Painting = self-cutting, Y/Y?

[tooth_and_claw]

There seems to be a theme running through almost all of the recent essays I see, on or off LJ, that tackle either writing or art: that the act of growing, learning, and expanding in either is an inherently painful experience. Lots of adjectives like "shredding", "tearing", "agonizing" and "depressing" are used to describe the experience. It seems

Comments

[ninja_turbo]

I've never been a huge 'bleed for your craft' artist, but at Clarion West, we were always being urged to push ourselves to the next level, to strive, try harder, fail bigger, because that was the point of the workshop. However, to flow into the metaphorical pattern you've identified, the phrase that most stuck in my head about that urge is in fact to "bleed all over the page."

Very recently, I followed the dao of "bleed all over the page" while revising a story and the results were very powerful. I think the advantage of incorporating that degree of pain, of emotional turmoil into the creative process is that summoning forth certain emotional states in the artist helps transmit those emotional states through the medium.

We create for many reasons, but for those who seek to effect change in others, it only makes sense that we effect change in ourselves during the process--temporary emotional shifts or longer-lasting pursuit of the ever-more-demanding craft.

However, it doesn't mean we should be self-indulgent and angsty about it, setting ourselves apart for our heroic sacrifice on behalf of the 'common people,' those unable or unwilling to make the shamanic journey/sacrifice of the Artist. Because that's bunk, and I don't mean a cantrip.

[tooth_and_claw]

But I think there's a huge difference between putting emotion into what you're doing-- which can include pain, often with powerful results-- and equating the *process itself* with being innately painful. Bleeding all over the page, as you say, can be incredibly healing and cathartic. Even making yourself feel something for the sake of your story is part and parcel of the process for some people. But the difference lies in where it becomes pathological, where every time you attend to that page or canvas, the pain comes; when it has nothing to do with what your working on, and everything with how you approach that work.

It's like gaming-- I can pull up tears and true emotional responses to events in character, but when those translate into serious OOC issues or problems with the act of gaming itself, that's unhealthy.

You do bring up and interesting point, though: the artist clinging to pain as a badge of honor-- and I think Amber's right in her response below that this isn't something just limited to the arts. "I've suffered more than you, so I'm better/more pure/have more experience" is a HUGE part of our society.