etc., until some new insite begins to occur. Then we do it again twisting and turning the best of the ideas until one begins to dominate the field. That's the one they go with developing it further into realisation.
By the way, I've never really felt the Muse, the 'other' behind my work unless one considers a kind of universal force or power (prayers to God if you like) as the one I am speaking along the way. I tend to see my creative searches beginning either with a fairly specific theme or topical idea or by throwing several ideas up into the air to see where each falls out. These become a beginning if I have nothing more specific. But some smaller inspiring spirit, the daemon, muse whatever? ...somehow I feel more integrated than that. And generally I don't wait around for it. I found long ago that when I'm on a regular discipline in my studio if I go to work at 9 I'm inspired by 10. It's a discipline like...well I suppose it is like any meditative discipline...Yoga for instance.
on Tuesday, February 12th, jose said
Walt, it could lead to a very interesting body of work... maybe we should all of us here come up with something which starts off from a cliche and share it somehow on aa.
on Tuesday, February 12th, walt said
Marjan,
But what I said is true all the same. Cliches are an interesting topic. While we should try to get beyond them in our writing and our art they are, quite often, appropriate starting points because they do have a certain communication aspect that can be useful. I should write a blog about them sometime.
on Tuesday, February 12th, marjan said
Walty, I wasn't referring to you....
on Monday, February 11th, walt said
Critique accepted. I come from a long line of cliche mavens. My mother had the best. I always learned a lot from cliches. They are the language of the common folk. Then if you twist them just a little they say something new with enough of the old that people have to stop and think. Bob Dylan was a master of the twisted cliche.
But I do admit they are in my blood.
on Monday, February 11th, marjan said
walty, I hadn't thought that you'd checked out or felt venom of any sort. I was trying to be clever when you wrote about adding, I thought of subtracting. OK , not that clever.
Btw, I think you have the patience of a saintly teacher on your blog. The cliches are beyond bearable; but I do read your informative stuff.;) Right on, Walty!
on Monday, February 11th, walt said
Marjan, I did check out for a little while. Nothing personal. Just got caught up in the newer blogs. But I check back every so often. I'll chime in if I have something of interest to say.
on Friday, February 8th, marjan said
Josey? Owe me?
Your life of colours despite the anguish....:)
on Friday, February 8th, jose said
I owe you one, thanks!
on Friday, February 8th, marjan said
That's so sweet!
By the way, I've shown your paintings to some people and they also adore your colours.
on Thursday, February 7th, jose said
Thanks Marjan, sounds very interesting, I'm going to check Professor Amaryta Sen as soon as I can. No, Walty's one of the faithful he won't let you down. BTW have been named a josee, hosee, josay, hosay, jos, joss... so josy wouldn't hurt.
on Thursday, February 7th, marjan said
Jose, it did make sense!
Have you ever been someone's muse? It's really weird, because one could easily vex people into writing terrible poetry. (hehe) Reminds me of one of my favourite novels 'The Loves of Faustyna' by Nina Fitzpatrick, in which Oblivia vexes men into an addiction of writing bad poetry.
Down there somewhere I mentioned something about feeling limited by identifiable classifications; I watched Professor Amaryta Sen's lectures "Identity and Violence" and "Making sense of identity" (you can find them on google video) and I tend to agree with him on plural identities. 'Thought it might interest you, but, you know now that Walter has nothing to add, do you think we are endanger of him subtracting? ;)
on Tuesday, February 5th, walt said
I've little more to add but so nice to see so many new contributors here. Good one Jose!
on Tuesday, February 5th, jose said
In the case of the muse, Marjan, I would argue that the presence of the noun affects the verb, it consumes your whole presence and transforms whatever action ensues. In a sense you do loose yourself, become consumed, but you are abandoning yourself to a cause you wish to be one with - Art - there is no escape... there is running into its arms, its vortex, its abyss, or whatever it is that distances the artist from those who would only splash about in the shallow-end, closer to shore [the honnest engagement look was referring to?]. As I'm typing this I wonder if this makes any sense or is plain gibberish, but I'll post it just the same. Henry, Ed, Vijen, thanks for your contributions.
