What forces stimulate artists’ best work?

I’ve always been put off when journals issue themed calls for submissions. I don’t see how a writer can be expected to produce quality work, at short notice, when so conceptually constrained. That’s not to say that such calls might not provide an opportunity if you happen to have something already in the back of a cloud folder, that can be tweaked to fit the theme. But it’s an odd way to go about things—redolent of art classes and ‘creative writing’ courses, giving people a topic to tinker with.

I was reminded recently that there isn’t just one optimum way of getting the best out of yourself. Awake in the night (a recurring problem throughout my life) I was listening to a transcription of Bach’s Goldberg Variations on R3. (Yes, the work is believed to have been composed for an insomniac ‘for the refreshment of their spirits’, and it fulfils the brief: but that’s not my point here). Some people regard this as the greatest single piece of music ever composed (that’s a conversation-starter, not a falsifiable assertion); and it’s worth remembering that it was a commission. Most of Bach’s work was essentially contract work, to earn a living and keep doing what he was good at. Did he already have in mind, in a notebook somewhere, the sublime aria that begins and ends this particular masterpiece? Or did it just come to him when he sat down to get on with the job? Was he hurried by a deadline or relaxed at the absence of one? It would be fascinating to know how this work came about. (Angela Hewitt’s exquisite COVID lockdown recording of the aria is here).

It seems to me that most of the art that we make efforts to engage with, comes about through a combination of the need to earn a living; an impulse to create; the expression of a talent; and the individual need to achieve something. I suggest, for example, that much poetry is generated mainly because of the impulse factor. Whereas for many composers, earning a living has been the predominant factor. But it varies. After the early years, Picasso did not need to earn a living from his work but remained extraordinarily productive, impelled to create. Or consider Virginia Woolf. It’s true that for a time she needed to generate income from writing (mostly through reviews) but throughout, what drove her to express her complex insights in fictional form was the impulse to create and her individual need to achieve. If she’d not had sufficient wealth and therefore time in her day-to-day life (and a room of her own of course) it seems highly unlikely that her best work would have been stimulated by a journal inviting submissions on, say, ‘lighthouses’ or ‘posh people’s parties’.

On giving ourselves a chance to appreciate works of art

Turner & Constable exhibition Tate Britain

I met up recently with a friend of mine who is an art historian. The last time I’d seen him was at the ‘Turner & Constable’ exhibition at Tate Britain (still another three weeks to run) and he told me he’d seen it four times altogether.

Naturally I immediately asked whether he’d had new insights on each occasion? ‘Yes of course’, he said, ‘especially with the Constable’.

This is a remark from a man who published a book about Constable back in about 1990 (and which is still in print).

The most striking implication is that art of any depth takes receptivity, time, experience, reviewing and reflection in order for us to appreciate it. But the risky part of this is that of necessity, most of us have to take short cuts through such demands. We therefore may count too heavily perhaps on our experience, and spend too little on time, reflection and revisiting a work. I know I do this: for example at an exhibition I will just glance at some pieces, judging that further investment of time will not be as rewarding as dwelling on other pieces. Otherwise I get too tired. Similarly when reading fiction or poetry, or at musical concerts, I might give my mind a short rest for one or two pieces. This seems normal. Life is short, and much quality stuff must escape our attention.

My friend did not say whether or not he thought four viewings of Turner and Constable paintings—for someone already very familiar with the oeuvres—was sufficient to feel he had learned all he could learn. But I suspect he would have said it probably was not.

As a writer, in the past I’ve received rejections to submissions with surprising speed: in one case a work was declined within three hours, on several occasions within 10 hours. It is these instances that I’m reminded of, when recalling the anecdote above. Of course I would like to know the basis on which the editors who dismissed my work so abruptly, took their decision, but of course I will never find out. Vita brevis.

One writer’s way of dealing with an occupational hazard

Many of us may have sensed this: Kathleen Jamie expresses it perfectly—

https://sortof.co.uk/kathleen-jamie-findings

“If we work always in words, sometimes we need to recuperate in a place where language doesn’t join up, where we’re thrown back on a few elementary nouns. Sea. Bird. Sky” (Findings, 2005, p164).