I haven’t read Stephen King in a while, but I recently picked off a random shelf the last of his Dark Tower series — The Song of Susannah. I was intrigued enough to start reading. King has in the past written many nice essays on the subject of writing. The introduction to this book is no exception.
What caught my eye and what I’m relaying here is germane to all the arts, so I thought I’d bring it in.
From “On Being Nineteen (And A Few Other Things)”
I think novelists come in two types, and that includes the sort of fledgling novelist I was by 1970. Those who are bound for the more literary or ‘serious’ side of the job examine every possible subject in the light of this question: What would writing this story mean to me? Those whose destiny … is to include the writing of popular novels are apt to ask a very different one: What would this story mean to others? The ‘serious’ novelist is looking for answers and keys to the self; the ‘popular’ novelist is looking for an audience.
It is no stretch to extend this to other arts. I know what kind of artist I am. Which kind are you?
Ah, Rex, you do ask the most difficult questions.
Maybe it’s a function of being 19 that makes this a question of either/or.
For myself, I think I would ask both questions (and answer them both as King has above), but an even more important one for me is how do I solve this problem that my creative being wants solved. That might be stretched to mean “for myself” but it seems outside both self and audience, dealing with the materials at hand.
So, what kind of artist are you?
Hi June,
Thanks for pondering.
Sometimes in simplicities lie fundamental truths. I do believe it is often an error to think it’s more complicated than it is. Inductive reasoning leads to less data, not more. It is incorrect to apply deductive modulae to that type of thought.
I am definitely of the second kind. The quickest way for me to get creatively stagnant is to concern myself with myself. The fast track to artistic excitement is to fall utterly in love with my audience.
Right now, and I mean this very second, I have a bass across my lap. One of the things about a bass is that it needs other instruments, but played at a high level, it drives the whole musical dynamic of the group.
There is wisdom there. I have not figured it quite out, but I know I’m on the right track.
A little story…
One time I found I had to get out of a certain town in Florida FAST. (Untold long story there) I could not even go to the bank to get money. I packed a bag in about two minutes and ran, literally ran, out the door. I hitchhiked across the whole country.
Every single ride I got was from some poor person, some outcast, some regular worker. Never once did anyone in a nice car and nice clothes with a nice job ever stop.
I’d been pretty much a spoiled brat. It woke me up. I realized I did not care to serve anyone without the compassion and courage to pick up a poor boy in need of road miles and wherever he was going.
I found an audience because I found I cared about people like that and did not care about those others.
Art is a service. I have no problem with thinking of myself as a servant. It ain’t about me. I know me. Yawn. Boring. But you? Ah!
Rex, your last paragraph made me laugh out loud. It’s what I say again and again — “I know me — yawn — how boring.” How much more exciting things outside myself are.
Isn’t there a third question in art?
What is the essence of this tree, this mountain?
Perhaps a tree, mountain or ocean is different now than it was a century ago?
I have no idea who my audience is. I’m pretty sure it’s not Stephen King’s audience, though.
I can only imagine that the audience is me, and make what seems right to me. That may appeal to some, and certainly won’t to others. I do know (or believe) that I could sell more photographs if I changed various things, but that, to me, would be boring.
That doesn’t mean it’s about me in the sense of me talking about myself — not a practice I’m known for in normal life (this blog is not normal life!). The part of me it’s about is as new to me as to any audience that might be out there. I’m currently trying to write a few sentences to introduce my horse project. I certainly can’t say I know why I’m doing it, not in a any satisfying way. In six months I’m likely to know more about that; that may be the main reason for carrying on.
What is the essence of this tree, this mountain?
Yes, a great question, and very worthy of pursuit. But the artist only ends up expressing what the essence is for himself or herself. I love to see what that looks like, but I hate the artist statements that say they (even try to) reveal the essence of the subject.
Hi Birgit,
I’d say the answer to your question is a question: “I don’t know. Why don’t you have a look and tell about it?
And Steve, it’s easy to figure out. It’s not as trite as, Which gives the most satisfaction? Pleasing yourself with your work or pleasing others?
Instead, have a look at the long range benefits.
There are people who call or write who bought pieces twenty years ago, but I have no interest at all in the work sitting in boxes from that period. Others see things I did not know were there, and they are more forgiving than I am about technical deficiencies.
It is a fantastic artist’s aid to just imagine even an imaginary person and work for them. It gets one out of oneself.
The best way to find out about yourself (IMO) is to let go; cut loose; don’t think; take action.
Rex
I see June’s ‘Miocene’ as an example.
Beyond the “for me” / “for others” choice, there’s a third option: for God. It used to be quite popular and I understand it is still important to some people. ;-)
I like Birgit’s “essence” with the caveat about making it “an” essence rather than “the” essence. And Steve, of course, is right (here I am, agreeing with him again); the final product comes from the artist and can’t be more than the artist can see.
So an external essence and the absolute limitation of self — a conundrum or paradox with which we all have to live. Perhaps it is that we take as a moral duty to see a fully as we are capable of so that when we express what we see, we are doing so ethically — we are not fooling ourselves or others. Not so much “to thine own self be true” but “push away thine own self in order to see a truth or two.”
