I know I want to write something but I don’t know what it is yet…sometimes the subject comes before the urge but other times the urge is there without a subject. Those are the times when you have to just start writing or painting SOMETHING! Where does this creative energy come from? My personal belief is that we are born with it. Some may experience it in greater degrees than others but I think all human beings are born with a natural creative instinct or ability. It doesn’t mean that we should all go on to be artists but it does mean that we should all be given opportunities throughout our lives, to use creativity as a means of expressing our experiences of life.
When I’ve heard stories of people who, as children, were told their drawings weren’t very good or they were torn up in front of them, it breaks my heart. It is so brutal and it feels to me like someone having their voice box ripped out from their throat or silenced with gaffa tape. I hear stories of this kind of response to artwork even now, by people who think that by being cruel to children they will somehow teach them to try harder. Who created the standards by which art is often judged? Who decided that drawings are supposed to be a realistic representation of an object or subject. I love the Ken Robinson story he tells of a young child in primary school who was asked by her teacher what she was drawing. The girl replied ‘God’ and the teacher said ‘but how can you draw God? No one knows what God looks like!’ to which the girl replied ‘they will in a minute!’. I laugh with joy at this story and I love the freedom she had in expressing her imagination and can only hope her picture was received with the wonder it deserved.
I’m only really touching the surface of this topic but I sense there are a lot of adults and children in the world who suffer the consequences of ‘creative abuse’. Creativity is vulnerability. It is the revealing of our unique response to our experiences. I have had the pleasure of teaching a lot of people over the years - expressive art making, more formal painting and drawing, life drawing, and worked with people of all ages from 1 - 91. There are always several conversations with people who have been deeply hurt by things that have previously been said about their art skills and yet they know they need to keep doing it. So many of us are inhibited by the possibility of ‘getting it wrong’ or our work looking rubbish. I want to say to those of you who have had negative, hurtful experiences around creativity - you ARE creative and you CAN express yourself wonderfully and meaningfully. I want to see people released from the shackles that have been clamped around their beautiful creative energy.
I feel pained by the phasing out of the arts - particularly visual art, from the school curriculum. It is one of the most vital means of expression, discovery, connection with others, mental development - I could go on - we have as human beings.
Communicating through pictures and made objects has been going on for millions of years so come on everyone lets keep making, painting, photographing, dancing, singing, writing (and all the other art forms available) and show each other who we really are.
