art-icipation

Tags

architecture, art, arts, crafting, creat, creativity, literature, Pablo Picasso, Picasso, quotes, random, thoughts

Tomorrow I am going to grab my pad and pencils and brave the word of art. I am going to create, if good bad or absolutely ugly is yet to be seen. But I am still excited, an art-icipation flowing through my veins, hopefully getting those proverbial creative juices flowing.

So as I sharpen my pencils and dust off my sketch-book, I can’t help but wonder about what role art plays in our lives, not just for those who make, but for those who take as well.

Art seems to be what is left, when all else is gone, and it doesn’t matter if it’s words, images, sounds, crafts or architecture. The Colosseum in Rome or the Pyramids in Cairo, the pots left over from Pompeii or Faberge’s golden eggs, melodies composed by  Beethoven and Tchaikovsky, Brahms and Bach, sonnets and stories written by Shakespeare, Wilde and Austen, are all mementos from the past, yet they still find a home in our world of today.

I read somewhere that many see creativity as the source of meaning in our lives. This doesn’t mean that if you are not creative you have no meaning, but when we create, we experience a surge of energy, a sense of purpose, fulfillment and contentment when we achieve what we set out to do. And it doesn’t seem to matter whether it’s crafting with the family, knitting a sock or painting a masterpiece.

Art is what separates us from monkeys, the way we use language to tell a tale, how we combine colour and fabrics, how we decorate our homes, own things we love but have no purpose other than just being beautiful. We value  the result of an individuals creativity, a four-year-olds painting holding pride of place on the fridge, a crooked vase holding a bouquet of flowers reminding of a ten-year-olds attempt at pottery, photographs decorating our homes taken for their beauty or the memories they hold, music a constant friend (or foe) to our ears, films and plays while away our hours,  gallerys, museums, monuments are places we visit, talk about and remember.

We may not always realise it, but we are surrounded by art, in one form of the other, our world filled with the results of creative thought. And it is what makes the trudge of every day life bearable, cushioning us from reality and showing us the true beauty of living. As the master Pablo Picasso said so well:

The purpose of art is washing the dust of daily life of our souls

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naughty is nice

Tags

art, breaking rules, Cubism, Expressionism, fun, miscellaneous, naughty, Picasso, Pop Art, power, psychology, ramblings, rules, thoughts, Van Gogh, Warhol, wine

I was naughty last night. I know it was a work-night and I needed to get up early this morning but for some reason I felt like a glass of wine (dark red pinot noir) and a film was the best way to end the day.

As I opened the bottle and those fruity, berry flavours filled my nose I felt my body relax and was really looking forward to just sitting down and being lazy. As I poured the ruby red pinot and put on the the DVD I couldn’t help but grin at the thought how I was braking my own rules.

A study done a while back shows that people actually believe that those who break rules tend to have more power, drive and are more likely to get things done. The reasoning behind this idea is that the more powerful someone is the fewer rules they need to keep. For instance someone who sits down at a table in a cafe without waiting to be seated, buts his feet up on the seat next to him and brusquely orders a coffee is seen as more powerful as someone who politely waits their turn.

As teenagers it’s important to break rules even if it drives parents up the walls and the phrase “I can’t believe she/he did that, she/he knows better!” seems to be always on the tips of their tongues. Without this naughty behaviour adolescence can’t feel independent, test their own capabilities and learn how to deal with consequences.  It even seems to be that risk taking/rule breaking is hardwired into their brains for a certain period of time allowing their minds to learn how far they can push themselves and why some rules are necessary.

As a writer and designer I know only too well that the rules you learn on how to write a ‘good’ article or design a ‘pretty’ page have to broken every now and then to change the ‘good’ article into a ‘brilliant’ one and the ‘pretty’ page into a ‘stunning’ one. In art Picasso broke the rules of perception and created Cubism, Van Gogh decided to NOT paint what he saw but how he felt and Expressionism was born and Warhol focused on the mundane not the special in his Pop Art revolution. This shows that while you need rules as guide lines it is only when you step outside the boundaries that you can create something new and unique.

But sometimes breaking rules is just fun, it gives you that little tingle of delight that you are doing something you shouldn’t and it makes you feel alive. Simple things like running barefoot over a lawn you are not meant to be stepping on, or stealing the toiletries off a hotel-cart or maybe swiping the flake out of someone elses 99er and popping it into your mouth before they can take it back are breaking rules, but not really harming anyone. And the little rush you get makes your heart pump, adrenalin flow and your mind think outside that ominous box. And sometimes all you need is a glass of wine on a work-night.

So today I will make sure to break a few rules, have fun and maybe seem powerful to the rest of the world.

Breaking rules makes you seem more powerful