on Tuesday, February 5th, marjan said
to Look
I rather like that you wrote "as long as it is an honest engagement". So far, I've found 'improvisation' and 'intuition' the most honest and pure.(If this makes sense)
on Tuesday, February 5th, marjan said
Jose
Haha, flattery. ;) As for the muse bit, there seems to be a confusion here in the difference between the verb and noun and dictionary definitions versus interpretations? (That's what the muse told me, anyway.;))
on Monday, February 4th, look said
I tend to take things easier. I believe anything an artist honestly engage account for something about the artist and his work. What ever you name it. That includes an escape as long as it is an honest engagement.
look fr studio LDA
on Saturday, February 2nd, Henry Reed said
Enjoyed your picture
on Thursday, January 31st, Ed T. said
Interesting thoughts Jose, the politics of our time will be lost in 100 years, but a timeless work of art is well,.....timeless.
on Monday, January 21st, jose said
Brad [Greek], interesting what you just said there, I'm also finding myself setting aside aspects of what I previously considered life, especially if I don't feel it brings anything to my art, a sort of asceticism I guess, the superfluous is more easily cast aside these days.
on Saturday, January 19th, odette said
I envy you now Brad Greek...
I thank you for your advise Brad, Mark and José...I am trying to grap the muse :)))
on Saturday, January 19th, walt said
Ah Brad, but isn't one man's escape another man's quest?
on Saturday, January 19th, Brad Greek said
I would have to say that I totally escape into my art. It's the only place I find peace of mind. It's the only place I want to be. I have a family, they like me better when I'm not there, lost in a painting. Otherwise I'm complaining about something. I prefer to stay in my own mind, my own bubble as I think of it. The only thing on the outside world that I enjoy is the muses that find me everywhere. I can see the beauty in just about everything, even the ugly and devastating disasters has it's place. As I get older, the stronger this escape is getting. I'm shutting life out, it doesn't interest me much anymore. I'm content only when it's art related. Maybe I'm going mad! LOL Good!
Brad
on Thursday, January 17th, vijen said
Jose, nothing matters when you paint. It does not matter if you are escaping from whatever or wherever.... or living in an escapism, as long as you are true to your self, paint, sculpt how you feel and love what you are doing, nothing else matters. you are centered. no words can take tear you away from you, as an artist.
on Thursday, January 17th, jose said
Salut Marjan, glad you’ve joined in. The way you look at things and show them to us through the images themselves but also through the titles you choose makes you an artist [and I’m not just trying to be nice here. Mark said the rest and I agree]. Hey, maybe what you saw in those fire-hydrants was her doing… the object we depict is never the muse, the muse is just what makes us see and want to do.
Nyoman, terima kasih! I am honoured by your visit and participation in our blog. I drove past your museum in Peliatan upon my last visit to Ubud, an impressive setting, but unfortunately did not have the chance to visit - Bali is so full of art and places to enjoy it that you could spend a life-time and still discover you missed something important. I have found that the passion the Balinese people show for art and the support artists are likely to find there are unparalleled. Next time I am there I will definitely pay a visit and hope we can meet, your project sounds very interesting. I shall say more in my comments to your site.
Walt, on the topic of escape, I guess there’s no escaping it. There’s something the portuguese poet Fernando Pessoa wrote that I always go back to in his Livro do Desassossego [Book of Restlessness]: «Each of us is several, is many, is a profusion of selves. So that the self who disdains his surroundings is not the same as the self who suffers or takes joy in them. In the vast colony of our being there are many species of people who think and feel in different ways.» The idea may not be his originally, but I like how he makes it sound.
on Thursday, January 17th, Ellen said
Walt- You're topping me with Morrison!
on Thursday, January 17th, Nyoman Rudana said
Greetings from Bali. I'm Nyoman Rudana, founder of Museum Rudana in Ubud, Bali, Indonesia with the concept of Balinese Hidu philosophy of Tri Hita Karana. For more information about me and my museum, kindly check my weblog : www.adonisrama.wordpress.com and put some comments.
on Thursday, January 17th, Mark said
Marjan,
Perhaps you do have a muse. Look to your second paragraph in your reply, '...a mixture of frustrations and'.... so on (I'll not rewrite the whole quote). Your words speak of meaning in creating and that is a muse, is it not?
