Read & Reflect/Blog # 15
Fascinating. Im reading this article and my world makes a little more sense to me....LOLOL Seriously though, Im reading this and I am trying to apply its principles and theories to a particular student I have (who also happens to be my 11 year old daughter)
I am wondering if it is possible to simultaneously be highly creative and then, ricochet back into rigid linear type thinking, being uncomfortable with the sensations which accompany creativity and can that dichotomy exist in a single little person? And as a teacher (and her mother) how do I address all of it in a learning environment.
Anyway....Inspiration. Yes, perhaps that is the peak of the creative process... I do see this in kids... they have a brilliant idea, so big and beautiful and in their passion to express it, create it they become frustrated and forget the joy of the process. I agree that sometimes the final product can be a let down... as an artist I experience this myself and I see it so clearly in my own daughter. However, what I also observe is the magic of process. This is hard to see when your in the thick of it. The process itself becomes food for inspiration. As a teacher, guide, fellow artist, this is what I try to model for them. The joy of an unanticipated happy accident, the freedom to shift the original idea to something new as it grows.
I used an analogy the other day in a painting class. One of my 7th graders was working on her watercolor and exclaimed in frustration, this is terrible and I dont want to finish it. I smiled and asked her to consider her painting a toddler. Toddlers are incorrigible, uncontrollable and hard to manage. Just because a toddle breaks things and doesn't follow directions and makes all sorts of social blunders.... the parent does not give up on her. We give her the space to grow and take the time to guide her. I tell them the artistic process is like raising a child (or a puppy) and it takes time and investment and not to be too quick to judge....Not to give up.... give it the space to grow. In this, they find support for that inital inspiration. It gives them a different way to think about the process. It becomes about an interaction with material and idea right there in the moment rather than some sort of far away big idea that has little to do with the moment they are in.
I LOVE your analogoy!! I have run across a few uncontrollable toddlers in my own work latey!! "Give them room to grow!" That's priceless! (And the Gnezda article made MY life make a lot of sense to me!) As for your 11 year old? Sounds like a brilliant artist in the making! Lucky to have a mom like you, too.
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