Even before I began writing, I loved to draw and paint. Although
I enjoyed it, I never considered it as a profession. Maybe I was afraid
of the impracticality, or like my character, Oliver, (in my novel April
& Oliver), I was simply afraid. Accessing one’s own creative power can
be terrifying. Disowning it, on the other hand, opens the door to catastrophe,
as poor Oliver finds out.
To keep me sane, and in an effort to understand the world,
I’ve lived and traveled in a variety of continents. It hasn’t helped on either
score, by the way. I now have more questions and less sanity.
Nevertheless, traveling has added a thick, rich texture to my life. Throughout
these journeys, my journal and sketchbook have been my navigation tools. For
me, the two are complimentary, and over the years, visual art has taught me to
be a better writer.
Painter Roy Kinzer (shown left) who formerly taught at the Montclair Art
Museum, unwittingly taught me as much about writing as any writing teacher. He
pushed his students to see large, abstract forms, positive and negative space, and
nuances of color – such as flecks of green in a skin tone or reds in a swatch
of grass. By forcing myself to yield my preconceived ideas to the reality of
what was actually in front of me, I slowly began to give that same courtesy to
my characters. My stock assessments of them fell away as they revealed their
true and surprising selves. Also, Kinzer’s insistence that we work on all parts
of the canvas at once, rather than get bogged down in minutia too soon, trained
me to stay fluid with the overall arc of my storyline.
Years ago I saw a film about the creative process that has
stayed with me ever since. French director Henri-Georges Clouzot persuaded his friend
Pablo Picasso in 1956 to make a documentary of his painting process. The film,
called The Mystery of Picasso, shows the artist creating more than a
dozen paintings, and illustrates the relationship between creation and
destruction.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gHlTvE-AI3Q
(2 minute trailer)
As with Kinzer, Picasso starts with broad geometric shapes
that immediately take possession of the entire page. Then come shading, color
and depth. The most striking thing about the film is Picasso’s spontaneity, the
dexterity with which he changes course. In one breath he has drawn an intricate
fish. Just when you think it is perfect, he dives back in and transfigures it
into a rooster. His changes are ruthless. He has no hesitation about obliterating
what he has just done in order to transform it into something else. Just when
you want to scream out, “Stop! You are destroying a Picasso!” he leaps in again
to vaporize the rooster into a demon’s head. As an artist, it’s
hard to watch this film without gasping. Many of us know the anguish of
realizing we have to cut the very line we thought was brilliant. With Picasso,
there is no anguish. His mercilessness is stunning. He may have been an
arrogant SOB in life, but in art he was without egoic attachment. The film
illustrates his total surrender to form. By prior agreement, when Clouzot
finished shooting The Mystery of Picasso, all of the paintings were
destroyed.
The Hindu goddess Kali is the deity of creation and
destruction. Robert Bly writes about her as an
example of a “Death Mother” in Sleepers
Joining Hands, and elsewhere. Generally, she is depicted with four arms
that carry a sword, a trident, a severed head dripping blood, and a skull cup
catching the blood. Her necklace is made of the skulls of her victims, (our
inner demons and egoic attachments). She symbolizes the link between
destruction and restoration in nature, and is feared for her extreme methods of
initiating change - the forest fire followed by new growth, flooded plains
followed by alluvial soil. Despite her ferocity, or rather because of it, she
is the embodiment of divine energy, or Shakti.
Picasso did not fear his own Kali energy. On the contrary, he slept with
her and made babies with her, lots of them. Painting and drawing have
introduced me to Kali, too. She is the goddess of change; in other words, the
goddess of Now. When I am tempted to save a favorite cut line in a scrap file
for possible use later on, Kali tells me, “Baby, just hit delete.”
