Fernando Del Paso

Venus de Milo
Ancient Greek Statue

"Literature and music exist in time: they have a beginning and an end.  Painting and sculpture exist in space. . . . Where does the Venus de Milo begin: in her navel, in her breasts, or in her head?  Where does an abstract painting begin: in the lower left corner, or in the center?"

— Fernando Del Paso

Mexican Novelist, Painter and Poet

1935 -

Back of
Venus de Milo

De Paso has raised a very interesting question:  where does a painting or a sculpture begin?  When analyzing a painting, people often identify at what point the eye is drawn into the painting.  At what point do we the viewer enter into the picture?  But that point of entry is not the beginning of the painting.  In fact, paintings and sculptures have no beginning.  They just are here and now.

The flip side of this question is:  where does the novel exist?  In the head of the writer?  On the pages of the book it is printed in?  In cyberspace somewhere?  Or in the head of the reader?  And what novel are we talking about?  Is the novel that is in the writer's head the same as the novel on the page?  Is the novel that is in the reader's head the same as what is in the writer's imagination?  

Fernando Del Paso

How many times have you as a reader altered the novel on the page by changing the looks of a character or the physical location of the story.  Unlike the painting which is concrete and visual, the novel is nebulous and changing.  Yes, we can impose our stories upon the painting, but the painting still exists outside of us.  We change the novel as soon as it enters our brain.  We have altered the story as imagined by the novelist.

Have you ever wished that a novel would not end?  You may even have slowed down your reading so that the ending would be delayed?  Novels exist in time and have a beginning and a ending, but we can continue to revisit them through our memory. 

Matsuo Basho

"Seek not to follow in the footsteps of men of old; seek what they sought."

— Matsuo Basho

Japanese Haiku Poet

1644 - 1694

Poems by Basho on Tanzaku paper

Yamagata Museum of Art

Sometimes we seek to copy the masters.  We need instead to look deeper than the surface technique and understand what they were attempting to accomplish — what was the passion in their lives.  We need to connect with their souls.  What was their moment of enlightenment?

I believe we have a spiritual connection with those artists and writers who have gone before us.  We need to explore this connection and learn from it.  We should not simply copy what we like.  We should connect with the meaning in their work.

What are you seeking to accomplish in your art?  What do you want others to perceive in your writing?  What is your understanding of the universe?  Have you achieved enlightenment?

Walt Whitman

"To have great poets there must be great audiences too."

— Walt Whitman

American Poet

1819 - 1892

I have been listening to a biography of the singer, Marvin Gaye, and one of the emotional struggles he faced was whether to write and produce the kind of songs that he wanted to and his muse demanded or to write songs for his audience.  Gaye apparently vacilated back and forth.  He felt guilty when he pandered to his audience and the money they gave him.  He felt he was betraying his musical vision.  Every artist, writer, actor and singer has experienced similar frustrations.  We want our work to be accepted by the public, but we don't want them to dictate what we create.  It is a fine balancing act.

Every artistic work requires an audience whether it is an audience of one or a thousand.  The great artists, writers, poets are fortunate to find great audiences, even though it may be after they die.  And sometimes great audiences will push the artists to create even greater works.  Actors and musicians will tell you that live audiences impact their performances positively and negatively.

Who do you create for?  Yourself?  Or your audience?  Are you frustrated by having to create what people want to buy?  How do you balance the demands of your muse and the expectations of your audience?

James Galvin

"Let us begin with a simple line,

Drawn as a child would draw it,

To indicate the horizon...."

— James Galvin

American Poet

1951 -

In drawing and writing, we almost always begin with the line.  The line turns into letters which turn into words which turn into sentences.  And eventually the sentences become poems, short stories and novels.  The same is often true is art.  The line becomes an eye, then a nose and soon a face.  The drawing begins as a simple line much like what a child starts with.  The artist then transforms that line into a beautiful portrait, landscape or abstract painting.

When we begin the canvas and the paper are blank, empty, without much meaning.  As creative artists our job is transform that paper or that canvas into more.  To create something out of a simple line.  To communicate our vision of the world through a simple line joined with other simple lines — one built on another.

The same can be said about life.  Each moment we live is like a simple line.  We build a life through living each moment to the fullest.  And millions of moments become a life lived.  

Here is the poem, Art Class, by James Galvin.

Art Class

By James Galvin

Let us begin with a simple line,

Drawn as a child would draw it,

To indicate the horizon,

More real than the real horizon,

Which is less than line,

Which is a visible abstraction, a ratio.

The line ravishes the page with implications

Of white earth, white sky!

The horizon moves as we move,

Making us feel central.

But the horizon is an empty shell —

Strange radius whose center is peripheral.

