Thursday Thoughts...

"Being creative is not so much the desire to do something as the listening to that which wants to be done: the dictation of the materials." 

Anni Albers

I always think when you hear people speak about the conversation an artist or maker has with their work, that you know that they get it.

I sometimes find that materials tell me what they want to be; at other times I make because I simply need to make.  Most often tho I think it is a dance, a meeting in the middle.

I will be wondering or thinking about an issue or a topic, reading about it, writing short notes, trying to make it make sense for me. Realising (or not) that I want to say something about it, as she suggests in the first part of the quote  - the desire to do something.

This then leads to the listening part of the conversation - what is around me, what does the idea say to me, what can the things I see or do suggest? And often this arrives in flash - I can see clearly what the thing needs to be. I haven't directed that this be so - I have simply paid attention to the things I know and see, and they have subconsciously forged the idea.

At other times I struggle, investigate options - sometimes I try to drive it too much.

Of late, I have come to realise that I sometimes say to myself - push your boundaries, do something wild, do something different. And in the end I keep coming back to things that I feel best represent me and the things I want to say, and how I want to say them.

In the end,  I listen.