As I stated below painting is not an escape for me. Sailing, riding my motorcycle are, can be, escapes. Writting (a hobby for me) can be an escape. I use the words 'can be' because at times they are not escapes, when an idiot motorboater heads striaght for our sailboat, or another vehicle pulls out in front of me on my bike, or when what I am writting is not going as planned. My point is somethings can be an escape but not always, and maybe that is good as it keeps us in touch with the reality of the world. Which in the long run makes what we create deeper and more meaningful.
on Thursday, January 17th, marjan said
Salut Jose!;)
What an interesting piece of writing.
I've just realised that I've never had a muse. I have more of a tendency to fall in and out of love with 'ideas'.
I, also don't think that what you describe is 'escape', but a mixture of frustrations and a desperate need and curiosity to understand, find and share insights and explanations in this world and being aware and a need to share? Afterall 'art', 'fantasy','imagination','escape' etc. are all part of (perceived) reality?
But then, I don't even know if I am an artist (I did have a few gos at that definition, but found it limiting because of depressing expectations of particular classifications), so very possibly I haven't a clue what I'm typing about. ;)
I'll quote Ligeti.
György Ligeti (1923-2006)
" Je vis ici et maintenant, fais involontairement partie d’une culture et ce que je produis s’imposera avec le temps ou non."
I really appreciate your 'Kanopi II'. ;)
on Thursday, January 17th, Walt said
I do in fact lose myself in my work. But my work is not an escape per se. Perhaps it is a kind of therapy at times. But my work is the basis for my day job so it always works in unison. My day job is not an escape from my work either but a continuation. Since I teach art, what I do in the studio is always contingent with what I do in the classroom.
On the one hand I don't teach the kind of art that I do...(I want to use the word per se again but I'll resist)...because what I do in the studio is the result of my life experience coupled with the universal principals I think I teach. So the two work together on nearly every level. I go home inspired as often as I go home depleted. But it's a happy exhaustion for the most part. At every stop when I think I'm ready to quit it seems to become all that much easier.
In fact, if I escape at all these days, it is when I take my boat to the lake to go fishing or meet my friends on lake Erie to go sailing...on the other hand some of the friends I sail with are artists as well and so it becomes more of a jam session at times.
I must escape at times. But it isn't during my road trips or international travels because those are all art oriented in one way or another.
I escape maybe when I stay up all night on Mondays and watch the X-Files. But then I get so many great ideas from watching television, whether the X-Files or the daily news...so maybe that isn't exactly an escape either.
Who was it said "life mimmicks art"? Well at anyrate I certain subscribe to the words of Jim Morrison who summed it up nicely when he screamed..."No one here gets out alive!"
on Thursday, January 17th, Ellen said
Jose- Society always looked askance at me. I didn't fit the artist mold, feminist mold, housewife, professional, ect. When I wasn't crying, I was laughing. I certainly never met the expectations of my parents, but I sort of met the BEGINNING of my own....NOT the completed version. I took strength in from ALL places a Ricky Nelson song: "Garden Party" which has this immortal line, a personal mantra: "If you can't please everyone, then you've got to please yourself." Billy Joel also said it well: "Go ahead with your own life; leave me alone." Lastly: "Keep on Keeping on."-Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King. Jose- your sincerity shines in your art & your writing.
on Wednesday, January 16th, jose said
Ellen, It is a great feeling when you achieve that. I guess I felt it was an escape in those days because there was a very high expectation that I become something else, not so much from my parents, mind you, but from the society in which they [and my brothers and I] moved - those unseen forces in a way instilled in me a belief of needing to conform with what was expected so as to not cast a shadow on my parents - trust me the warmth and charm of latin cultures comes with some pretty tough things to digest. Anyway, that chapter’s solved, no more escaping, or at least I try to believe.
on Wednesday, January 16th, Ellen said
Jose- Aside from the cruel/stupid things that people say intentionally or unintentionally I have never felt that I was escaping behind the canvass: only when I was out in the world was I escaping my work. That is truly odd? Sort of like when I painted, I was more alive than not. Except the times with my children.
