Bad Art

I present to you, Gentle Reader, that Bad Art does not exist. Now, go ahead say it "Kris what about…" and you will proceed to give me multiple examples spanning all genres, mediums and historical eras, “It was a dark and stormy night.” Ishtar, Jackson Pollack, every garage band that ever plugged in a guitar, and so on. We all have our personal favorites. But is it Bad Art? Bad Art implies a value judgment. I argue that no art is bad if the artist created in good faith. Art exists on a continuum from faltering first steps to brilliantly executed form. 

It’s easy to judge our work as bad because that absolves us from the responsibility to ourselves to continue. “I can’t do it.” We whine. “It’s really bad. And then we have the excuse to close the laptop, power down the camera, clean the brushes and put the first draft of our novel in the back of a dresser drawer.

So, if art isn’t bad, then what is it? Experimental, practice, playful, a learning experience, a new direction, a test, a challenge, growing pains, answering the question ‘what if..’ When we chose to honestly follow our creative direction, we all have to start somewhere. We can’t expect to produce perfect results, Good Art, immediately and consistently. We do our best. We consider the process before the product. We actively seek more knowledge about whatever it is that we want to create. And when the work isn’t perfect, we accept it for where we are and try again.     

Back to Basics

My friend Laura and I are reading The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron. It is a classic work on rediscovering one's creativity. I read it years ago and it's like renewing acquaintance with an old and dear friend. 

One of the many things that I've learned about creativity is that we can hear something or read something and not be ready for it or not understand it but when we keep ourselves open, when we keep listening or reading we will eventually hear or read what we need. Sometimes we need to hear or read something many times before whatever we need to learn sinks in. 

I learned a lot the first time I read through The Artist's Way and I look forward to learning even more this time. Here's the poster I made the first time around.  

The Artist's Way is full of exercises and activities to nurture one's creativity. This poster is just one of many. If you'd like to see some of Laura's work, here's the link.

There's a moral in here somewhere

I recently wrote an article for the Creativity Coaching Association's February newsletter. You can read it here. 

In the article, I described how I had beautiful plants growing, beets, spinach, cilantro and parsley while most of the country was covered with snow. The next day we had the coldest weather in years! We even had a dusting of snow! Hello, this is the desert, remember?

My plants died. They flopped over. The leaves got yucky and slimy. They're the technical terms for it, I'm sure. They were dead. Or so I thought. Then after the cold spell ended-it's 83 degrees here as I write-they came back. Even the deadest of the dead plants now have new growth. The spinach, in particular, is growing wonderfully. Not quite enough to harvest, but soon some leaves will be big enough to eat. 

Like the little girl who sees the pile of horse manure and thinks, "There's got to be a pony nearby," I think there's a moral in here somewhere. I'm not quite sure what it is.     

Pride goes before a fall (or a flop)?

Strong roots run deep?

That which doesn't kill us only makes us stronger?

What do you think?