On being an artist: Art is a lifestyle not just an activity.

From http://www.luminous-landscape.com/columns/aesthetics10.shtml

"Art is a lifestyle not just an activity. One's art and one's life are eventually inseparable. One cannot be an artist without living a lifestyle which is conducive to being an artist:

Being an artist means having a lifestyle that makes creativity and art part of your everyday life

One cannot be creative 8 hrs a day, from 9 to 5. Similarly one cannot schedule "creative time" say from 4 to 5 p.m. every Thursday. While you can certainly write this down in your planner, or in your PDA, whether you will feel inspired on that particular day at that specific time remains to be seen.

Fact is, the muses visit whenever they please and not necessarily during "business hours." It is therefore very difficult to schedule creative time the way one would schedule a business appointment. Certainly, it can be done. But there are no guarantees that you will feel creative during that time. To guarantee success in your creative endeavors you have to be aware of your creative impulses and design a schedule that works around them, not a schedule that demands that you be creative from 3 to 4 then do paperwork from 4 to 5 and so on.

Being an artist therefore means implementing a lifestyle that favors creativity, impulsion and freedom. Because this may conflict with other activities being an artist means learning how to organize your life so that you can handle these potential conflicts successfully. "

Meditate on this. Do you agree with this or not? In what ways do you feel your life is dedicated to/inseparable from your art? In what way do you make space in your life to nurture your inner (or outer) artist? Is it class and rehearsals only, or do you live what you create in other capacities? Good questions...

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