Creative Block - Esther
Are you usually a creative person? Are you finding it difficult to be creative or even constructive during lockdown? As the lockdown measures ease & are gradually lifted here, it’s easy to get sucked into a type of inertia you’re unfamiliar with. Like me, you might be anxious about going back to work, perhaps the weeks of lost routine have taken their toll. Don’t worry. It’s normal. At any time, creative block can happen to the best of all kinds of artists.
For example, despite having pages & pages of ideas for this art blog, this week I have found myself feeling inspired by none of them & staring at an empty computer screen. The clock ticks away & five minutes becomes half an hour & still nothing is done. As a visual artist, for me block happens differently. It’s rarely some catastrophic world-altering event that causes it, but more personal difficulties or periods of being extremely busy at the day job or being worried. Here I’m in good company. Monet, Blake, Hepworth & Pollock are all known to have had some form of block in their careers, but they seem to have done alright in the end.
Sometimes, the act of just doing the thing, doodling for artists, scribbling random words for writers, improvising for musicians can unlock something they weren’t expecting. Thus it was for today’s blog entry. I was stuck, blocked, frustrated, caught in a immovable state of inactivity until I began typing this. I loosened up &…
…opted to look for various meanings of “block.”
Warning: links to the word “block” may be tenuous & tacky.
Block of colour - “blocks” in art are not what I’m usually interested in, so this entry wouldn’t have happened without the block of being unable to write. Block in art suggests colour, one or more masses of flat, uninterrupted colours used in a perhaps abstract way. Piet Mondrian is surely everyone’s go-to guy for colour blocks. Taking Cubism (& perhaps abstraction) to its logical conclusion: the domination of line over form, as seen in Composition II in Red, Blue & Yellow (1929).
Block of time – one of the most well-recognised of all “time” pictures is Salvador Dalí’s Persistence of Memory (1931). Decay represented by the ants, closed eyes, a dream-like landscape, many of his most used symbols are present & the painting is of course a Surrealist masterpiece. The whole piece is anti-reality. Not only is he tinkering with time, Dalí is examining the concepts of space & matter.
Block of flats (apartment block) – for Windows in the West (1993), Avril Paton echoes every voyeuristic film & TV programme you’ve ever seen but centres the “action” in Glasgow. The image is instantly recognisable to anyone that has spent time in Glasgow in winter, with the sandstone tenement transformed by the stormy light. But wherever you spend your winters, the scene is universal, with people going about their day, sheltering from the elements & living their lives. It even works during lockdown.
Head on the block - from that cosy vignette, we travel across the sea to revolutionary France where Louis XVI has lost his head. Heinrich Sieveking’s Hinrichtung Ludwig des XVI (1793) engraving shows the aftermath of the execution. The artist denied being gratified the king had been put to death despite the wielding of the king’s head in this work having a decidedly gratuitous air. There was some debate at the time as to how insurgent Sieveking’s own values were, but nevertheless he publicly denounced the methods of the revolution…
Around the block – Caroline Dunn’s A Walk Around the Block is a gentle take on the phrase, not in an urban setting, but a mixed media stroll in a countryside landscape. Here she applies various treatments to silk to depict a walk where she circles back to her own front door.
A chip off the old block – it’s unlikely that’s the description any of us would give the boy from The Return of the Prodigal Son (1619) depicted here by Guercino, but if father & son were so alike, it might explain dad’s unfair & ridiculous behaviour. No, it’s not my favourite parable & the errant son was a brat. There. I’ve said it.
Go on the block – meaning to sell or auction: Eyre Crowe’s Slaves Waiting for Sale: Richmond, Virginia (1861) depicts the harrowing auctioning of human beings. His disgust at the slave trade is evident in his sympathetic & expressive rendering of the figures & faces of those being sold. This painting was originally shown in London & his sketching almost led Crowe himself to being thrown out of the auction room for being a suspected abolitionist.
Stumbling block – for centuries, the stumbling block of being female in the world of art has been present. Louise-Catherine Breslau was one of the first women artists to be given France’s Legion of Honor. Although her reputation grew during her lifetime & she was able to make a career, her discipline & talents were greater than the credit given after her death. Throughout history, opportunities were rarely given to women in the field & it was unusual for unmarried women to make a living from their art as she did. Whatever might be happening in Portrait des Amis (1881) the women have the air of the thwarted & dissatisfied & the dog doesn’t look too happy either.
Knock one’s block off – not to emphasise the dual Scottish stereotypes of drunkenness & overall innate aggression, John Pettie’s Tussle for the Keg (1868) does a fine job of illustrating this particular form of “block.” Then again, the image can be also be interpreted as the ubiquitous conflict between a smuggler & the excise officer, representatives of rich versus poor. Yet another interpretation is that of a fight between Highlander & Lowlander. It goes on, but one way or another drink is involved. It’s fair to say, it’s complicated. Once lockdown is finally lifted this reflection on alcohol-induced hostility can be viewed once more here at Aberdeen Art Gallery.
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