Creative Inspiration, Recognition & Process

In three recent web news articles, three different people were quoted about their views on creating art and what is most important. All three took a very similar posture that art can not cater to what is accepted but rather should answer to its own voice.

Artist Pratuang Emjaroen was quoted in the Bangkok Post(8/9/05 - article now N/A)as finding his inspiration from current news and events - that he sees art and his work as a "counter balance for the suffering. The world today is very commercial; nothing is free. But art is free, with no expectations. It can provide support for the whole world.” 

Similarly in Pitch.com Eleanor Heartney is quoted as describing what creativity isn’t:  "It’s not about finding the thing that pleases the greatest number. It’s really about finding the thing that isn’t particularly welcome at the moment it comes forward."

The general theme is to not create so much to please others but let the creative mission rule. And though I believe they are generally correct about how to create, we are not living in a vacuum and many of our aesthetic choices are necessarily dictated by common culture and consensus.

However, there is a message that can be taken from this thinking and applied completely. So much of what inspires us, we reject. We look at the thought and say trite, boring, overdone, who would care, etc.  Sometimes being creative means developing the mediocre idea and finding out where it leads. Just like life being a journey - creativity is about the process - the finished pieces are like a gift. Try not to reject them before you even create them - advice I wish I could heed better myself.

See Also

• BGNews.com
  DayInTheLife - Pop Culture Professor
• Pitch.com
  Night and Day - Lady Eleanor