art and creation (not in a religious way)

Hello,

It's a bit fun and exciting not knowing who's reading this, so, hello! I could tell you my name, or you could read along and try to guess. The answer’s at the end (or skip ahead if you like spoilers, jeez).

Today's newsletter is a guest newsletter as Jessie bullied me into writing one. Just kidding, Jessie gave me a prompt after one of our usual calls about snippets of our lives, and I decided to write it while laying on a flowery knoll at the botanical gardens during the first warm, sunny Saturday San Francisco has seen since September. I hope you got a kick out of that alliteration, because I did.

It was recently my 25th birthday. And for this celebration of my quarter life crisis, I decided to throw a party. The idea was to create art and auction it off to each other with monopoly money, essentially leaving with a piece of art you didn't create (The other idea was to use my patio for ONCE, but considering that the day I'm writing this is the first sunny Saturday, I'll let you imagine what happened there). Friends also had the option to bring a piece of art they'd already created (and were happy to part with), but out of the 12 or so people who came, only one brought something premade. 

I set out all my arts and crafts supplies, and friends got to creating. I went around the room offering my art advice and experience when my new students had questions, and then I sat down to create something myself. What I didn't anticipate, however, was the shift in mood when I handed out the cards for our fellow artists to label and display their art for the auction.

The gloom of the dull clouds and pattering rain entered the room as if I'd forgotten to close the door to the patio, until someone finally spoke up and said, "Is it ok if I don't put my art up for auction?" 

I blinked, surprised they'd even asked and said, "Babe, I'm not going to force you to give away your art. If you want to keep it, then do?"

Suddenly, everyone was speaking up:

"I don't think I'll do the auction." 

"I'll keep my art."

"I'm too attached to let anyone else have this."

Ultimately, all of our artists, quite sweetly, felt very connected to the art they made. And everyone who made their art that day left with the piece they created. 

So I told Jessie this story (with less forethought and narrative devices), and we ended up here.

Lo and behold, the aforementioned prompt: "I feel like there's something to be said here about the undervalue of creation/creativity but the way it still manages to make people feel."

Well, Jessie, I absolutely agree. 

There is something to be said here: "jessie is my hottest friend." kidding, (it's true though). 

In a world where art is mass produced, and AI is threatening the arts and creativity, the narrative around creating art is murky at best. Our society chronically undervalues creating. We consume so much media at any given moment that we forget why we were drawn to certain pieces in the first place. People who spend their livelihoods creating art in some manner know best how hard it is to really create something and how meaningful it can be.

Consider how the average person reacts to art in modern art museums. I've visited plenty in my life and yet without fail, there is always someone there saying things like "It's so simple that I could do that/ Why is this art/ This is so stupid."

Sure, art can be simple, but did you do it? Did you make it? No. So maybe that wasn't the point?

When Jessie and I were in London, we went to the Tate Modern. 

There was this list in the exhibit that urged museum goers to start thinking about the art.

We loved that it was there – Jessie and I spent our time in that exhibit asking each other those questions. Not only did I feel like I connected with the art, but I connected with my friend. 

Art always has and always will be about connection. Experts can sit there and debate technique and meaning, but just looking at a piece of art gives you a feeling. Whether that feeling makes you cry or laugh or think, "This is stupid," your connection to the piece has accomplished something. That is what draws us to art. That is why creation has value. 

We crave connection, we lack connection, and art creates connection. 

A connection between the artist and the art, between the art and the person it's shared with.

To me, it's always been easy to give away my art. 

When I first gave away art, I was a perfectionist. If my work wasn't perfect in my eyes, I didn't want it. 

But in the eyes of my parents, or my closest friends, it is perfect, and their love for my art meant they loved me, and that healed a little piece of me I didn't know was broken. 

These days I'm not as much of a perfectionist (though, candidly, it creeps in sometimes), and I enjoy giving my art away to friends because it brings both them and me joy. And we could all use more of that in our lives. I've spent so long creating and honing these skills that the connection of me to the art becomes less important than the connection a friend feels toward it. Maybe they'll keep it forever, or maybe it ends up in a recycling bin during a future spring cleaning, but in that moment, we experience a feeling together, and that's what matters.

Like All Things by Nataly Zigdon
A series of self published journals by a local San Francisco writer about life, love, and art. 

"I don't know what it is about this city that makes a person so driven to create, but I can't help but let it be all I can see when I shut my eyes. I don't know if it is the art that is spoken about in every conversation or the art that is spoken to you on every street corner, but it has an alluring pull that makes it all feel so softly tenacious, like it is the only thing that holds you together on even the foggiest of days."