Creativity

Unweaving a Rainbow: What Makes Something Beautiful?

Investigate Everything!

Some of you might not want to parse out what makes one thing more beautiful than another. I completely understand. Keats complained that Newton had “destroyed the poetry of the rainbow by reducing it to a prism.”

I’m here to meld that duality and I contend further that prism and poetry can co-exist fruitfully. In fact, in order to make my best art, I require that generation of The Third which emerges from Opposites.

I’ve tried the romance of just messing around with the crayons, the keyboard, and the clay, rather juvenilely hoping that the lightening bolt of genius will make a lucky strike. (Even sometimes thinking it actually did, for me.) Ultimately, though, it’s like playing Blackjack: while the odds are better than most games of chance, they still are in the House’s favor, not mine.

Goal-less and right-brained fooling around is creatively essential, but it is a warm-up: the beginning doodle, the free-write, the initial pinching, coiling and rolling. It so rarely makes it to that zen place of offhanded perfection, as much as we might be glancing over our shoulders to see if it did.

To take my craft into beauty and excellence –leaving the lightening bolts to shock themselves –I explored the nature of the creative process, studied Color Theories and The Principles and Elements of Art until I felt conversant and sometimes even fluent.

In other words, I got scientific and it helped. Now I could not only wonder at the rainbow’s glories, I could unweave it and put it back together in my own poetic way.

When I changed my art-making from 2D mixed media to 3D ceramics, a whole new set of loveliness standards came into play. What about Line and Form in Space? What about that Viewer in motion around the piece – or actually using it? What about Front, Side and Back? Top and Bottom?

So…. besides sticking to the work in my studio evolving my efforts, besides near constant conversations with mentors, colleagues, fellow enthusiasts and supporters, besides Art History courses and museum gallery visits, and besides deep thought on what motivates and thrills me, I read books.

And here are those that I deliciously don’t quite understand, but every time I delve through them, a little more is revealed:

The Nature and Art of Workmanship and The Nature and Aesthetics of Design, both by woodworker David Pye. If you click on the links, you will get descriptions and reviews. (Don’t miss the one for the Design book by wiredweird! I can’t describe the power of this book any better.)

Li: Dynamic Form in Nature by David Wade

And two exploring the realms of Sacred Geometry, whose philosophies lie at the heart of my seeking the Music of the Spheres in all I do.

Sacred Geometry by Miranda Lundy

The Power of Limits: Proportional Harmonies in Nature, Art and Architecture by Gyorgy Doczi. The cover of my edition gives a hint of how the author connects the Golden Mean and the Fibonacci sequence to both the natural and visual world: with the language of mathematics.

Certain proportions occur over and over again joining unity and diversity

Herein lie richly illustrated pages with examples from plants, crafts, animals, Art: both ancient and modern, writing, the human body, music and more, all pointed toward a revelation of cosmic order so universal the author coined a new word for it Dinergy. “…Made up of two Greek words: dia — ‘across, through, opposite;’ and ‘energy.'”

A sample page.

So this is why Acoma Pottery is so pleasing! (Hint: maybe)

So what makes something beautiful? It’s surely not book learning and the methods of parsing, unweaving, reducing and dissecting! I don’t play around with numbers at all, I make art.

Rather, it’s about understanding that essential beauty’s out there, we’re all capable of perceiving it and here’s a Tiny Bit o’ Why. We may wildly disagree on specifics because there are many ways these patterns manifest.

Time, place, culture, narrative and materials don’t matter, yet there it is: A certainty of visual knowing instinctive and true.

I swear this knowing is how I sense when a work is done. There’s an out-breath, a hand relaxation, a satisfaction, all related to the cessation of seeking more for that piece. The rainbow is rewoven for now and I don’t need to measure it to make sure.

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5S Methodology, Mise en Place and My New Studio

Hot stuff wall paint is named Briquette

PART ONE: The Set-Up

Legions of artists fantasize about The Perfect Studio. Whatever the particular siting, configuration and appointments, it comes down to it being a vortex of personal creative energy where the conduits of genius become pure and we are blissful.

I’ve walked around a few incredible art-making habitats, many with zen views, which gave my artist’s soul the same frissons as Disneyland’s Peter Pan’s Flight did for me at age 6.

After the thrills, though, come the tidal waves of malicious envy followed by the dirty backwash of self-admonition: “A lot of artists don’t have any studio at all!” The Voice nags. So I go clean and rearrange one more time, dutifully attempting to bloom where I’m planted.

Sometime late last year I got a case of INeedABetterStudio-itis that was not induced by envy or guilt, but by a strong re-conceptualization of how I work best. I noticed things go better for me in my creative space when:

1. It has an open feeling with largish work tables and good task lighting.
2. It has dedicated places for tools, supplies, and other necessaries and they are clearly labeled.
3. I have separate areas for wet clay forming, bone dry and bisque work, and for decorating and photographing work.
4. Deep storage and side activity supplies are not visible.
5. It is inviting and pretty easy to keep clean.
6. There’s a private feeling, separate from my household.