This is another unusual ocurrance: Stephen King wrote a great book called Rose Madder (a gorgeous color). In the book the protagonist goes into a painting...walks right in. As a landscape painter, I frequently feel, that when I am in a place I've painted, I am in my PAINTING! THAT is strange, but a wonderful feeling. It happens more when I am in real life, but sometimes, if I'm lucky, it happens when I look at my work....I can be inside it! It's an incomparable feeling to be one with your inage. It matters not whether the image is finished or not/ good or not: I just feel completely inside the work.
Paint on Jose!! You apparently have a powerful and wonderful muse!
on Wednesday, January 16th, jose said
True Mark, there's the big outdoors beyond our studio and we have to know how to cope with it. Alfred, it's a bummer when it comes from a colleague we thought was a friend, I don't mean the critiques, those are welcome and if they come from a respected colleague they're even special, I mean the shallow comments. But judging by what I read in Michael's blog I trust you're good at handling these things too
on Tuesday, January 15th, Mark said
The most important thing an artist needs to develope is a thick skin. Many will hurt us with words and actions, but to continue one must be tough and let what others say or do roll right off. Otherwise we will all end up crazy or worse, stop doing what we love (have) to do.
on Tuesday, January 15th, Alfred Perez said
Jose, I'm happy that I read your blog today. I recently experienced a similar scenario with an artist "friend" of mine who made a comment about my work. It left a sour taste in my mouth, and I was planning on addressing it next time we ran across one another. After having read both your article and the responces above, I've grown just a little more....Thanks!
on Tuesday, January 15th, jose said
Precisely Mark, it's what I meant by a new quality of presence.
on Tuesday, January 15th, Mark said
Odette, to repeat what the others have said, your muse will return, just open yourself up and it will come.
Jose, I re-read your blog and did I ever go in the wrong direction (even though I stand by my statments of trying to legitimise). Nor did I mean that loosing one's self in the work is a way to legitimise what we do. I'll leave this dicussion for another time.
When painting I never loose myself in the work, I am focused, I do think and ponder over what I am doing and how to get closer to what I want but strangly I seem more aware of my surroundings when I paint then when I am not painting. Outside when I work 'en plain air' I see more, hear more (as well as in the studio). I know more about what is happening around me then if I was just standing there. Plus I feel more in touch with myself then at any other time. Creating is a good thing regardless of what we, why or how we create it.
on Tuesday, January 15th, jose said
Odette, I agree with Brad, if the motivation is there, fine-tuning will ‘awaken’ the muse back with time. I think we run the risk of loosing her only if we blatantly turn our backs on her and refute our creative side, not because something unexpected and unwanted has temporarily got in the way. She’s within you, you just can’t tend to her the way you would like to or used to.
By no means, Mark, I do not take your statement to be harsh, though I do think we may be looking at this from opposing angles: when I am in my studio painting I'm not looking for ways to legitimise what I have chosen to do either, it is only when I have to come up with a blog that I try to think of things that I hope are common and meaningful to as many of us as possible. Even though I know this is a great way to possibly even promote my own stuff, I try not too be too self-centred or fixated on my production or my own career, in fact I would find that quite loathsome and not the point of this particular forum. At the studio, as pretty much anywhere else, to my wife and daughters’ dismay, I am completely engrossed by whatever idea it is I am trying to bring forth – to them it seems like I am up in the clouds, and perhaps I’d have to admit there is some escapism going on at that level. Although she did know she was marrying an artist and the girls are usually pleased by what they see me bringing down from the clouds. There I go legitimizing again, blast.
Brad, in this reverse phase I am going through right now I have to say I felt very pleased with myself last week for not to letting myself be ‘trapped’ as you well put it, in to a situation that could have closed down a door I was trying to keep open for a future exhibition. It’s sheer madness – as if there was never any middle ground: twenty years ago they [gallery owners; directors; etc.] used to be older and awe inspiring and unattainable and now they’re getting younger, not so awe-inspiring but making up for it in arrogance and the fine art of patronizing.
on Tuesday, January 15th, BradMM said
Odette,
Your muse will find you again. I don't think the tether is ever cut once your are bounded - it's just a matter of fine tuning and letting it back through.
on Monday, January 14th, Odette said
You are sooo right José, the times we spend behind the canvas are not at all moments of escape. On the contrary they are moments in which we confront with our real beings...
