Very interesting Juan... or rather, MICELI.SYSTEM. I believe the artwork does swallow us everytime we allow it to. The problem is that we very rarely do (sometimes we hold back, afraid of the abandonment) and we end up with the feeling you describe: of being separate from the creation. I also think the good stuff we manage to pull off every once in a while is the stuff where there is a feeling of being one with the work - when it absorbs you and you reach at-one-ment. Then the upgrade you mention happens. I completely agree with you. look forward to seeing how this conversations evolves. josé

answering, Jose.
the sense I have is totally brand new, as if I had melted a frontier which existed between me and my artwork.
It was a little bit frightening at the begining but when I finally let myself go, it was great: no boundaries anymore.

so it is very interesting to have your feedback...
so, tell me more about your rising!
cheers

Juan,
It seems to me that the real question or concern here is connection. And the way you describe your process/evolution points to the idea that you are becoming more closely connected to your work.

And that has to be a good thing.

There's a strong tradition of artists taking on different identities, personae, personalities, etc. Someone like Cindy Sherman comes to mind who has made a career of taking on radically different identities in her work. Marcel Duchamp used to dress up as a woman and call himself Rrose Selavy. It's possible to make your self (selves) very much a part of your work.

It would be interesting to see how many different identities you can develop and allow them to disagree, argue, debate, etc. and to create very different kinds of art.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rrose_S%C3%A9lavy

Craig

Precisely Craig, very good point.

When you completely get involved in the process you become aware that there are no boundaries to your 'self'... to that thing you clung to and identified as being 'you'. There is no unified you, there is no unified 'style' of an artist, or if this emerges it is only in hindsight. As artists we have the privelege of discovering other aspects and potentiallities within ourselves which are not commonly accepted [most people stick to an 'identity' they construct for themselves and are happy to remain there]... we get to explore all the 'beings' that live within us and work to give them a voice, like you pointed out in your example. Have you heard of the portuguese poet and writer Fernando Pessoa? He wrote under at least 4 famous heteronyms or alter egos... four completely different identities, each with their own peculiar styles, themes and aspirations:

http://portugal.poetryinternationalweb.org/piw_cms/cms/cms_module/index....

josé

Juan,

Just found this by Fernando Pessoa whom I wrote Craig about, I think it has something to say about what we're discussing here:

The Keeper of Sheep II

My gaze is clear like a sunflower.
It is my custom to walk the roads
Looking right and left
And sometimes looking behind me,
And what I see at each moment
Is what I never saw before,
And I’m very good at noticing things.
I’m capable of feeling the same wonder
A newborn child would feel
If he noticed that he’d really and truly been born.
I feel at each moment that I’ve just been born
Into a completely new world…

http://portugal.poetryinternationalweb.org/piw_cms/cms/cms_module/index....

josé

yes, this sensation is definetely related to connection as if my art pieces are unraveling new parts of myself (new hidden personas?). It is great to acknowledge how the feedback of an unknown person can put some light in our questions, thoughts and doubts.

yesterday I ve written a note that really has to do with this issue, if you feel like it I invite you to read it (same for Jose). the name is rise of miceli.system: the death of miceli...

and in some way I feel I have died in an strange manner... and then something new has risen / born

I really appreciate your examples, they are most enlightening for me.
cheers

first of all, thanxs for the Keeper of Sheeps II
a great poem and very close to the feelings I am experiencing right now... are u a seerer!? just joking, off course

And yes, definetely we have a privelege as we are able to enjoy the different identities within ourselves. And I aint talking about anything related to madness or esquizofrenia, I think it is crystal clear the way you put it:

"we get to explore all the 'beings' that live within us and work to give them a voice, like you pointed out in your example."

I have developed brand new identities like miceli.system. I have to say I feel them like something very natural and healthy since it empower my creative process. It would be great to know 'bout yours

I think I understand what you all are talking about but I experience it a little differently, maybe.
When I paint I am so involved that 6 hours will pass in about 20 minutes. Then I sort of pull back out of it. A few times I have felt surprised at the work in front of me because it looks different when I am not so focussed in it. Sometimes when I look at a painting later I realise that I can't remember the feeling of making it anymore, of the motivation for the choices I made during the process, because it was so of that moment. So I can never make that painting again or even remember why I made it in the first place. That makes the painting feel a bit of a stranger to me. It has a piece of me in it that I can't know any more.

after reading you I think that in that momentso you yourself melt with your art, then you are art

cheers

Julie, i think that this feeling of absorption you mention is a sign that we are tapping-in to that centre from where creativity spurts... it's as if there were a membrane or a looking glass and we move beyond it to fetch what we know is on the other side. the feeling of distance or of loss with the connection of self (or what we are acustomed to identify as our self) is merely due to what i would call a limitation of our 'machine' and the weak knowledge we have of its workings. the more we learn to remain awake on those trips - damn hard task, and sometimes even limiting of what we bring back on to the canvas in the first attempts - the more we become aware of how the process unfolds and the sense of connection with what we found [and create with what we found] grows and becomes a part of us we readily accept - at-one-ment. It took me perhaps some 20 years to start to 'see' the process this way... but then, perhaps, I'm only a short step from the looney-bin and all that i've just said is simply madness. In any case, that is our job, to go beyond the looking glass to get what we sense lies beyond it and bring it back to create things that will guide others safely beyond... and back again. Then it becomes art, and we are art.