Those were the qualities that I kept seeking in the yellow space, a large back bedroom located off the laundry/pantry pictured below. But, I was asking too much of it. I wanted it to be an active studio as well as a major seasonal storage area, a photography studio, an Etsy Shop inventory and shipping area, a place to stage and prep my outside-the-studio teaching and volunteer projects, an art reference file cabinet and a mini meditation hall. No wonder I had no lasting success in wrassling it into a dream studio!

Free Swimming in the Creative Soup

It was clear, though, that I would not be moving off-site, out in the yard or be converting the living room. What, oh what to do besides more Sisyphean tidying? Eventually it occurred to me I could switch out two rooms by moving the active studio around the corner and down the hall to the off-the-beaten-path red room, taking only the necessaries with me and leaving the other functions behind to be joined by the exercise equipment.

And that is what I did. See the just-moving-in shot at the top of the post.

A few weeks later, I performed a dedication ceremony thanking “the divine cockeyed Genius assigned to my case“, by clearing and blessing the newly-born space.

Flowers, Candles, Oranges, Incense, Salt and Rattles

PART TWO: The Never-ending Conclusion

As I continue to pay attention to what I need in my studio (to make it vortex of personal creative energy by opening the purest conduits to genius and thereby fostering my ultimate bliss,) I make adjustments.

I stand when I work, so I propped the tables up on bedrisers and topped them with HardieBacker board, a smooth and durable work surface. As a bonus, the higher tables make the storage beneath them accessible without groveling.

I can reach everything on all the shelves, no footstool required, and I am able to keep stuff nearest to its likely use.

I swung the decorating table 90 degrees to create more elbow room, found sturdy, stackable clementine boxes to hold everything on the shelves and labeled them, got rid of the odd-shaped wareboards, threw out the broken and moldy and gave away anything not often used.

Albert Einstein, an earthly genius, said, “Things should be made as simple as possible, but not any simpler.” In the spirit of simplistic balance, I am scrutinizing my remaining tool collection and questioning why I have 8 cut-off wires, 16 needle tools, 23 ribs, dozens of similar wooden modeling tools, a deep drawer full of sponges and a whopping 212 brushes – I just counted them!

I think the bulk of these need to go. They are going.

In practice, I only use about 20 favorites from all categories, which I keep handy on my right side along with my water tub, spray bottle, sponges, hand towel, brushes, slip container, and a cache of beloved sticks, straightedges and dowels. It’s an artist’s version of a mise en place, which works really well and I have begun to hone.

I now drive a custom cockpit of ceramic creation. Here’s a non-action shot (because an action shot would be less clear.)

A way of working that works

My entire studio is becoming a pretty decent personal version of Japanese workplace organization called 5S Methodology

1. Sorting (Seiri)
2. Setting in order (Seiton)
3. Shining (cleaning) (Seiso)
4. Standardizing (Seiketsu)
5. Sustaining the discipline (Shitsuke)

There are three other Ss that accompany this methodology: Safety, Security, Satisfaction. While they mean something different for factories and schools, I see them more as positive emotive qualities, emanating from the newly organized and clean space, helping me feel professional by fostering my sense of privacy, comfortable confidence and pleasure in my craft.

It’s a practice, this studio functionality perfection biz, but, I swear, now that I don’t need to kick a fire lane in to the work area every time I enter, only to stand there both fog-brained and hyper-distracted – essentially pre-defeated by the disarray – I’m making better art and having a way better time at it too.

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Claiming A Character in a Plain Clay Cylinder

Each face is unique; it has to be

A new series of face jugs has begun! Similar to the Local Talkers 2009 in that they are based on the faces appearing in the 2011 Local Talk column of the Santa Cruz Good Times, but different because each one is full-sized and meant to be a stand alone work.

I’ve lifted some of the limits I placed on myself in 2009, in that I can choose one or more faces/respondents a week, or none. And I can base my choice on expression and/or on what the person says.

Each jug is stamped with that person’s first name, last initial and one word of their reply to the question of the week. In the top photo are, left to right, Cecil U. Stopped, Kate K. Y and what eventually became Nicole B. Amphitheatre.

Here she is at leatherhard before being cleaned up and getting the base coat of underglazing.

Love the headband and the earrings!

And just for fun, here’s a close up of the source face.

Facing the camera and smiling slightly

For me it’s not about creating a photographic likeness, but an energetic and gestural one. The clay jug form has its own demands that must be served. The cylinder needs to balance in all ways. It can only stretch so far. It can’t get too heavy with add-ons. (Hair!!!!) It needs to function as a vessel, although I’m finding I care less and less about that as I go deeper into sculptural expression. I just might be getting to the same place as sculptural teapots which are generally full of narrative and SO not meant to be used for serving tea!