Now I am dealing tough times, due to several matters I wasn't able to paint in months. And it is so hard to me to start again, to find myself again...
Yes, the muse calls for your constant attention and demands total commitment. I wonder if she will find me again.
on Monday, January 14th, Odette said
You are sooo right José, the times we spend behind the canvas are not at all moments of escape. On the contrary they are moments in which we confront with our real beings...
Now I am dealing tough times, due to several matters I wasn't able to paint in months. And it is so hard to me to start again, to find myself again...
Yes, the muse calls for your constant attention and demands total commitment. I wonder if she will find me again.
on Monday, January 14th, Brad Michael Moore said
Everyone carries the memories of times when someone spoke to us in a manner that stirred us within in a negative way. I agree with Walt that engaging silence is a most beneficial course to growth. I have experienced that when someone makes a remark to my face I construe as lashing out - if I lash back out at them with my best cunning wit - I actually trap myself from grasping the best lesson to be learned from the exchange. I think your right, Jose, that lesson comes with time and reflection - and sometimes, many adjustments that bring better clarity to your own voice and work.
on Monday, January 14th, Mark said
Jose,
I have spent a life time with a small smile and silence. At times it is do to a lack of words, sometimes a wish to not commit, or perhaps to let the individual find thier own answer and other times to let the owner of the words squirm. I admit not all good reasons. I am not proud of them all but there are times that silence is the best answer.
I think though that this blog once again tries to address why we (artists) are here and to legitimize our being here. Of finding ourselves. If not to others then to ourselves. To give reason for what we do and to place it in society as it deserves. Also to define what an artists is and why and what good it is. This next statment may seem harsh but I do not mean it to be so.... So what!... I think it time we stop worring about our place in the world and trying to legitimize what we do and to in affect, 'Find Ourselves' and our artistic sensibilities so that others will take us seriously and so we can go on our creative way trying to convince ourselves that we are artists. I say this with no anger or hurt or frustration. I say this because although it is good to think of ones place in the world, to reflect, I think it time that we spend less of it trying to convice others or ourselves that what we do is worthwhile and that we are artists and more time just doing the work. No matter how much lip service we give it our work will determine if what we do is worthwhile and artistic.
Your blog though, Jose, is an excellent one for it has made me think of these things and has convinced me that for myself anyway I will spend more time doing the work that defines me and less time trying to convince myself or others that I am an artist, and what I do is art
As to what makes an artist. Does that matter? We do what we do. Leave it to time to say an artist created that.
Thanks Jose.
on Monday, January 14th, jose said
Problem is, Walt, as I get older I seem to be getting snappier. Always thought that patience and wisdom would kind of grow as time went by, but right now it feels like it's in reverse.
on Monday, January 14th, walt said
Jose, I've found over the years that when you have the will power not to engage silence can be the wisest answer. It gives you time to sweep your orignal thought, misgivings and suspicions under the table and helps you get to the kernal of truth behind the other's comment. And sometimes there is indeed some wisdome there beneath the personal shadings.
Some time ago, back in the nineties, an acquaintance said to me that I had been wise in my choice of alibi. I smiled and pretended not to understand, preferring to pass on the chance to respond adequately; I felt it was better that way because there’s always too much at stake at an opening to jeopardise the outcome giving-in to the venom of the odd jealous colleague. He made it sound like a compliment but I believe to have understood that he implied that my travels to India and the inspiration I got, and used unashamedly, back in those days were being perceived by some as an excuse not to tackle more ‘serious and pertinent issues’ more in keeping with my contemporaries. But the more I thought it over the more I came to realise that he hadn’t intended it as criticism but actually believed that finding the perfect alibi was part of the artist’s task. This worried me because in my view it isn’t.