Jose -

I like the idea of a membrane - a transparent layer or several layers through which we are able to travel - puncture - connect. Furthermore, membrane has biological connotations - so it points us in the direction of some kind of system that we are maybe connecting to individually or separately.

System - Juan mentioned system in the first post.

I don't think any of what you have written is madness. As a matter of fact, I think this is all extremely rational thinking. It seems to me - that too often we (as artists) fall prey to a kind of stereotyping by others that places us in some kind of fringe group. Whereas - madness - real madness is something that can more readily occur when one is trying to determine whether or not to buy the Pampers Size 5 60 pack or the Luvs Size 5 70 pack in the grocery store.

You mentioned that it took you some time to 'see' the process this way. How were you seeing it before? Just curious.

Craig

Craig,

I'm currently on the move right now... sending home and studio to Japan and logging in from internet cafés along the way. as soon as all the dust has settled down i'll be able to think and right more clearly (dislike writing from a café, interesting athmosphere but hard to focus on certain things). I'll stay in touch though. I agree with the statement that madness is the dilema between the pampers and the luvs size 5...

i don't know if i was seeing anything before, but i'll go deeper into that as soon as i'm settled and have my own internet connection up and running in japan.

all the best to all of you's here. Juan, this is turning into a really interesting debate/trip!

josé

I used to view my artpieces as something completely separated of myself, as objects... But since my last exhitbit in march I have started to feel my art as something different, maybe "organic" is the word but I dont quite like it.
the true feeling is that right now I feel one with my production, even as if my artpieces (the old, the new and the upcoming ones) were running trough my vains.
so that is why I have started this question "is the artist art?"
because I think of artists as sytems, living ones, with all the information of their production in thair dna (???) or soul or whatever it is that ignites the flame.
And YES, I totally agree... madness is at the grocery still deciding, madness is travelling everyday to the same place by metro, madness is believeng artist are mad, madness is avoid the opportunity of dying to normal life

cheers

That it is up to the artist I think... personally I do not treat myself as an art object but others do... well, sometimes I do

Nice one, I like Pessoa, I got to know him through Saramago though, I like the idea of multiple personalities, or akas, I do that myself..

Oh! I am sorry, I do not want to be rude but is like you are talking of a religious/ shamanic process, it feels weird to me, like too pretentious. I have myself more the approach of an art worker/creative.I think art is a human manipulation of things/elements to create something new and special, for the sake of it or in order to communicate, shock, enlighten, embellish...though I may consider as art things/situations/actions that other humans would not and vice-versa...

Maria, it has nothing to do with religion / chamanic process. I am just saying that right one I feel myself one with my artwork and that I like to play the avatars / akas game : )

Yep, we all take on different approaches towards the artwork, I try to detach myself from my work, I may not like the idea that it is all about me. But i like the idea of having different avatars or akas, so I can let myself go in them. By now i have a bit of a conflict within myself, one aka is a big ego, pushy and self centered , another wants to be the humble craft worker, I tried to combine both but sometimes I think i am more keeping them on hold, repressing them so we do not explode or one kills another... ups, do not take me seriously, it is not that bad...

This is a very interesting subject.
Lately Iv been giving thought into taking it rather a step farther then just extending the concept of art to the artist, but rather, isnt life in and of itself art? Is there really any difference between art and the human experiance itself?

Interesting what you've said there Grace. I share the same view - Life itself is art, it is the unfolding of creation in increasingly complex patterns as it distances itself from the original creative spark of the Big Bang. Most of us don't get the picture because we're too entangled in its unfolding, identifying with it. I think that a part of what we do as artists has to do do with the ability to distance ourselves critically from life, every so often, to point at the beauty of the whole process. And in a way, when we manage that we sort of ride alongside the wave, watching it as it moves and picking up bits and pieces to put in our work. I don't think it has necessarily anything to do with an altruistic purpose of sharing what we see (or the presumption that what we see is the Truth) it's just the realisation of something we are capable of doing, and the work we extract from this process of distancing and observing is just the way we know best to express what we've seen and felt.