Live Like an Artist: On Making Art Anyway
— Let us begin with the comedy of artistic doubt. Granted, I have been trying to return from 8 hours into the future (jet lag), but this past week I have been in a state of artistic doubt. It’s nothing I haven’t had basically my whole entire life to varying degrees, but usually one comes to that place where it feels like: what is the point, or no one wants your art anyway, or I’m making art and sending it into the abyss. And THEN, usually, right after that, comes a feeling of freedom — if no one wants it, you might as well make whatever is in your heart, whatever most obsesses and compels you, entirely for yourself then.
— That state of doubt though, that interval, it can be useful, clarifying, and it can create in you a permission — you allow yourself to be a beginner, to play, to go places you might not have gone otherwise. Nowadays, when I start to doubt, I admit, I have been letting myself get distracted and overindulge in scrolling (the death of art making). And the thing is, is that uncomfortable spot of doubting is rather crucial isn’t it? So here, I pledge to sit with the doubt for longer. Doubt is the friend. I repeat, doubt is the friend.
— Perhaps amusingly, the piece I am struggling to write is about “writing anyway.” It’s about re-encountering the work of Artemisia Gentileschi, which has led me way down into some rabbit holes regarding the reception of my first two books, and how that informed the rest of my writing trajectory. So there’s comedy in my current state of doubt, for sure. I’ve been thinking about who my audience might be for this piece, is there an audience, even? Obviously, I know better, and yet. So yes, I will write the dang thing and worry about everything else after that. There is likely an audience, however small.
— Onward. I always have a sharp eye out for library thoughts/ news/etc. So here are a couple of articles I thought I’d share in case you have a similar interest. From Nautilus, “Viva la Library! Rebel against The Algorithm. Get a library card.” A quotation from the article: “Libraries might be our last bulwark against the digital degradation of life and learning.”
— And here is an article titled: “AI Is Supercharging the War on Libraries, Education, and Human Knowledge.” A quotation from the article: “The boosting of artificial intelligence by big technology firms, big financial firms, and government agencies is not separate from book bans, educational censorship efforts, and the war on education, libraries, and government workers…”
— This next thing isn’t necessarily library related (though it could be). Have you heard of the “Personal Curriculum” trend? Obv. libraries could be useful in this regard — sourcing books, videos, etc. What would you choose to study for a month? This trend is something that writers just naturally do — find a topic and obsess about it until it turns into a book.
— I have been thinking about how I used to centre the question, “How can I be of use?” I suppose for the last few years I’ve been centring the question, “How do I keep my head above water?” I should like to return to the former question. And. Maybe it’s useful in some ways to write about doubt….but I need to put more thought into my processes. :)
— Something I do find useful related to my current writing doubt/stagnation/paralysis is this quotation by Rilke:
“The longer I live, the more urgent it seems to me to endure and transcribe the whole dictation of existence up to its end, for it might just be the case that only the very last sentence contains the small and possibly inconspicuous word through which everything we had struggled to learn and everything we had failed to understand will be transformed suddenly into magnificent sense.”
— In other words, persist, keep going. Begin, so that you might arrive at that mysterious and magnificent inconspicuous and utterly necessary word. (As always, I prescribe, I give advice to myself here, which may or may not be useful to you, dear reader).
— It is the artists and writers who will light the way, that I do believe. Spending time once again in Italy recently for 2 weeks devoting ourselves to looking at art, feeling art, only convinces me more. Of course it does. No one wishes to visit cities that are devoid of art, history, culture.
