about art and creativity

“At the same time, art cannot be understood in terms of purpose. As the sculptor Charles Ray has said, art is “for absolutely nothing.” To make, or experience, art is to enter a kind of free zone; it slows us down, places us in some epistemological estuary, takes us into the wild. We make art from our flaws, fragilities, perversities, from our need

The fear of developing “bad” taste, or taste that diverges from the mainstream, can paralyse creatives, stifling their creative growth and leading them to try to borrow or buy taste through bootcamps, curated inspiration documents or sheer are.na-driven osmosis.

Elizabeth Goodspeed on the Importance of Taste – And How to Acquire It

When I have a piece of writing in mind, what I have, in fact, is a mental bucket: an attractor for and generator of thought. It’s like a thematic gravity well, a magnet for what would otherwise be a mess of iron filings. I’ll read books differently and listen differently in conversations. In particular I’ll remember everything better; everything... See more

James Somers • More People Should Write

Art is the greatest operating system our species has ever invented, a means of exploring consciousness, seen and unseen worlds. It is an instrument, medium, matrix, or miracle that transforms old impressions into new thoughts; that makes a thousand insignificant details light up and draw you out. For many of us, it is another country, a new home.

Jerry Saltz • Art Is Life: Icons and Iconoclasts, Visionaries and Vigilantes, and Flashes of Hope in the Night

If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, Wayne Thiebaud (1920-2021) knew how to appropriate most ardently. The renowned artist once said, “It’s hard for me to think of artists who weren’t influential on me because I’m such a blatant thief.”

Kate Mothes • Wayne Thiebaud's Passion for Art History Shines in 'Art Comes from Art'

Wayne Thiebaud on Art

But we could create a better deal: These organizations could invest in artists rather than owning them outright.

Music studios could invest in musicians and Spotify could invest in podcasts, giving those artists the capital they need to distribute their work on a grand scale, but the artist could retain majority ownership and creative control over... See more

I’d rather have an investor than a publishing contract

Reflecting on this email from a Sublime believer:

Consuming media has become a massive time-suck for humankind. Only decades ago, the average person had one source of information, if any — the newspaper. Journalists chronicled happenings relevant to their community. And that was it. Someone got married, someone is selling their house, someone died,

For all its good intentions, art that tries to minister to its audience by showcasing moral aspirants and paragons or the abject victims of political oppression produces smug, tiresome works that are failures both as art and as agitprop. Artists and critics—their laurel bearers—should take heed.

Anastasia Berg • On the Aesthetic Turn | The Point Magazine

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monoskop.org

There is taste in people, visual taste, taste in emotion

- and there is taste in acts, taste in morality. Intelligence, as well, is really a kind of taste: taste in ideas. (One of the facts to be reckoned with is that taste tends to develop very unevenly. It's rare that the same person has good visual taste and good taste in people and taste in ideas.)