As the horizon draws us on, withdrawing,

The line draws us in,

Requiring further lines,

Engendering curves, verticals, diagonals,

Urging shades, shapes, figures...

What should we place, in all good faith,

On the horizon? A stone?

An empty chair? A submarine?

Take your time.  Take it easy.

The horizon will not stop abstracting us.

Stanley Kunitz

"The poem in the head is always perfect.  Resistance begins when you try to convert it into language."

— Stanley Kunitz

American Poet

1905 - 2006

This statement by Stanley Kunitz sums up one of the key challenges that every creative leader faces.  What we create in the physical world never is as good as what we imagine in our minds.  Most artists, writers and performers are never satisfied with the end product because we see something different in our mind's eye.  And we have to learn to accept that it is okay to be imperfect.  Perfection is unachievable.  In fact, as humans what makes us interesting is our flaws.  And the same thing is true of our art.  It is the mistakes that make our art unique.  If the work we created was perfect, then every piece of art would look the same.  It is our flaws and weaknesses that make our art uniquely ours.  Our imperfections help make the art perfect.

Here is a poem by Stanley Kunitz.



Passing Through



By Stanley Kunitz



     -- on my seventy-ninth birthday



Nobody in the widow's household

ever celebrated anniversaries.

In the secrecy of my room

I would not admit I cared

that my friends were given parties.

Before I left town for school

my birthday went up in smoke

in a fire at City Hall that gutted

the Department of Vital Statistics.

If it weren't for a census report

of a five-year-old White Male

sharing my mother's address

at the Green Street tenement in Worcester

I'd have no documentary proof

that I exist.  You are the first,

my dear, to bully me

into these festive occasions.



Sometimes, you say, I wear

an abstracted look that drives you

up the wall, as though it signified

distress or disaffection.

Don't take it so to heart.

Maybe I enjoy not-being as much

as being who I am.  Maybe

it's time for me to practice

growing old.  The way I look

at it, I'm passing through a phase:

gradually I'm changing to a word.

Whatever you choose to claim

of me is always yours;

nothing is truly mine

except my name.  I only

borrowed this dust.

Theodore Roethke

"Being, not doing, is my first joy."

— Theodore Roethke

American Poet

1908 - 1963

 

I must confess that being is very difficult for me.  For years I have been caught up in the culture of doing.  Setting goals and working to achieve my goals.  I find it very difficult to sit and just be.  I must at the very least doodle and who knows maybe my doodles will one day be famous.  We can dream can't we!  If I go on vacation, it often takes me a week to relax and forget my day job.  But I still feel I must be doing something.  Writing.  Drawing.  Producing something.  Rarely can I just be.

How about you?  Are you caught up in the culture of doing or have you learned like Roethke to enjoy just being?

Here is my favorite Theodore Roethke poem.  I love the first three lines.  This is a poem to be read outloud.  Listen to the interaction of sounds.

The Waking

I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.

I feel my fate in what I cannot fear.

I learn by going where I have to go.



We think by feeling. What is there to know?

I hear my being dance from ear to ear.

I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.



Of those so close beside me, which are you?

God bless the Ground! I shall walk softly there,

And learn by going where I have to go.

Light takes the Tree; but who can tell us how?

The lowly worm climbs up a winding stair;

I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.



Great Nature has another thing to do

To you and me, so take the lively air,

And, lovely, learn by going where to go.



This shaking keeps me steady. I should know.

What falls away is always. And is near.

I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.

I learn by going where I have to go.

Dante Gabriel Rossetti

Self-Portrait, 1847

"Picture and poem bear the same relationship to each other as beauty does in man and woman:  the point of meeting where the two are identical is the supreme perfection."

— Dante Gabriel Rossetti

English Poet and Artist

1828 - 1882

Lady Lilith, 1868

Having spent over 35 years writing poetry and now painting for the last five years, I am fascinated by the point where poetry and painting meet.  Dante Gabriel Rossetti was trained both as a poet and a painter and spent a lifetime writing poetry and painting pictures.  He once said: "If any man has any poetry in him he should paint it, for it has all been said and written."  And yet Rossetti saw himself more as a poet than a painter.  He also said: "Painting being — what poetry is not — a livelihood — I have put my poetry chiefly in that form."  And I would have to agree with his last point.  While it may be difficult to make a living being a painter, it is even more difficult making a living from writing poetry.  

Is there a poem inside you asking to be let out?  Is there a painting inside you begging to be set free?  I strongly encourage painters to write poetry and short stories.  I think every poet and novelist should pick up a brush and spend a few hours painting.  Remember it is not about being financially successful.  It is about releasing your inner creativity.

Here is a poem by Rossetti:

The Honeysuckle

I plucked a honeysuckle where

The hedge on high is quick and thorn,

And climbing for the prize, was torn,

And fouled my feet in quag-water;

And by the thorns and by the wind

The blossom that I took was thinn'd,

And yet I found it sweet and fair.

