February 3, 02 Meeting

Freestyle Writing

At today's  meeting we started off with a 12 minute freestyle writing  on a topic that Joan picked out. Who or what has been an inspiration for your life? (see below for the full writings) Joan was inspired by physical activity, specifically dance and running, I by a friend with whom I had traveled, Ida by a friend, Gary by a friend that encouraged him to do a drawing, Sandra had different attitudes at different ages and Harry by encouragement from people.

Drawing the feeling

For the main activity we experimented with an activity from the book, Drawing on the Artist Within, by Betty Edwards. The idea is to write down different emotions on a piece of paper. You then try to remember a time when you felt this emotion and let the feeling move down your arm into your hand and onto the paper. You are not to use symbols or characters. The ideas is to get the feeling transferred to a pencil line on the paper. In her book, Betty compares the drawings people did to works of fine art to show that this is the approach they used to convey feelings. We did the activity to see what we could learn about inspiration by comparing the drawings.

We picked 4 topics; inspiration, insight, energy, and one each of us picked one of our own.  Do you have any insights from these drawings?  I think we need a bigger number of samples to get better insights. Maybe 50 or so drawings of inspiration would be good to have.

Edwin	Joan	Ida	Gary	Harry
Inspiration
Insight
Energy
Enthusiasm	Direction	Sig??	Clarity	Connection

Drawings with comments.

Inspiration

remembered a project book, ideas were popping, felt a harmony in what I was doing, a flow and joy, it was of short duration, a couple of days	the feeling portrayed is me, of reaching for that ultimate experience - going to new heights by riding the wave of energy, also, included at the last moment was some insight and direction	where else, but from the primordial cesspool of life	a feeling of illumination like the sun shinning on me in winter when it is welcome	all the possibilities - think of blue  - I could read of it, compose it, tell the story, dance it.
Edwin	Joan	Ida	Gary	Harry

Insight

a one quick burst of energy, a small burst deep in my mind	the feeling is one of a co-member mentioned the aha - first it was in the form of a triangle, then on second thought - other shapes developed kernels of ideas.	from the many, from the defused, from the chaos to one point	a feeling of sinking through the surface into the depts. I feel listening and patience connected with this.	I may suddenly have a glimmer or spark of understanding about this puzzling _____.
Edwin	Joan	Ida	Gary	Harry

Energy

a heavy push quality to it. I get obsessive	an obvious feeling of going everywhere full of movement	a burst back into chaos	A bad subject for me today - it looks murky and jagged.	comes into my body or comes over me (or others) and MUST BE EXPRESSED physically.
Edwin	Joan	Ida	Gary	Harry

Others

Enthusiasm; ongoing, flowing, energetic, bursts of lines shooting out.	Direction - the feeling of direction to me is going in a linear exploration.	sig??: that's the cycle, that's the simple reality of it all	Clarity:  has a feeling of immediacy and certainty. A feeling of connection with what is REAL.	Connection: conveying the idea of connection.
Edwin	Joan	Ida	Gary	Harry

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Who or what has been an inspiration for your life?

Sandra

Edwin - My friend Harold inspired me in some ways. In general I can't think of a lot of people that have been a Muse to me. Harold is a friend I met while traveling around the world. We picket apples together in Hood River, traveled into the highlands of the Philippines, India and the mountains of Kashmir, Europe and still other places.

Before I took off traveling, a lot of my friends had said they wanted to travel as well. However, when the time came to actually go, no-one went. Harold was someone that had the same seeker and quester view of life as I. So we traveled a bunch together. What inspired me was the energy of talking about life and people which we did. So this is one person that inspired me. He was always looking at life and exploring. He finally did get married, had kids and did the normal life, so he is no longer an inspiration in that way. I am still inspired by the questing of the past.

Who else is a Muse? I'd say relationships I've had have been Muses. I see the picture of Rodin's, the Poet and the Muse. The poet leans back against the naked Muse, he has a pencil and paper in his hand and you can see him pondering. In the same way, love relationships inspire. I have not taken the step of turning this inspiration into a form - like Rodin's Poet. That's something I'd like to do.

Ah, but I heard in a documentary about Picasso, they said, he was inspired by everyone he met. Now there's an idea. Everyone is the Muse, I haven't reached that point however.