I am keeping better studio records this time too. Here’s the page so far for Cecil U. Stopped.

SO much better than binder paper!

So, that’s my Studio Report at the outset of one thematic series I will be exploring this year. The face jugs provide a looser more organic foil to the other works I’ve got going and I like that I get to find my way from the plain cylinder to the character waiting to take form.

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Anti-Goals, Part Deux

Comedy and Tragedy, Which is Which?

Ya know, I think I really got me onto something with those Anti-Goals from my last post. I wrote mostly in jest, but then again, not really, as those are behaviors and thoughts that I struggle with and it was good to name them with high irony. And while I don’t think I’m alone in my difficulties, I must work through them alone in person in realtime in this life.

 

What’s that quote about happy and unhappy families? Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy, first line…. Being “unhappy” in one’s own way, even if it seems mundane, means needing singularly specific “happiness apps” as remedies, which requires close and personal attentiveness.

Point is, once one knows one’s devil-enemies, the playing field and/or battleground cannot help but change as well. And that, too, demands a tricky and confusing mobility of soul, not to mention of thought and behavior.

No wonder it’s so hard to attempt to change for the better! Everything is changing anyway, my mind, my mood, my give-a-shit…what the hell does it take? How, oh how, to sustain Positive Change through All Change? I loosely quote the insightful potter Annie Chrietzberg, “What don’t you get about the change-yness of change?” Exactly.

Well, I get that I am a Contrarian. I get that I need to take on both sides – the Either/Or – before I resolve to the Both/And or The Third….which brings actual change to sticky places. Once The Third is perceived, duality crumbles and all manner of 4ths, 5ths, 6ths…..Infinite-ths arise. It gets juicyfun again, too.

Continuing in the vein I started last post, I need to counter those snarky S.M.A.R.T. goals, whose very left-brain linear clarity propels me smack into petulant inaction.

I tried making my Anti-Goals S.M.A.R.T. by identifying their Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant and Time-bound components. That led to Action Items like this one: Raise FreeCell Win Percentage from 34% to 35% by end of the week. What a beautifully written goal, but just as unmotivating as any.

Instead, I found it edifying, even cleansing, to propose S.T.U.P.I.D. goal criteria and here they are:

S.T.U.P.I.D. Criteria

S = Self-Sabotaging
T = Time-wasting
U = Unhealthy
P = Punitive
I = Impossible
D = Diffuse

This is my happiness app, doing things like this – though it is ultimately about the liberation of getting out by going through.

I pretty much find both the S.M.A.R.T. and S.T.U.P.I.D. criteria examples of the Either/Or camp and now that they’re resolved a tad – because I am more aware of what I want and of what I don’t want to aim for – I get to boogie around in the Both/And arena hopefully discovering what I truly need to do, be, attract, attain and what discipline and order I need to bring to those practices and tasks. If that’s what I get out of this, great, but if I get something else, I’ll deal.

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Anti-Goals 2011

You can't have one without the other!

It’s January. It’s time to light a candle and seek resolved renewal in the cold, dark and wet. Time to aim the mind’s sextant out into the chill, clear soulnight at one’s personal North Star and set a course. Time to clear away, focus and make lists of goals. Timeframes. Working Plans. Mission Statements. Tasks. All that. Or not.

I’m workin’ on it, sorta. I belong to a few formal and informal circles where this is a daily discussion item. Some of the participants have pages and pages of S.M.A.R.T. goals. Some wish they did too. I’m not convinced.

I think I want Goals. I think I hate them because they’re too constricting and ultimately I become mulish or openly rebel or I change them drastically, so what’s the use of getting so officially worked up in the first place? I’m not the Boss of Me!

Even when I actually craft a juicy, heartfelt, authentic list of things to do and be, I notice I’m good at mistaking Goal Setting for actual achievement. Like walking through a stage set flat of a house and not a real house.

Still I feel the need to periodically choose a few directions and some supporting behaviors, both personal and professional. I think it was Yogi Berra who said, “You’ve got to be very careful if you don’t know where you’re going because you might not get there.” Be afraid of that! That way lies the abyss, the labyrinth, the black hole of meaninglessness. Honest. Or maybe it’s a Zen thing.

So, this January, to help me call my own bluff…to harness my Inner Mule and and amuse my Wild Child: Anti-Goals.

Just think of things you think, do, and are that seem to prevent you from living that Best Life. Write ’em down. Start seeing the What Not To Wear version of your Goals. What gets revealed might just be the very thing you needed to know to start wearing your true colors.

