Posts
MUSELESS
I suspect that most artists would relate to my state of mind
this week. I am uninspired to paint. Yes, it happens. But I must persist in
spite of that inconvenient truth (apologies to Al Gore, though I doubt very
much that he will ever read this).
So artists/writers and other such creative types are
supposed to have muses…right? I suppose it’s not to be taken literally, but I
get it. As artists (whether painters, musicians, writers, or whatever), we have
creative impulses that are not science-based, but more…ethereal. So we’ve
created an entity that embodies that factless notion. The muse.
The problem for me is that my “muse” is inconsistent. I call
her Aunt Clara. No doubt you remember Aunt Clara from “Bewitched”...Samantha’s
aging aunt with the colossal memory problems, who sporadically dropped in
through the chimney, and stayed just long enough to create chaos. BUT…she had
inspired moments. As I recall, she once caused the blackout of the entire
eastern seaboard. That’s awesome. And didn’t she once turn the Tates’ kid into
twins? Hilarious (Larry Tate...what a jackass). But mostly she just
screwed things up.
So that’s the inconvenient truth of my artistic life. I’ll
have to press on without Aunt Clara, and hope that she shows her ash-covered chimney-face
as the week progresses. And who knows? Maybe I don’t really need her after all.
That’s ridiculous. Of course I need her. We all need inspiration…
But maybe the inspiration comes with nitty-gritty work.
First comes work…then the muse. After all, the muse can’t do much with an
artist who has no skills. So for all my fellow artists out there…just keep
putting the brush to the canvas. And assume that the muse will show. At some point. Hopefully without a blackout of the eastern seaboard...
