Art: where the broken wings fly after all

Originally posted April 4, 2008. Thought I'd haul it up here again and update it a bit to remind me.

Every person has beauty and value. Some have other unsavory aspects which obscure the beauty and value, but it's there.

Some of us are eccentric, obviously old, ridiculously odd, too fat, too thin or perhaps misshapen or unpleasant or unreliable. Some folks, though beautiful, are misshapen in ways more difficult to see - disfigurement by the constant prejudgement of others, where every word was twisted, shaded, weighted and measured against some mythical standard of perfection. Or by constant criticism during childhood where every flaw was carved up like a roast repeatedly. Or by constant underserved praise and by life passages bought and paid for by blood money rather than earned. This unhappy learning is latter replayed on others.

Sometimes people find it really difficult to get past it all. Some are like moths that have emerged from the cocoon in a jar that was too small. (See my pencil drawing above) Their wings unfolded only midway and are forever bent. Yet even in this there can be value.

Like many other resources, the past can be transformed. Rather than repeat it, and live it out again and again, rather than turn the bitter criticism or the too clever manipulation on others or measuring them against an imagined perfection, or insulting them for dramatic effect (sounds familiar in the current political scene) -- the best use of the past is to render it down into art. (Not the so called Art of the Deal,  but art in the expansive sense - whether literary, musical, visual, theatrical etc.) In that way it is an offering, and something is given to world.

It doesn't even matter if the world accepts it. It is the making of it, and perhaps the offering of it, that heals in a way that golden toilet seats and hair implants never can.

- Mar  Walker

Poet Jason Labbe recommends daily writing discipline

Waiting for inspiration won't help you find some, according to Jason Labbe, who read at Wednesday Night Poetry last week at the Blue Z Coffeehouse in Newtown.

It's important to write every day, and out of that discipline discoveries come, he told the Wed. Night Poetry crowd during the Q & A following his reading. (I think that might be good advice for practicing almost any skill or art form - a discipline of playful, purposeful exploration.

Labbe has an unassuming, understated reading style. His work is evocative, surreal, yet somehow spare and stoic. I really enjoyed his featured reading. He has an MFA in creative writing from the University of Vigrinia and a chapbook called Dear Photographer (Phylum Press, 2009) which is out of stock already. He's also a musician and drummer actively involved in performing and recording. Visit his website for details of his doings www.studyinblue.com (If you run the cursor towards the top of the page a menu will appear.)

Inspiration's lineage: the discipline of play

To many teachers, this picture might well represent the ideal student that they have never before seen. Eager, empty and knowing it, friendly, waiting to be filled with knowledge. HAHAHAHA. Dream on teacher friends!

The figure in the painting represents a muse and the conceptual problem with it is the same as the basic conceptual problem with many folks notion of education. The muse has appeared at a light source, removed the top of his head, and is indicating to the unknown source to "Fill 'er up!" Presumably, the muse will the travel to artists and musicians etc  in need of inspiration.  Then the muse will pour off a bit of inspiration into their heads....

But the world really doesn't work this way nor does education. Getting inspired, getting an idea, and getting educated are not passive activities.  They require preparation and effort, though the spark may come at a moment when the prep has paused.....   You have to have been entertaining various notions for a new one to pop into your head.  Reading or looking or thinking or writing or painting or playing generally happens first, usually on a regular basis. So this is another way of saying that inspiration is often the result of that boring old thing: discipline, even if it is a discipline of regular mental play.....  (hmm some irony there)

ABOUT THE PAINTING: This painting of mine is an oil on canvas which went to Cape Coral Florida with Sharon and Jim Houston many years ago,  I don't know where they are now, or if some hurricane has destroyed the canvas or if they sold it in some weekend garage sale.  Or if they are even still alive or have moved to god knows what state. I was known as Misti in those days, and that is how I signed this painting. This picture was scanned in from an old snap-shot.

