Artistic Inspiration

Serendipitous moments are wonderful, and especially when several seem to connect AND bring forth a revelation and encouragement. This has been a week of such moments. A couple of days ago I found a video, Elizabeth Gilbert on Genius, which addressed artist's inspiration and when it just doesn't seem to come together.  She suggests ultimately we must "show up" to create, and the genius will be with us/in us (suggesting it comes from something external), not always, but sometimes, ONLY if we show up to create to begin with. Gilbert, known for her book, Eat Pray Love, now a movie starring Julia Roberts, talks of at age 40, people say to her, well what are you going to do now that you've had such a big hit; what if that never comes to you again? Well, again, keep writing, she says. That's what she was born to do. So, if you were born to create, you will create and the genius will come and fill your work, maybe not everyday or every time you create, but it is a process, and maybe the frustrating moments are just as important as the a-ha moments, at least I have come to this conclusion for me and my work.

So, yesterday as I was pondering this, a friend named Patty came by to see me and asked if I'd look at some photographs in a recently privately published book, Studies in Black and White, photographs by her great aunt, Liddie McDermott. Liddie is 98 years old and made beautiful black and white photographs for a span of eighty years.  Patty asked if I might make some comments on these photographs in a notebook of comments she was collecting to send to her great aunt, who now resides in South Carolina. Liddie, now 98 years of age, has a book of almost a lifetime of her images and passions published! Now, is that not inspiration? I would love to meet Great Aunt Liddie. Hey, if we are born to create, we create, or as Erma Bombeck said, "When I stand before God at the end of my life, I would hope that I have not a single bit of talent left, and could say, ‘I used everything you gave me." This quote came to me via the art blog of Bridgette Guerzon Mills. Maybe these links will offer a bit of inspiration to anyone who happens upon this blog. May the artist within and around you be inspired to create!