Anti-Goals for 2011

1. Wake up daily with a sense of overwhelming dread.

2. Let perfectionism and fear of success lead to entrenched procrastination.

3. Say Yes to nearly all requests from others.

4. Remain sedentary.

5. Eat and drink nervously and unconsciously.

6. Discount all money matters; spend anyway.

7. Believe that gathering lots of artistic ideas is just as good as making art.

8. Wait to be discovered.

9. Lurk online.

10. When discouraged, do nothing. OK, whine about it and let The Voice berate your spinelessness.

11. Harbor professional jealousy and keep score.

12. Bemoan how far behind you’ve gotten.

So, there’s a dozen for you. They come easier and easier and they humor, soothe and direct me in ways my Good-Girl-You-Get-An-A+ Puritan Workaholic Get ‘er Done Checklist Self never knew. Auspicious…

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Being A Social Artist

Social Media Marketing for Dummies Book Cover

Oh, my, such a lot to explore here, but I will try hard to stick to my major idea: For me the idea of being a Social Artist who Markets Her Work means attempting to be a living oxymoron. I just don’t resonate with it.

Or didn’t. Or I’m a work in progress, learning to live the BOTH/AND instead of the EITHER/OR. Nowadays I find it interesting to ‘put on my Big Girl Panties’ [my new favorite saying from this summer] and get myself out there, even if I concurrently break out in metaphorical hives.

This unnatural, learned behavior was hatched in October 2008 when I ran across Alyson Stanfield’s Art Biz Coach site and book, I’d Rather Be In the Studio! The Artist’s No-Excuse Guide to Self-Promotion.

Fast forward to the present, having collected Alyson’s wisdom through her book, artbizconnectionsalon, online classes, blog and website, phone sessions and even a couple of live workshops she happened to conduct in Northern CA (lucky me!) I – who couldn’t make an attachment to an e-mail back then – now find myself blogging, chatting, friending, following, tweeting, linking, posting, commenting, messaging, convo-ing, listing and re-listing IN ADDITION to making art and more art, entering exhibits, opening my studio, contacting galleries, joining art associations, attending receptions, and in general authentically livin’ the dream I dreamed my whole adult life. The mysterious other things that artists do out in the Art World have been revealed…they are just not exactly what I thought they would be and I am learning to pick and choose.

The Isolationist INTJ me still gets plenty of solace and creative communing one-on-one with my Muses, of that I make sure. But I have come of artistic age in a new time when the gallery walls are transparent, the artist’s rep looks a lot like me and I have the virtual means with which to share my artistic entirety – images, words and connections – in a way that strangely suits me.

There are no longer Gatekeepers: we know our fans and collectors and they know us. We expect it. Though I sit here and you there, you, dear Reader, are a real person! You can talk back to me, you can tell others, and so it goes virally along.

Being a Social Artist, even one who Markets (read: SHARES, and thanks, Alyson,) isn’t quite the oxymoronic existence I once felt it to be, and even if I have my reluctant moments, I have definitely learned how rewarding it is dive in the pool and play.

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If You Were a Vessel…

Good Times Local Talk September 28, 2000

…What Would Your Purpose Be? Here’s the header of the Santa Cruz Good Times Local Talk column that caught my eye ten years ago, tickled my imagination and never really left.

It is the direct inspirational source for my work of art, “Local Talkers 2009: One Face Jug a Week….” that I have blogged about a lot over the past year, including showing you all the finished version in last week’s post. (Since then I learned that the piece has been accepted into the Cabrillo Gallery Exhibition entitled CAL IF OR NIA, an all media juried exhibition open to all California artists and curated by the Owner and the Director of San Francisco’s venerable Braunstein/Quay Gallery, Ruth Braunstein and Shannon Trimble, respectively. It opens August 30 and runs through September 24, with the Opening Reception September 12 from 3-5PM on the campus of Cabrillo College in Aptos, CA. I am SO proud, please come see!)

But that’s not what I came to talk about today. It was more about that question about being a vessel: a containing conveyance, carrier or conduit. That’s what never left my mind and why I saved this column. I was astonished at the responses’ variety: a ship, a blood vessel, a food bowl for the hungry, even a metaphoric container for religious views.

It never occurred to me to be anything BUT a ceramic vessel, probably a pitcher! It is just my ceramic artist’s personal frame of reference to the word “vessel” which completely illustrates “the law of the instrument”, that we tend to overuse the familiar tool, as in “If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.” (An old saying attributed to Mark Twain and Abraham Maslow, and many others.) I like, too, the French concept of deformation professionelle which really nails it (pun intended…) “looking at things from the point of view of one’s profession.” C’est moi!

So this column expanded my thinking both by jolting me in the first moment I read it and then by seeping in deeply over the years as it has hung in my studio. It has become a vessel of its own, conveying me to expanded art horizons, both conceptually and actually, and I am forever a pitcher of sweetened gratitude because of it.

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