-- M.M. (Mar) Walker

Poetic license

As a medium, oil pastel offers a lot of possibility. This is a none-too-flattering, not particularly accurate self-portrait of the puzzled dragon at the easel. This was just after I came back from Maine when I lived in the attic of the house where I grew up. I like the crazy colors. The curtains were really white but that wasn't that interesting somehow. My hair is not really green either. haha.

WRITING NOTE: Writing fiction or poetry is a lot like that - the details can be altered to good effect on the bottomline of the story. Non-fiction has another standard - but the filter is still the writer's, reflected in what comes first, what details are included, what items had follow up research, etc etc.
 

brain center for metaphor found?

Is metaphor an unfathomable enigma to you or to anyone you know? According to research at the Center for Brain and Cognition at the University of California, San Diego, a small region of our brains may either equip us for metaphor or limit us to literal narration.

According to researcher V. S. Ramachandran, director at the center, a region of the brain dubbed the angular gyrus is most likely partly responsible for the human ability to understand metaphor, according to a May 2005 article that appeared in Science Daily, an online science magazine.

The photo is detail of a mixed media oil painting of mine from long ago. It has hunks of broken  mirror glued on to the canvas board

What is art? some questions...

This article has been on my web pages in similar form for a few years.

This rose is lovely, but the plant and the photo , well they are not exactly art. But what is art?

What’s the difference between art and decoration? Nice colors, a pleasant sound, an emblem of some barely attainable perfection? Is it art or craft?

Or need it be a philosophical statement? If it's art, there must be beauty, yes? No? If it's art there must be a message, right?

Does art have a meaning, deep significance that transcends the generation in which it was created... or does it? Must the significance be a concept expressible in words? Or does art have to embody the ineffable? Is it a mystery? Is it “spiritual?” errrr....

Who gets to say whether a given work is "ART!" Is this solely the purview of self-declared critics, experts, appraisers, historians? The creation of current high-end market forces? The aspiration of cultural social climbers? Is the art of writing mere nattering? Is avante garde art the froth of madmen and misfits, practitioners of liminality, the product of twisted intellect gone astray?

I personally think that it's the spotty legacy of a species of ape that is materially and ideologically busy beyond any of its closest kin, an expression, a sort of cultural phlegm - the unavoidable by product of breathing and growing and moving in the surrounding cultural air when one is more or less allergic.

Do artists know when they are art-making and when they are just fiddling around? Or are those the same? I am just asking a few questions here.... -- mad mar (Mistryel) walker

Art's Method: the great chef metaphor

Much of the beginning poetry I hear seems to be narrative, and much of it is quite literal, a record of the writer's feelings - writing as a form of autobiographic sorting.

At its best, this can be transformative writing that reveals to us our common human condition and creates meaning for both the writer and the reader. At its worst, this intention can result in a sort of emotive belch that relieves the writer but leaves everyone else staring at the floor. The difference lies in the writer’s breadth of exposure to good writing and good poetry.

A great chef, (to use an extended metaphor for a great writer) doesn’t fall out of the womb with a souffle pan in hand. A great chef doesn’t only cook - but loves to eat, to taste and smell the subtle aspects of various dishes, finds romance in flavor and texture and in discovering the potentials of an ever reaching list of ingredients. A chef in training would sample a variety of cuisine - French fare, Italian, Arabic, Mexican, Japanese and Chinese as well as American dishes. By learning the range of possible flavors, and how they are traditionally combined, and by making great experiment to combine them in new ways, he would would build his own palette, and his own colorful works of culinary art. (Another metaphor!)

Even so, a writer, like a chef. must sample the range of available styles, forms and themes by - READING - in order to develop a broad-based sense of language, and to evolve his own style .

When I ask a want-to-be poet or writer what they are reading, what are their favorite books, poets, essayists, topics - and in reply I get a blank look and a shrug, I draw conclusions.

One last question: if our hypothetical chef had only ever eaten at McDonalds - what do you think he would cook?

- Mar  Walker