Inspiration much?

Was e-mailing with a friend yesterday about the kookiness of trying to make a living as a writer when he said this:

Being an artist is a risk. Risking non acceptance. Art has an interior dimension. One is groping for what has profound MEANING. Then to present that sense with integrity is vital. But it is a risk because it may not resonate in current time and space with the public/audience. That can hurt.

Fear of that pain can derail art. One begins to game the audience. The vision in the mind’s eye of the artist becomes poisoned and refracted by these tensions.

Look at this passage from a 1966 Playboy interview with Dylan:

PLAYBOY: Let’s take one last dip back into the material world. What about an artist’s relationship to money?

DYLAN: The myth of the starving artist is a myth. The big bankers and prominent young ladies who buy art started it. They just want to keep the artist under their thumb. Who says an artist can’t have any money? Look at Picasso. The starving artist is usually starving for those around him to starve. You don’t have to starve to be a good artist. You just have to have love, insight and a strong point of view. (My highlight) And you have to fight off depravity. Uncompromising, that’s what makes a good artist. It doesn’t matter if he has money or not. Look at Matisse; he was a banker. Anyway, there are other things that constitute wealth and poverty besides money.

categorized in: creativity