I once heard that art is about story telling and most art comes from a place of struggle and darker parts of ourselves that we are not usually used to talking about. Some examples might battling addictions, weight, depression or family hardships. To make meaningful and thought provoking work the responsibility of the artist is to go to those parts of ourselves that we keep buried away from the rest of the world.
During my last semester of school the work that I was creating was lacking and I couldn’t seem to figure out a solution to get past this block and move forward. One of my professors who knew of my struggles asked my this, “Amy, do you want to be a painter, a really good painter? Artists who are painters travel to the places of hurt, they are willing to dig deeper for source materials. How far are you willing to dig to find what matters to you?” These were hard questions for me to tackle but I also knew that if growth was to occur in my work I had to go to these places of myself that I feared. It ended being some of the best advice I received while in school and helped me to create and generate ideas for the work that I made before I graduated to the work I am still doing 10 months later. Sometimes however, an artist doesn’t always have to go to the darker, deeper parts of themselves to be creative and I think if you do want to be more of a creative person then read the books below.
Recently I watched a presentation on TED Talks that got me thinking about what I wrote above. The speaker was Julie Burstein, the author of the book I posted below; “Spark: How Creativity Works.” This is a great read if you want a little insight into creativity. Another book to consider reading is by Daniel H. Pink titled “A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule The Future.” Anyway, happy reading and Happy Thanksgiving!!
