Re: I'm looking for inspiration!

Warning: Very long anecdotal story to follow.

    What a great thread. I recently went through a very similar dilemma
myself. A couple years ago when I was still a meek potential BFA student I
hit this wall. My problem was that I came from a different background. I was
a history major. I just kind of stumbled into the art studios one day and
thought "hey, this is more fun than writing 20 page essays on the Black
Death". I started taking all kinds of art classes and focused on photography
b/c that was something I already knew.
    I liked it so much I switched to being an art major. And my work dried
up and I stopped creating anything. My problem was that I was convinced that
I wasn't really an "artist". I was a history student what the hell did I
know about making art.
    All of my peers were creating bodies of work. Explorations of inner
turmoil and existential angst. Pictures that had all of this meaning behind
it. I just shot things I thought would look cool. I liked the lighting. Or
the composition. The morning dew on the leaves. There was no turmoil. No
exploration of the human condition or the state of the modern art movements.
To be honest I felt like a fraud. A sheep in wolves clothing.
    There were two events I can think of that snapped me out of this mind
set. First was similar to what you did. I started a class discussion one day
about what is an artist, and what makes art "Art". I explained that there
was no meaning or motive behind my art. They were just pictures. I thought
that for it to be art I should have this preconceptualized idea I was
expressing through my medium. The only problem was that everyone else in the
class said I was making some good art. Arguments ensued. Finally someone in
the class said something I'll remember forever. He said, "It doesn't matter
if you take a taxi or ride the bus to get downtown. So long as you get
downtown." His point was that the final product was art, it doesn't matter
how you get there.
    The other thing that broke me free was when I put on my first show. Here
I was confronted with a major problem. My artist statement. I had to
describe what I had emotionally put into the work when I felt I had not put
anything into the work (titling can cause similar dilemmas). So I sat down
with all of the pictures I was going to use (all shot in the same day on a
field trip) and looked for a common thread. I turned out be the quality of
the light in the empty rooms. So I wrote an artist statement (which I
merrily though was a heaping load of b/s) about warmth and hope shining into
the empty cold rooms.
    Once the show was finally up on the walls and I could stand back and
look at it all as a whole I realized it wasn't b/s at all. I had selected
those pictures out of an infinite number of pictures I could have taken. I
printed them to intensify what I saw was already going on in the pictures. I
had created art around what I was feeling while I was there shooting. Oops,
I had emotion and meaning in a cohesive body of work.
    So the moral of my story is don't try to make art. Just go out and
shoot. As long as you are honest with yourself you'll make fine art. If you
sit around all day trying to think of the perfect subject (or in my case any
subject) all you'll ever do is sit around and think. Sometimes you find
meaning upon reflection over finished work. It's like sitting down and
trying to come up with something to have an epiphany about. It just wont
work.
    Shoot what you like. Shoot what moves you. Shoot what makes you feel
something, even if you don't know what that something is. Just go shoot.
Find it along the way.
    Some things to think about that help me when I'm trying to find a body
of work in what I've shot:
    All artwork is autobiographical. Every photograph you make only you
could have made and only at that very moment in time. Everything that has
happened before in your life has led up to that photograph and is present in
it. If you are unsure about your art you can see your photographs as
portraits of an unsure artist.
    Because you are inherently present in all of your artwork you can always
find a theme in your work. Two particularly rich veins I've found are memory
and emotion. If you took a photograph, you took it for a reason. Did it
remind you of something from your childhood? Did it make you feel something?
Why did you take that photo and none of the myriad of other photos you could
have taken?
    Looking for answers in other peoples art work is dangerous. Only they
can say what they've said. Look to see how they've said it but don't try to
make their artwork. Make your own.
    Books can be very comforting (as can talking about making art). But both
can become dangerous substitutes for making art (albeit comfy easy
substitutes). Read all you want but never let that take the place of the
creative development you get from actually making art. That being said I
second Mark's suggestion. Read Art and Fear by Ted Orland and David Bayles.
    Sorry if this was way too long, but I hope it helps. Best of luck and
don't forget to enjoy yourself while your doing it.

Your fellow traveler,
Jordan
Received on Sun Aug 14 10:50:06 2005