This is a probably futile attempt to organise my thoughts regarding all the creative ideas and concepts which make an impact upon me. How to structure what is thought or done or discarded should, in effect, when collected explain a great many of the complex narratives which in turn reveal the creative life of the individual. As a writer and artist whose initial drive is directed towards recording on paper and preserving for posterity (really ? he asks himself). In fact the intimate artistic history of impulse, impetus and imposition would definitely seem to make the base foundation of the examined life that of the Journal. Whether that can successfully record both stream of consciousness and external stimuli is a cunning plan born out of the mind of a collector and a creator.
How many of us lie awake at night with our brains fizzing with world-shatteringly brilliant dreams and need to write it down if only to grab some semblance of peace and quiet. Sometimes the idea is fine, sometimes it is rubbish but other schemes and schedules can easily develop out of this miasma of half-considered and semi-understood desires. If I had a copy of every doodle I had ever made or every quotation that ever attracted my attention, every book read and painting admired, every garden planned or rearranged would it help the process of creating art. I tend to regard every artistic or creative endeavour as being in some way linked. I like to keep archives of photographs that carry meaning. Imagery from magazines that arrests my attention. The thousands of volumes in my library that serve as a repository of reference material. I hoard pebbles, rocks, pieces of driftwood; all with colours and textures that for some reason have found a place in which to rest. The link between these collections and the creation of new art may possibly be argued for and be supportable (even if not immediately self evident) but the average person on the street who demands a "use" for an item might well be baffled.
The struggle towards creativity however has little to do with the concept of "average" and as in so many struggles what is most obvious is the confusion. It is in order to access the individual strands that combine intellectually, psychically, spiritually and even physically to create an artistic anything that I try to anatomize the elements of my own individuality. Yes it is self-absorbed but it looks both ways inwards and outwards. I am looking for connectivity between areas of interest and searching for the alliances between images collected and concepts explored. It is both academic and emotional moving between differing disciplines and entering into the shadows of areas not so seriously studied. Out of this navel-gazing and creative-stalking of myself I hope and aim to find out more about who I am and what I can do. If it reflects other elements of the environment that has designed me then so be it but this is a personal pilgrimage with all the overtones which that term can carry. To find the crux of creativity can bring both angst and absolution. To discover an intimacy of identity can forge either integration or isolation. To listen to the voices in your head and by mapping those personal perspectives you may begin to find a series of different directions in which to travel. The process is in the Journey.
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