Thursday, May 03, 2007

Movimento numero zero / 0 - Prelude

“Because something with a certain quality can happen, it is necessary that an empty space is available” These words by Peter Brook, still resume today the starting point and the development of the creative process.

Why an empty space ?....Because an empty space potentially allows the birth of something new and spontaneous.

I don’t think the creative process is different in plastic art, music or performing arts; it just works with different containers in each of these disciplines, and yet if we were to be precise, the division is made more for intellectual purposes than for the sake of a natural truth.

Starting these interventions I’ d like to begin with a general point of view, and each time, focus more on every piece of the puzzle and every aspect of the subject.
If we want to talk about the creative process------detached from any artistic marketing strategy -------we should start by talking about the “invisible”.
There is an Indian word which in its own sound suggests the sense of the creative spark, of the unseizable instant : this word is “sphota” , something like “life spark”.

So how can we materialize the invisible whether in writing, dancing, sculpting, painting, drawing , playing, acting or in any other else way? We simply can’t.
The invisible does not need to become visible, yet even if the invisible is not obliged to manifest itself, it can, at the same time, do so everywhere and in every moment, through everyone or every thing, if the given circumstances are the right ones.

The only thing that can help is a certain awareness of the present. If we accept the present moment in an intense way and the conditions are right, the spark of life might appear within the right sound, the right movement, the right image, the right fold of the paper or stain of colour or gesture of the hands on previously “inert” material. It is within a special exchange that the invisible might appear, that’s why it might appear in thousands of unexpected forms.

In a more provocative sense we can also say that, the invisible, the creative spark has or at least had, a sacred origin ; it is rooted into the ancestral world. But what is the sacred, the ancestral? It is a transformation, in terms of quality, of what that is not sacred at the beginning.

A simple human life is an example of “the visible” through which the invisible might appear.

Sometimes it’s not even necessary to be able to do something extremely well. If there is no attempt to fake that a creative gesture, or a form, or a sound is more than what it really is, then another criteria takes this place: the need to find an interior echo; within this empty space of authenticity the contact with something really different is possible. There is no method proposed; it is only about being aware of something, and this may happen anytime in anyplace or never in no place.
Here is a be-bop about creativity; quick flashes that we’ll consider one by one in the coming “movements” in this blog.
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All is evoked by one thing----the creative gesture is a gesture of the soul; it does not matter what you do; it is not connected to any behavior.

Extension of the gesture of the soul = creativity
No talent differences---there are levels to cross----something invisible must be switched
no guarantee/only possibility

The way someone creates = the way the viewer receive the message

The way a person works defines what the person is

APPEARANCE = STRUGGLE AGAINST WHAT IS ORGANIC
The idea starts from the mind, but not “through the mind”. If I start from the mind it means the world around is DRY

TO CONCEIVE EMPTINESS / SPACE AROUND US, NOT THE OBJECTS

All methods are systematic : you learn to do everything right but it’s mechanical, it does not move.

We become insensitive to the world when we become a character, a caricature; this prevents the possibility to be reached across. All stimulation from outside can feed the character-monster: if something that it cannot analyze gets to this character-monster, there is a block = identity crisis

To be creative we need to dismantle any masque or role, even unconscious

Physically being empty and transparent
EMPTINESS---RELAX & CONCENTRATION = ACTIONS HAPPEN BY THEMSELVES
(it’s not us that mentally create them)

CREATIVE ACTIONS = THEY HAPPEN WHEN THEY ARE ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY
( it’s like in a death-or-alive situation)

WE NEED TO ALWAYS LOOK FOR SUBSTANTIAL RELATIONSHIPS OF CAUSE

The key is CREATIVE SENSITIVITY
Correspondence with flowing things
FLOWING = ALIVE
Do not try and fix them
(if we fix them, we are “acting” like if we were creative)

IF YOU ARE SOMETHING, YOU ARE NOT BORING BECAUSE YOU CHANGE CONTINUOUSLY

AVOID CHANGE = REPETITION = DEATH

TO BE WE MUST NOT TRY AND UNDERSTAND / No obligation to react

OBLIGATION TO REACT = IMITATION

When we really become something we do not look like it

We cannot truly understand something without getting lost in it


This sensitivity it’s the origin of creativity

DO NOT TRY AND FIX THINGS

THERE IS NOTHING WE CAN KNOW

IT IS POSSIBLE TO FOLLOW FOR A WHILE SOMETHING CHANGING, BUT IT IS NOT POSSIBLE TO DO IT CONTINUOUSLY
TO BECOME SOMETHING ;
the mistake begins when we think that “something” is a “thing”.
It is our EXPERIENCE , OUR ENCOUNTER with them , which gives life and meaning to things
Nothing and nobody is fixed , all is flowing

In ART

To interiorize = to lose the sense of self and of truth
In art we should not live “inside”:
We should imagine that we do not exist inside, but just OUTSIDE, near by.
The encounters we make define who we are

Maybe TO BE = TO BE THE ENCOUNTER WITH THE WORLD

Creative experience exists revealed in the interaction with the real world; if we interiorize, we need codes to explain ;
EXPERIENCE REVEALED = INTENSELY CREATIVE

BRING THINGS IN THE SKIN AND IN THE ACTS INSTEAD OF IN THE MIND
You can enjoy Beethoven or being Beethoven, but not both.


To be able to give a creative response :

-) do not focus on what we think we want
-) become more sensitive towards what we do not want
-) develop capacity, attention, sensitivity toward WHAT WE DO NOT KNOW
(instead of what we want)

First important question about creativity:

HOW CAN WE ALLOW OURSELVES TO BE TOUCHED BY THINGS THAT DO NOT ORIGINATE IN US ?

-) Identify the fluxus and follow it
-) being able to see when it is manifested and it is flowing, not caring about where does it go



To be continued..............

Ghost Story

Started sketching out a ghost story after a stay in
Hong Kong late August 2005. I had spent a few days
experiencing the Hungry Ghosts festival, its customs,
its gossips, leafing through newspapers for true
ghosts stories etc. I noted down Miami resort hotel
and its romantic suicides trend.

End of story. Over the following months I developed 3
characters: Mia, the foreigner who got robbed by Hung
the thief. And Chen, the bus driver.

This May holiday I came back to Hong Kong to renew my
visa. At the same time will I tour the city for visits
and tango dancing. A friend lives on Cheug Chau. I had
never been there. I went for a 4 night sleep
over. Cristina (painter recently moved from Beijing to
Cheung Chau) picked me up at the Hung Hong train
station and lead me to her island.

Well, don't you know...Cheung Chau is where Miami
resort motel is. And the island abounds in ghost
stories.

My exploration goes on.