Writing, Chewing Gum and Bliss

Last week a question was posed on a popular artblog “Why is it so many bloggers write as if they're chewing gum?” Frankly, at the time, I was too busy painting to compose an intelligent answer to the query. However, in the interim, I’ve considered the question and arrived at an answer dissimilar to that held by the art critic who initially asked the question.

It became evident to me that the critical issue is essentially a struggle between the word and the image. George Orwell, in his essay “Politics and the English Language”, warned us that if a writer “is not seeing a mental image of the objects he is naming…he is not really thinking.”

While the artist attempts to communicate one’s inner vision through the choice and rendering of materials, the writer is forced to use the medium of language. Logos—“meaning” can be derived from both experiences but will be expressed differently because of the media chosen.

Consequently, words, images and logos often enter into battlefields such as artblogs, websites, and even the production of artist’s statements. While marketing gurus encourage artists to take the plunge into the blogging experience, citing the importance of increased exposure, there is no consideration of the negative impact of poorly constructed or maintained presentations when this suggestion is tendered.

One of the other problems facing artists when considering blogging is the very real consideration of how one spends one’s creative time. Does one write or does one focus on one’s principle artistic endeavor?

Perhaps we’d do well to follow Joseph Campbell’s advice,”…. if you do follow your bliss you put yourself on a kind of track that has been there all the while, waiting for you, and the life that you ought to be living is the one you are living. When you can see that, you begin to meet people who are in your field of bliss, and they open doors to you. I say, follow your bliss and don't be afraid, and doors will open where you didn't know they were going to be."