I like to make things. I have posted some of the things I make here, others have simply been for me and my D&D friends to enjoy. Still others are functional more than anything else. It is also why I write. The act and the art of creativity is important to my mental health. The expression of emotion, thought, dreams which might otherwise be trapped inside my skull as I struggle to articulate the pressure I feel building.
Like a kettle on a stove without a whistle in the spout, the pressure builds inside me until I have to let it out.
Visual Art
People talk about art therapy. About how painting, drawing, making, can be an outlet for emotion. An expression of something beyond words. What they cannot convey is the shear relief of losing oneself in an image. In a singular idea, iterating, erasing, building, drawing. Creating this thing until such time as you are no longer in need of that release.
Digital art is not good enough for me when this is what I need. It is too easy to start a sketch, decide I hate it, and delete it. Physical art though, I have to follow through. I don’t always, or I might leave something partially done for weeks. When I get back to it, though, I don’t have the luxury of a clean slate, instead I have the reality of building on something I already started. I have to embrace the imperfections in the lines of the paint. I must choose to flow with the shape of the canvas, work around the spills and smudges. Engage with imperfection as a reality in life and in art. For there is no true perfection in this imperfect world.
My paintings are not perfect, but they do not depict perfection. I have frequently chosen colours and ideas which intentionally break the rules of what it should be. A little oddity here and there, simply to show you that this is not supposed to look like a photograph. It is why abstract and fantasy ideas stick with me. I don’t have a clear idea in my head of what it must look like. I have a vague sense of the shape, the texture, the idea. Sometimes it is shaped as I draw by the things I am thinking and feeling. Sometimes I can hold onto a story told by others as my hands and eyes engage with one thing, but my mind and ears with something else.
Nevertheless, regardless of how perfect or imperfect, visual art is a way to show emotions and feeling and ideas which words cannot do justice. I have taken time to draw pain. To explore darkness. To flash whimsy. Each time I have done these things, I have healed something inside of me which I did not know how to express. When I lose the will to create visual art, I ask myself where that spark has gone. It is never truly lost, it is sometimes just shaped into something I don’t currently recognise.
Music
If music be the food of love, play on;
Give me excess of it, that, surfeiting,
The appetite may sicken, and so die.
That strain again! it had a dying fall:
O, it came o’er my ear like the sweet south,
That breathes upon a bank of violets,
Stealing and giving odour! Enough; no more:
‘Tis not so sweet now as it was before.
Twelfth Night; Duke Orsino
Shakespeare knew the power of music as he penned these words. The language of emotion, which without skill and understanding is simply another background of sounds without meaning. To drink music as it flows over your soul, understanding the pain, joy, suffering, and laughter of the artist who created such a source for us to engage. To fill the soul with something bigger, stronger, more terrifying than we could do on our own terms. Then to attempt a poor echo of greatness as we create our own tunes, our own beats, our own sounds in life.
To make music is a wonderful gift. To be able to bring to life that which others have penned and allow still further audiences to engage with the sounds, a blessing beyond description. In many ways I share my love of the visual and written arts more easily than music. Perhaps because my tastes are far reaching. From the baroque sounds of a harpsichord or lute, the riches of a choir, and the overwhelming power of a full orchestral ensemble tot he simplicity of a country musician with a piano or a guitar, singing words from their soul. To the heavy driving sounds of the angry and hurt in the rock and metal movements. What you choose to listen to, to fill your ears with, to fill your mind with, can be a larger influence than you might think.
Put on happy music when you are sad, and allow yourself to dance. Put on quite tunes when you are contemplative, allow your mind to wonder. Or sit in silence, and allow your mind to fill the gaps. There is no wrong way to enjoy music.
Even my dreams are filled with sounds. I have woken with songs I know, or songs I do not echoing in my ears. There have been dreams where I wish I could hold onto them because I know the music they hold will be lost as soon as I come fully awake. The memory of music leaving an ache in my heart as I can never recreate that sound in honesty and truth.
I say it is easier to share other types of art with the world, and yet I do share my love of music. I lead a Church congregation in song regularly. Choosing, learning, practising songs which reflect faith, hope, life, joy and pain. Until you have heard a full Methodist Church bellowing hymns you cannot understand the depth of soul which music can bring to a community. Perhaps not only Methodist – but we have a bit of a reputation, and we have earned it. Those services where I can hear the congregation singing back at me louder than I am leading them I know that I am blessed to be there.
For music is not about me.
Music is about so much more than me. Music is unique in that when shared and built with others it grows into something which is grossly more than the some of its parts. A song once shared belongs to every ear which hears it. To every voice singing along, whether they sing on key or off. To listen to music, to engage with music, is to connect to something deeper, bigger, grander than ourselves. It is a deeply human response. One we cannot turn off. One we can only nurture, love, and facilitate.
Written Words
I want to say that writing comes more naturally to me than any other form of art. That would be a lie. I enjoyed the visual arts long before I ever contemplated that my words might hold meaning. I was embedded in a home filled with music, and with the creation of music, long before I thought I might be able to reciprocate the words which I read in stories, books, magazines. Yet to write is part of who I am. It is a skill I have worked on to the point where I know how poor an author I am.
I do not disparage my skills. There are times I read what I have written and I wonder if it were truly I who wrote those words. Yet I have honed my craft in a different way when it comes to writing. I practice painting, drawing, and music. Writing is not about practice. Perhaps because the work which goes into the consumption of the medium is different. Every piece I write and share must be complete and whole.
I have often tried to find the right simile or metaphor for the relationship between reading and writing. I tried breathe, and found it unforgiving. I have more recently landed on the enjoyment of food. To read is to eat. Sometimes we snack, sometimes we have healthy meals. Frequently we consume fast food. At time we treat ourselves to a veritable feast. Or a five star meal which leaves us wishing for more. To write is to cook. Some enjoy it more than others. Sometimes it is nothing but a chore. Most of what we write is meant only for ourselves. The evening meal, our quickly thrown together breakfast. Skipped on the days we order from somewhere else, or another member of the household takes the responsibility. Every now and then, it is fun to get all the dishes dirty. To pull together a feast of epic proportions to share with friends and family. We don’t do that every day, and not all of us have the skill of a five star chef, but we can have fun with it.
I don’t know where my words fit in. I only know that if music is about other people and community, writing is selfish. I do not write because you need me to write. I enjoy the fact that people appreciate my words — I am human after all. But I write because I have a need to express stories, concepts, ideas into the world. I write because I need to clear my mind of a series of thoughts. As painting and drawing help clear emotion from my mind. As music helps me connect with others. So writing clears the spinning thoughts from my brain.
And so
And so. To create is human. To make is a blessing. To build a legacy is to dream of a brighter future. There is no life in which I turn my back entirely on art and say it is worth nothing. The drawings of others may speak to me only superficially, but I know that it is because the complexity of human emotion which they depict may be beyond my understanding in that moment.
When the analytical mind needs a break, the creative brain may take over. Creating something, and celebrating the flaws, is part of who I am, and I will embrace that with all I am for there is nothing more beautiful to me than seeing imagination at play.
In the words of Brandon Sanderson, and Hoid, “Err on the side of awesome”.
Pippa Hillebrand 