Thence to a richer growth I came,

Where, nursed in mellow intercourse,

The honeysuckles sprang by scores,

Not harried like my single stem,

All virgin lamps of scent and dew.

So from my hand that first I threw,

Yet plucked not any more of them.

Here is a video on YouTube showing some of the paintings of Rossetti:

Charles Demuth

Self-Portrait (1907)

"Paintings must be looked at and looked at and looked at. . . . No writing, no talking, no singing, no dancing will explain them."

— Charles Demuth

American Artist

1883 - 1935

The Figure 5 In Gold (1928)

Inspired by a poem of

William Carlos Williams:

The Great Figure

One of the lessons I learned early in my career is not to explain my poetry to others.  If I had to explain it, then either I did not succeed or the reader failed to understand.  I would attend writer's groups where we would share our work and then the group would critique it.  Some writers would keep trying to explain their poems if they didn't feel the group grasped the meaning of the poem.  I think the same is true of any art form.  You don't need to explain your work.  A painter shouldn't explain the meaning of his painting.  The viewer has the responsibility in the communication exchange to study the work to the best of his ability just as the reader also has some responsibility.  It is a two way street.  

The Great Figure

by William Carlos Williams

Among the rain

and lights

I saw the figure 5

in gold

on a red

firetruck

moving

tense

unheeded

to gong clangs

siren howls

and wheels rumbling

through the dark city.

Maya Angelou

"If you don't like something, change it.  If you can't change it, change your attitude.  Don't complain."

— Maya Angelou

American Poet/Writer

1928 -

One of the easiest things to do is to criticize, to complain, to find fault.  It is a trap that many creative people fall into.  The world doesn't always recognized our creative genius so we put others down.  Complaining becomes our defense mechanism, the way to protect ourselves from the onslaught of the world around us.  What we need to learn is that complaining is not productive.  It does not help us create great works of art.  If we don't like something about the world, we need to either change it or change ourselves.  And what I have found over the years is that it is much easier to change yourself than it is to change those around you and it requires a lot less energy and time.

So ask yourself: "What did I complain about yesterday?" Then ask yourself if you can change it and if not, then change your attitude."  I teach people that they have little or no control on what happens to them.  The only thing they have 100 percent control of is their attitude.  If you don't like where you live, then change your attitude.  If you don't like your boss, then change your attitude.  We need to develop an attitude of gratitude.  We need to appreciate what we have, not complain about what we don't have.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

"When I first open my eyes upon the morning meadows and look out upon the beautiful world, I thank God I am alive."

— Ralph Waldo Emerson

American Poet/Essayist

1803 - 1882

I am fortunate that I have a yard that is full of birds, squirrels and rabbits.  And occasionally, a deer or a family of ducks have found the time to visit.  And our yard has maple trees, a large old pin oak and a few blue spruce.  Even in a metropolitan city I can find nature close at hand.  As creative leaders, we can and should find inspiration in nature.  I am amazed at how strong and resilient Mother Nature is.  If you have ever observed grass poking up through a crack in the concrete, you understand what I mean.  Long after the last man or woman has passed onto a better place, Mother Nature will still be there.

For me, the ironic thing is that human beings talk about nature as if we are not a part of it, only observers.  In fact, we are very much a part of nature.  And contrary to the opinion of many, Mother Nature is stronger and tougher than man.  I remember reading a study of overcrowded deer on an island.  The overcrowding generated unusual behavior among the deer such as increased fighting, rape and homosexuality.  Nature sought to reduce the overpopulation through disease.  In the end nature will win so we need to enjoy it while we can.

Photograph by Johari King

As artists and writers, we need to find joy, solace and inspiration in nature.  We need to enjoy the sunsets and the sunrises.  We need to appreciate the changing of seasons from fall to winter to spring.  The squirrels and rabbits in my backyard bring me pleasure and laughter with their play.  I have seen rabbits play leap frog, jumping over each other.  I have watched squirrels chasing each other up a tree.  And you will find both the rabbits and the squirrels in my haiku and my poetry.




Here are a few of my haiku.  More of my haiku can be found at my website.




downtown Chicago

    a squirrel buries apples —

        warm autumn sun







Illinois farmland —

    pheasant scoots across the snow

        the pickup heads home







early morning —

    two robins play leap frog

        in the shadows







on the corn tassels

    a flock of purple martins. . . 

        summer sunset

Robert Frost

"A poem . . . begins as a lump in the throat, a sense of wrong, a homesickness, a lovesickness. . . . It finds the thought and the thought finds the words."

