The Creative Mind

Being an artist, the concept of isolation struck a cord. 

The process of creativity is and can be extremely personal; it's very difficult to allow anyone in at those moments during this process.  I've designed and created large scale set and scenery projects, and I've created things as small as jewelry, the physical activity can allow limited social contact, but the process leading to that point is not always social.  It can be collaborative, where brainstorming is involved, and the creative excitement is shared throughout, or it can become an isolated visualization during the designing process. 

I switch back and forth from visual art to writing.  It's not always easy, this switch.  Mental agility goes from scene, subject matter, visualizing where dimensional perspective is needed, to mentally processing the material to the pictured outcome.  The hardest part for me is to verbally communicate that verbalized object of art, what I see in my mind, so sketching pictures is the next best thing.

When writing creatively, alone, it takes isolation that can’t always be interrupted or shared.  When writing poetry, I find I’m sometimes so submerged in hearing a beat, a piece of music, and tonality, that there is absolutely no conscious thought involved, only an active transference, emptying, of feelings from words to paper.  I don’t always know what I will see in front of me during this process until I've emptied my ‘vessel’ known as the mind.

At other times of creative writing, I visualize and sculpt lines and words to form a pattern, a visual art piece made up of words. 

Creativity is immersive and exciting at times, and at other times it can become an out of body experience; at other times, during collaborations, it’s a physical high to meet with other like minds to watch the blooming of visual art….or on the other hand, a knockdown drag out process of conflicting egos during that creative journey.

The process, any way you look at it, is time consuming, and not everyone understands the mind of isolation, because a creative mind “sees” things that aren't there physically to the outside world.  I also work in clay, and sometimes I take a large lump into my hands, and tell it to become anything it wants to be, I don’t take part in the process mentally, only physically, and it is a kick to see the results. 

I used to find it hard to switch art mediums, but the more I experiment, the easier it becomes.  I used to play the piano daily; I created my own notes to play, even when the sheet music was in front of me.  It’s almost as if I have to create something new and unique to something that already exists.  I’m the same way with cooking from a recipe; it has to be my own, putting my own signature to it.