At least, that’s what I like to think in my best narrative about myself.
I also think that self-consciousness can be very detrimental to seeing (and expressing) fully — being conscious of oneself puts a bit of a barrier between seeing and the vision. It isn’t probably something that can be easily overcome, and it can come out of a terrible awareness of the pain that one can give others if one is unaware, but it still interferes. This may be the source of the apocryphal “mad artist” syndrome — that artists have to be unself-conscious in order to see fully.
June and Alan,
Agreeing on ‘an essence’, can we go on and enter categories of essences such as science (geological and other data), energy (philosophical, religious beliefs)…
Rex,
I’m finding a contradiction here. Imagining working for an imaginary person, trying to please a real or imagined audience, sounds like much more conscious thinking or effort, and much less cutting loose, than doing “what seems right to me,” which may involve no conscious thinking at all.
Birgit — a can of worms! It’s lovely to think that maybe the visual artist could somehow enclose an essence of a geological truth (in my wildest dreams!). But of course, then one asks, which geological truth. And so forth.
Maybe I’m just terribly aware of my own limitations, hence self-conscious, hence not likely to break as freely as I would wish.
June,
Sorry to have embarrassed you.
Having spent so much of my life trying to figure out how things work, I find it strange that artists should limit themselves to consider only their own feelings or those of their audience.
Heavens, Birgit, you didn’t embarrass me! Sorry if I so missed making my point (and feelings) clear.
I thought your idea was extremely interesting, and then, as I pondered it, I got more and more entangled in the geological ramifications of making art about the fossil beds and realized that I was out of my depth (buried under rocks?)
So I was just continuing the quest for essences, trying to see “as fully as possible” — which made me know that I wasn’t seeing very far…. You must know the feeling, as a scientist, even more than I can know it.
It’s an eternal challenge, and our limitations are no excuse for not trying.
Does that still sound pompous and defensive — I don’t mean it to. I too think that if only the audience and the self are foci of the artistic quest, that that’s terribly limiting.
June,
I do understand only too well about limitations.
I just read a Cezanne quote
that reminds me of Hanneke’s peaches.
I don’t think it’s an either/or situation. But then again, I don’t think much of anything is. I prefer both/and. So why can’t an artist look for answers within themselves that may help others, too?
An artist can’t necessarily control who their audience will be nor what anyone will think of their art, so why try to make it for just one kind of person?
I write for myself and I photograph for myself and I think it would be foolish to deny “it’s all about me,” yet I’ve been surprised in the past at the reactions I get from my own personal “stuff” because they can have nothing to do with what I’m trying to say and that’s not a bad thing!
Well I’m afraid I must confess that all this talk about “essences” is beyond me.
And Steve, of course you should do what’s right for you. What I liked about King’s observation is that it sees the rightness of both viewpoints.
Which is the “and” between the “or.”
Rex,
I liked your story of hitchhiking across America. It is very profound and teaches one a lot. I will do that some day. Need to talk to my wife first though… Bought back memories of Zen and the art of… for me – for some reason…
I hope the restaurant business is going well.
Did not see any of your new portraits as yet. Hope the ‘painterly’ hand is not kept so busy making dishes that drawing suffers.
Hi Sunil,
I’ve done no drawing or painting for months. My job was a total drain.
I say “was” because I decided to add some crew and transfer to another job withing the same company. This inspired me to take up music again because it’s a lively place with lots of great musicians coming and going.
Again, it’s an audience thing. My present environment has an audience for music, and I do like to perform.
I think I’ll have to achieve some isolation before I do the two huge projects I have in mind for drawing and painting — The Techniques of the Masters and the illustrations for Diana’s Falcon.
Thanks for asking.
Right now, and I mean this very second, I have a bass across my lap.
Rex, I tried to imagine what you were doing with that fish, until I read the next sentence :)
I’d have to say I’m both kinds of artist, and I don’t see that as a contradiction. I don’t think of my audience as every possible person in the world. There are many audiences out there, many overlapping, and they tend to form around things that resonate with them. I’d rather have a small passionate audience than a large fickle one (though a large passionate audience would be best).
That said, I trust my own intuition to explore areas that I find compelling, and to know whether a painting or a song in progress is working or not. I don’t live in a vacuum, and there are others that like the same things that I do. I figure if it looks/sounds right to me, then it will to some other people as well. I do listen to my audience once the work is out there, and no doubt I adjust what I’m doing in response. But I don’t try to second-guess them. I think that would be a disservice to them.
June:
So you “know you – yawn – how boring”. My camera will say things like that. I argue with it as I insist that the lens through which it sees, and which it sees as boring, is, for all its transparency, the refracting and focusing medium through which it reacts to the world. Perhaps your boring self is actually such a transparency, rendered so through a long and complex life lived clearly. A pane, which if placed in isolation, would be a wonder of interrelated complexity and a marvel for all to ponder. There – how was that?
Kimberly:
Both/and it is. Birgit may agree that her chosen field of biochemistry works with both/ands rather than either/ors. Life becomes interesting when things combine. But then, knowing of the eithers and the ors as such, is itself, a combinational process.