Robert Frost

American Poet

1874 - 1963

Does your art grow out of your emotions?  How often does your pain find expression in your painting, your poem or your story?  Does your joy find the words to express itself?  Many times we forget the original emotion that triggered the thought that ultimately finds its expression in our art.  Some art begins in anger, some in love.  And if we paint or write well, our audience feels the emotion.  




Here is my favorite Frost poem.

The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both And be one traveler, long I stood And looked down one as far as I could To where it bent in the undergrowth; Then took the other, as just as fair, And having perhaps the better claim Because it was grassy and wanted wear, Though as for that the passing there Had worn them really about the same, And both that morning equally lay In leaves no step had trodden black. Oh, I marked the first for another day! Yet knowing how way leads on to way I doubted if I should ever come back. I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I, I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference.

e. e. cummings

"most people are perfectly afraid of silence"

— e. e. cummings

American Poet/Artist

1894 - 1962

e. e. cummings

1933

Writers and artists require silence to focus on their work and, yet, many people are afraid of silence.  Silence helps us find our way through the maze of life.  Silence opens like a flower in the morning.  Take time to enjoy the silences of your life.  The hardest silence to find is the silence of the mind.  We are constantly talking to ourselves even when we have silenced the voices around us.  Learn to slow your mind down and quiet the voices talking inside your head.    Rid yourself of your mother's voice.  Your father's voice.  The voice of the critic.  The voice of the editor.  Learn to love silence. 

Muriel Rukeyser

"The universe is made of stories, not of atoms."

— Muriel Rukeyser

American Poet

1913 - 1980

The universe is alive with story.  Without story, much of what we as humans know would be meaningless.  Through story we understand the world around us.  Through story we understand our lives and why we have lived the way we lived.  Story provides meaning to the events that have happened and the sorrows we have experienced.  As creative leaders, we are driven to share our story whether that be through a poem, a painting, a novel, a song, a sculpture, a film or a dance.  What stories are you telling in your art?  What stories are you telling that define who you are?  Our lives are filled with story.  Share yours today.

W. S. Merwin

"We are the echo of the future."

— W. S. Merwin

American Poet

1927 -

Wow!  These seven words can change the way we see ourselves.  We see ourselves as flesh and bones and full of life, but in the big picture to those who come after us we are only an echo of the person we were.  We think everything that is happening to us now is important and wonder if we will be able to survive the onslaught of problems that we face.  But in the blink of an eye that is our lives we are gone.  And as artists, writers and musicians all that is left are the works we created — the footprints we left behind.  The echo of person who was us.

Langston Hughes

Hold fast to dreams

For if dreams die,

Life is a broken-winged bird

That cannot fly.

— Langston Hughes

American Poet/Novelist

1902 - 1967

Are you flying high or do you have a broken wing?  Have your dreams died and lost their attraction?  Then maybe it is time to find a new dream — a new desire to give life hope.  Dreams do change as we age.  What was once important is now less important and something new has to take its place.  Art is a new dream for me in the last ten years.  Writing is a dream that has now held me in its grip for over forty years.  Here is a piece on dreams I wrote when I turned forty.

"If I woke up one morning and realized that all I ever was going to be was a business man, I'd probably die.  All my dreams would be shattered.  Early in life I had many dreams.  I dreamed of being a great basketball star.  I dreamed of being a preacher.  I dreamed of saving the world from war and racism.  And I dreamed of being a great poet.  Today, I dream only of writing."  (From an essay: The Writing Years: A Look Back)

Edvard Munch

"Art is the opposite of nature.  A work of art can come only from the interior of man."

— Edvard Munch

Norwegian Artist

1863 - 1944

Even in the most realistic work of art, nature has been altered and changed by the artist.  We as creative leaders alter the world, change it fit our perspective, our view of how things should be.  This is what makes every painter, novelist, poet and musician unique and different.  No two of us are alike.  Who we are changes what we create and what we create changes who we are.  We are not God.  We are different than God.  We are other.

Georgia O'Keefe

"Imagination makes you see all sorts of things."

Georgia O'Keefe

American Artist

1887 - 1986

Imagination is essential and necessary for the creative leader — writers, artists, poets, storytellers, musicians.  And in my experience we have very little control over it.  It appears when it wants to.  Have you ever struggled with a problem and could not find the answer and suddenly it appeared out of nowhere.  A few weeks ago, I was struggling with a project and during my morning walk at 5 am, the answer popped into my head.  Take good care of your imagination.  Encourage it.  Feed it.  Stretch it.  Trust it.  And believe in it.  Imagination is one of the best gifts that you have been given.

Do you know what it means to feed your imagination?  Give it large doses of information.  The creative mind needs information to be able to connect the dots between the strange and the obscure.  Read books on all kinds of topics.  Listen to people tell their stories.  Observe and study nature.