The other day I came across this post on Anna’s (Girl in the Hat) blog, where she wrote vividly and strikingly about what writing is like for her. I’ve come across many such descriptions of writing — and creating in general — but mostly they don’t describe how I feel about it. I used to think that’s because I’m not a “serious” artist, or I haven’t yet written something long enough to be sweating blood over, I’m doing it wrong, etc. And I used to never have an answer about what writing is for me, if it’s not the tickly torment it is for so many other writers. But yesterday, after reading Anna’s post, an answer came. I wrote in her comments:
Writing is a thing I do, like lining up pinecones along a trail, or stacking fruit at the table to see if it’ll balance. Like drawing faces on the steamy shower door, like talking to cats, like opening up someone else’s cabinets so I can know what’s inside. It is simply a thing I do.
As I wrote this I could tell that it is true for me, and I wondered that I never recognized it before. It’s not that writing just flows out of me like a delicious cream sauce (mmm… cream sauce), or that I don’t struggle to find the right way to express something. But I don’t think of it as pain, or even particularly as joy, although it can be. It’s just what I do, along with the many other things I do, like making pictures, or making laughter — or making tears.
Of course, after leaving this comment, I went back and reread some of my own posts that I’d tagged with “writing,” trying to imagine how my writing would sound to someone who’d only read my comment on Anna’s post. Then I realized that, as much as I admire and envy and long to be like the writers who do things in what I think of as a “more grown-up” way, I truly love the simplicity and brightness of my words. My pictures, too. All my life I have wanted to be more of a grown-up, and all my creative life I’ve despaired because I’m not as dark and edgy and angsty as everyone around me. I never wanted to sound like a kid, even when I was a kid.
But… why not? Picasso said famously that it took him his entire life to learn to paint “like a child.” Is there really any point to trying to be a grown-up when all around me, serious adults are trying desperately to hang on to their youth? I am not a rosy-glasses recaller of childhood; I remember how much fear and helplessness and anxiety there is in being young; but there is still so much wisdom that is lost with growing older, and so much of the immediacy of life. Recently I discovered an IAmA with a four-year-old in which someone asked him (via his dad), “What do you think about the world?” He replied (also through his dad), “I think it’s pretty good, but not if you’re alone or scared or dead or something like that.” There you go!
Here’s one answer to my “why not?” A critique I have often heard of my work is that it’s lovely and fascinating and fun to read, but it “doesn’t go anywhere.” It occurs to me now that this is a good description of what kids do, too. They have creativity and imagination and unfettered-ness like we adults can never achieve, but (perhaps because of it) they don’t make statements, and they can’t create a body of work. Those things take editing, and if you’re capable of editing, you’re capable of judging, and that’s why you can’t think 100% like a kid anymore. You know too much. Does everything have to “go somewhere”? What happens if it doesn’t? Well… adults won’t like it, and now that I’m an adult, everything I create (even if it were for an audience of children) has to go through adults. But what if I don’t care about that? Is there anything intrinsically less important about work that “doesn’t go anywhere”?

Paper cutout self-portrait I made last night at a free National Gallery of Modern Art event. Took me about 40 minutes. It was like kindergarten, with scalpels.
I’m not sure if I need an answer to that question (and I’m not sure I agree with that critique of my work anyway). It’s not really important. The important question is: having decided maybe I’m childlike and I’m okay with that, how much more can I create? (And: how much more can I live? And: is this childlike quality something the rest of you have been liking in my work for ages now, and I’m only just starting to figure it out?)
You make angst look like a sophomoric affect. Suddenly, I’m blushing!
I love your playfulness, your optimism, your brightness, clarity, and thoughtfulness. I wouldn’t have called it “childlike” but I guess I can see how you got to that.
Aw, don’t blush! Nothing sophomoric about your lovely words. 🙂 And now you’re making me blush, oh stop.
I guess when I say “childlike” I’m reacting to all the times I’ve felt that playfulness, optimism, and brightness were things to hide — more sophisticated people know to be blasé and anguished and pessimistic. I think really this was a skewed view based on some early creative writing classes in which the dark edgy types were much louder than the people who appreciated my stories (or, perhaps, I only felt that way because I was taken aback by the people who hated happy endings). Anyway, I’m happy to be reclaiming that proudly now. 🙂
very thought-provoking. i can definitely appreciate the idea of work that “doesn’t go anywhere.”
🙂 And sometimes going nowhere is the funnest journey because you don’t know what might happen!
I wouldn’t have called it childlike. It is free and fun and I like that for what it is. I’m glad that not everyone wants to make art like the Chapman Brothers, who frankly, just play with toys, and suddenly I guess they’re childlike too.
I don’t know anything about the Chapmans, but a little Wikipedia browse makes me see that I don’t have anything in common with their art! I will say that I have very little patience for adults who deliberately act like children — and neither do most kids.
It’s possible I see “childlike” differently than most people because I was always an old kid, taking responsibility very seriously, and worrying about things. I remember being about five or six, and walking down the corridors at school and thinking of a girl I’d seen on TV who was missing, and realizing how scared she must be, and saying a prayer for her in my head. That’s the kind of child I was and I think I’m still just the same!
I agree. It’s all just what I do. I do it, whatever it is, everyday. As my grandchild said, (who draws all the time and is good.) ” It relaxes me.” At first, I thought, oh but you are supposed to so through times of wanting to tear your hair out, but you know what? Drawing and painting are relaxing. It’s fun to do what I just “do”
🙂 It relaxes me too, even when I’m stressed because it doesn’t seem good enough! The doing is usually still fun — especially with drawing, more than writing. And Carla, I really see that with your drawing and painting — that you have fun with what you do and it is “just what you do” in that it runs through you like, well, not blood, but maybe qi or something lively and flowing. You’re such an inspiration to me, really!! Helping me see that art doesn’t have to be all huge and serious and ponderous. I had one of your pictures as my desktop picture (hope you don’t mind) the whole time we were in Toronto. 🙂
BTW – terrific self portrait – not childlike in the sense of not having much content.
Thanks! It was unbelievably fun just sitting on the floor in the National Gallery of Modern Art (in this room, in fact — a wild and colorful place) with scissors and glue stick and scalpel and big sheets of paper, cutting and pasting. 🙂
Hey Lisa. First I like to say your self portrait is cool and so well done. Art should be motivated by desire. A gift that is given at birth and nurtured through childhood and adulthood. Be free. Feel free. Create freely.
Thank you, Walter!! “Be free. Feel free. Create freely.” That’s the heart of it, totally. 🙂 I love the way you’ve put it!
I haven’t been so good at keeping up with blogs lately but I will swing by yours again soon. I want to see what you’ve been up to. 🙂
Four new video pieces, including one of my vacation trip to Tybee Island in GA. Check them out when you have some time.
I’m working my way through bit by bit. 🙂 Yay video… and vacations.
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