Ida - Unquestionably,  Hamilton has been an inspiration to me. He is disciplined, persistent, steadfast in his mission. His generosity of spirit is unequalled in anything I have experienced. His dept and breath of knowledge, his insight to life and his humanness is only surpassed by the dept of his convictions.  (He b??) undogged as he surrenders to the moment of life so that others around him bear witness as (his talie your????) life's challenges with courage and humility. His vulnerability an deep kindness completes a stunning figure of a man.

Joan - Giving energy to my life has been a day to day event I never know what might come up to lead my thoughts and ideas down a new pathway, a novel view or having me ponder how wonderful a certain possibility might be for a new direction. A force that  has been very significant in my life and has given  me energy even in the most difficult of times is to be able to move. I often think how fortunate I am to have that gift. Nothing can really be as paralyzing to me as the fear of not having that capacity.  Then I think of individuals that can have full, rich lives without that precious gift and they inspire me to new heights.

My association with movement started at the ballet bar at the age of four. What seems strange now is that the initial first experience was laced with fear. I was a tiny  four year old, small for my age and the ballet Maser was this looming figure standing there with a baton (stick). He spoke with a different sound to my four year old ears - someone who had come from a far away place. He would walk around and tap people with the stick. I can not remember if he tapped me - but I remember not wanting him to come near me. Standing with fear - maybe enduring some discomfort eventually gave way to pleasure and eventually passion.

Harry - (where is his? couldn't find it)

Sandra - (she will send via email)

Gary - I am currently exploring the roots of my inspiration in an attempt to reconnect with what my art was for me as a child. I can remember thinking that the greatest thing in the world was a pencil, because it was a doorway to my imagination. I used to find my imagination endlessly entertaining, and I would pick up a pencil and just start drawing whatever came into my mind and watch it unfold. As an adult, I felt I had largely lost this spontaneity.
I was talking about this to a new friend, and she challenged me to bring her a pencil drawing at our next meeting. I did this, encountering some difficulty with my inner critic, but succeeding nonetheless. The result was new inspiration, connecting my old spontaneous relationship with the pencil and my lifelong fascination with dreams. In this situation, my friend also acted as muse, because I did the drawing at her suggestion, knowing I would have been less likely to overcome my resistance on my own. Whatever gets you started is a good thing, in my estimate, because once started, there is momentum to continue. Here is the drawing I did, followed by the text of the dream, and a bit of interpretation:


 
The dream of 1/19/02: "A Murder Has Been Discovered."

I hike into the wild, steep mountains to the west with a group of men at night, by moonlight. The
mountains are vast and rugged. We are enjoying the wonders of the place when one man exclaims he
has found a body! We all hasten to have a look, and I can only stand a brief glance at the sight. It is
the pale, cold body of a woman, completely drained of blood, life & color, looking almost like a marble
statue in the moonlight. It is completely severed at the waist, and the arms and legs are missing. I am
stricken with profound grief and shock and turn away, saying we must go home and report the
murder.

As we turn back, the path gets more dangerous. It is as if we hadn't noticed the danger on the way
out, but just getting back to the main trail from the precipitous site of the murder is pretty scary.
Heading back toward the town in the valley to the east, I meet a man who is just heading out in the
direction from which we are returning. He extends a hearty greeting and is obviously in the mood for
a great solo hike. I warn him not to go farther, saying a murder has been discovered, and urge him to
turn back.

Interpretation:

The corpse is that of my art. I used to do a lot of beautiful figurative watercolors of women. I was trying to live my eros through my art, and did some good work, but failed to integrate it into my life and relationships. My marriage ended in divorce. Eventually, I fell into a dysfunctional relationship with a model, and stopped painting. The dream picks up the theme of the figure at the present point in my life where I am trying to find new inspiration in my art and also trying to find a real, lasting love with a primary partner. The feeling of paralyzing grief is what I feel about what happened. It is what I need to integrate to continue, yet I am telling the hiker not to go that direction. Part of me doesn't want to see that corpse and feel that grief. The victim has no arms or legs, thus cannot connect or move. Also the head & heart are connected, because the head is not cut off, but they are disconnected from the genitals. I have been working to heal and reconnect these areas. In the upper right is my critic, who seems to be losing his footing. So much the better!