Without discounting the excitement of discovering her writings, Oliver highlights the incredible self-centered selfishness of the “artist”. Which I won’t discount, having witnessed it. Transcendance however is not their sole purview. you find greater truth seated next to a nurse in a children’s ward, with a soldier who realizes he’s killed innocents, in an exhausted but hopeful immigrant. With anyone in a war zone. Individuality delights us and shines, but life humbles us and informs us more deeply.
I appreciate your comment. Truth. It is all truth when solidly felt and expressed. Should Mary have written about nurses, soldiers and immigrants, the same purpose is there. (And perhaps she did!? and perhaps you are...) Bravo. Connection. Feeling our slice of worlds (as there are many). Painting words on the page. Process. Truth-telling. All of it. Write on.
A delicious and delicate description of an artist. I don’t think an artist is made but born. And then attended to, all through their life. Or not, and suffers.
Bless you, Saint Mary O. Captures the pure passion of creation and creating. I just reread LAST DAYS and SUNDAY MORNING, HIGH TIDE, from Twelve Moons. A fellow New Englander, I can feel the sentient, reverberant life and thrum of her words.
Mary Oliver's voice and her encouragement to be fully engaged in the creative process, whichever type of artist you are is an essential piece of wisdom.
"In truth, the work itself is the adventure. And no artist could go about this work, or would want to, with less than extraordinary energy and concentration. The extraordinary is what art is about." So true. But although I believe in moments of creative "ekstasis," and have valued those experiences, my working-class side has also made me treat the creative process with all of the doggedness I experienced in my younger years while wielding a hammer to finish off a subfloor or to drive the last nail into the last sheet of plywood on a roof. To me, the visceral experience of creativity often takes a back seat to the poetic descriptions of it.
I love this passage but I can't help but thinking it's a little elitist. Assuming that are creative has a choice between the world of hours and the creative work. Artist starving in a garrett are no longer tolerated, and unless one is born or married into wealth, one doesn't have much of a choice.
A creative must create. yeah, that's true. When I didn't write anything at all, i was miserable. When I couldn't get my designs to echo what was in my head, I grew frustrated. When I write, I feel free, my mind feels sharp, and the Characters quieten down. Now that they've created the SDXL .9, I can almost get the bot to draw what I want it to. It doesn't cut off body parts, or put part of the character out of the frame.
I feel better when I can picture what I want and it feels right.
Without discounting the excitement of discovering her writings, Oliver highlights the incredible self-centered selfishness of the “artist”. Which I won’t discount, having witnessed it. Transcendance however is not their sole purview. you find greater truth seated next to a nurse in a children’s ward, with a soldier who realizes he’s killed innocents, in an exhausted but hopeful immigrant. With anyone in a war zone. Individuality delights us and shines, but life humbles us and informs us more deeply.
I appreciate your comment. Truth. It is all truth when solidly felt and expressed. Should Mary have written about nurses, soldiers and immigrants, the same purpose is there. (And perhaps she did!? and perhaps you are...) Bravo. Connection. Feeling our slice of worlds (as there are many). Painting words on the page. Process. Truth-telling. All of it. Write on.
I loved the line: "working artists are not trying to help the world go around, but forward".
I read the comments below and feel moved to say that we can be both working artists and people who give to the world through other work.
A delicious and delicate description of an artist. I don’t think an artist is made but born. And then attended to, all through their life. Or not, and suffers.
Your article validates my ridiculous imaginations!
Bless you, Saint Mary O. Captures the pure passion of creation and creating. I just reread LAST DAYS and SUNDAY MORNING, HIGH TIDE, from Twelve Moons. A fellow New Englander, I can feel the sentient, reverberant life and thrum of her words.
Mary Oliver, a poet-seer.
wow she goes all "Annie Dillard" here.....what a gift and that book Upstream an ecstatic portal.
Yes, I, too have deep appreciation for UPSTREAM.
always assumed she was a poet but the essays really flesh that
medium out...ive played catch up with alot past few years and she is one like Dillard who floored with ability in creative thrilling way
to communicate
Mary Oliver's voice and her encouragement to be fully engaged in the creative process, whichever type of artist you are is an essential piece of wisdom.
"In truth, the work itself is the adventure. And no artist could go about this work, or would want to, with less than extraordinary energy and concentration. The extraordinary is what art is about." So true. But although I believe in moments of creative "ekstasis," and have valued those experiences, my working-class side has also made me treat the creative process with all of the doggedness I experienced in my younger years while wielding a hammer to finish off a subfloor or to drive the last nail into the last sheet of plywood on a roof. To me, the visceral experience of creativity often takes a back seat to the poetic descriptions of it.
I love this passage but I can't help but thinking it's a little elitist. Assuming that are creative has a choice between the world of hours and the creative work. Artist starving in a garrett are no longer tolerated, and unless one is born or married into wealth, one doesn't have much of a choice.
It’s a narrow path especially now I agree
A-Fucking-Men
A creative must create. yeah, that's true. When I didn't write anything at all, i was miserable. When I couldn't get my designs to echo what was in my head, I grew frustrated. When I write, I feel free, my mind feels sharp, and the Characters quieten down. Now that they've created the SDXL .9, I can almost get the bot to draw what I want it to. It doesn't cut off body parts, or put part of the character out of the frame.
I feel better when I can picture what I want and it feels right.
Wonderful expression of creativity pushing past the edges. An artist works/ creates from that beautiful in-between, extending outwards into existence.
A specific understanding of the Artist.
So amazing and so very true. Bravo!
A simple dilettante thanks you.