“An idea, like a ghost, must be spoken to a little before it will explain itself.”
Charles Dickens
This felt quirkily accurate to me. While tit may appear tangential to the notion of art which I am pondering today, I think it is really at the heart of art and art making.
I find it absolutely joyous to spend time creatively, and am forever grateful that I get to spend time this way. One of the things I enjoy most is the ongoing observation, and gradual understanding, of how we make and create. The process we undertake and how the magic happens.
Not just the technical aspects (which also fascinate and possess at times) but more that obscure, ephemeral, fleeting notion of the creative process.
The idea of an artistic idea as a ghost-like apparition works for me. Sometimes the idea or thought is just out of reach; or it has been and gone so quickly I couldn't grab it but the sense of it remains. There is something lurking that I can 't recall without having the chance to focus and find it.
The second part where the idea sometimes needs a little bit of a conversation before it fully revels itself I find also accurate and true. I often find myself having jotted a notion down, then writing in response; asking questions of it; wondering aloud what I really mean...and then it can begin to make sense.
Quite the ramble in response to a few words.
What am I really trying say, I wonder???
Charles Dickens
This felt quirkily accurate to me. While tit may appear tangential to the notion of art which I am pondering today, I think it is really at the heart of art and art making.
I find it absolutely joyous to spend time creatively, and am forever grateful that I get to spend time this way. One of the things I enjoy most is the ongoing observation, and gradual understanding, of how we make and create. The process we undertake and how the magic happens.
Not just the technical aspects (which also fascinate and possess at times) but more that obscure, ephemeral, fleeting notion of the creative process.
The idea of an artistic idea as a ghost-like apparition works for me. Sometimes the idea or thought is just out of reach; or it has been and gone so quickly I couldn't grab it but the sense of it remains. There is something lurking that I can 't recall without having the chance to focus and find it.
The second part where the idea sometimes needs a little bit of a conversation before it fully revels itself I find also accurate and true. I often find myself having jotted a notion down, then writing in response; asking questions of it; wondering aloud what I really mean...and then it can begin to make sense.
Quite the ramble in response to a few words.
What am I really trying say, I wonder???
“The compelling thing about making art — or making anything, I suppose — is the moment when the vaporous, insubstantial idea becomes a solid there, a thing, a substance in a world of substances.”
ReplyDeleteAudrey Niffenegger 'The Time Traveler’s Wife’ 2003 (p274)
I am so often in awe of your glorious recollection of words and quotes from books Mo. I have read this book and could not recall this! That point of transformation remains magical...go well.
DeleteWhat a lovely, true thought this is, and how well your words expand on it and explain. Thank you as always for the sharing.
ReplyDeleteThanks Margaret/Charlton - this weekly pondering often crystallises or clarifies my own thinking and understanding....go well.
DeleteYou are right. What is fascinating about making art is the 'conversation' with the idea whilst playing, and the buzz you get when it starts to answer back
ReplyDeleteTotally! I know its weird to talk about conversations with ideas and work, but I swear they talk back!
DeleteI think you spoke volumes! I really understand what you mean when you write that an idea can come and then be gone so quickly yet leaves its imprint within somehow. And that other thought need teasing out and discussion to become something more tangible.
ReplyDeleteI think I will spend my forever days in awe of the creative process and how things come into being...magical stuff!
Deletecatching ideas is good work.
ReplyDeleteThe best!
Delete