if your work is solely driven by how people respond to it, you’ll create something popular but soulless if it’s driven by how you feel about it, you’ll create something potent but obscure but if your work is a dialogue between self & world, it can be both resonant & true
It's a tricky game because you do need to be aware of best practices, what works, what doesn't, etc - that's how you grow and learn to stand out.
But at the same time, you always need to return to the question:
"Why do I create? What do I create for?"
And of all the answers that arise, understand your primary and secondary reasons.
For me, primary
... See moreJustin C Scott • The Creative Way
“You can’t second-guess your own taste for what someone else is going to like. It won’t be good. We’re not smart enough to know what someone else will like. To make something and say, ‘well, I don’t really like it but I think this group of people will like it’, I think [that approach] is a bad way to play the game of music or art.
Do what’s personal... See more
Do what’s personal... See more
If you write to please others, you are selling out. You are in the process of audience capture. This way of talking, which is how the fear in me talks, is common—as if writing for an audience and writing for yourself are at odds with each other. I really used to feel like that.
But I no longer think that it is quite right. The relationship between... See more
But I no longer think that it is quite right. The relationship between... See more
Henrik Karlsson • Writing as Communion
While I believe that art is important and an important tool, over the years I’ve actually felt that expecting my art to move people stems from the ego. I’ve since let go of that expectation of having everyone engage and resonate to the art I make and meanings behind it.
These days, I focus on making art about my experiences and the things I care
... See more