The ultimate point of a piece for me is that it drives the next one. Does it open new doors? That's the success of a piece.
Interpretation
The success of a creative work lies in its ability to inspire future creations.
Twyla Tharp emphasizes that the true measure of success for an artistic piece is not just its immediate impact but its potential to inspire and lead to new ideas and works. A successful piece should act as a catalyst that opens up new possibilities and avenues for exploration in art and creativity.
In practice
During a discussion on a recent art exhibition, I shared this quote to illustrate how artists build upon each other's work.
Do I watch dancers as people? Yes, absolutely. Do I watch really good dancers for specifically who they are? Absolutely, because how they move best and how they look best is going to be most familiar to them, and not necessarily to me.
I am still pushing the edge of what my body can do.
No one is born with skill. It is developed through exercise, through repetition, through a blend of learning and reflection that's both painstaking and rewarding. And it takes time.
Without passion, all the skill in the world won't lift you above craft. Without skill, all the passion in the world will leave you eager but floundering. Combining the two is the essence of the creative life.
I grew up in a drive-in theater, from the time I was 8, working in a snack bar watching four features every week. It was silent theater in the sense that this was a drive-in, which meant that I often saw the films going with no sound. But I learned to tell stories through action.
Without passion, all the skill in the world won't lift you above craft.
A lot of children don't have a developed aesthetic. I did. I made early choices in life, even about cloth; I liked flannel and not polyester.
One of these poems I wrote after having been here only a month. The other, I wrote this morning. In the space between the two poems, I have found acres of grace
Reinforced concrete buildings are by nature skeletal buildings. No noodles nor armoured turrets. A construction of girders that carry the weight, and walls that carry no weight. That is to say, buildings consisting of skin and bones.
It is a symbol of Irish art. The cracked looking-glass of a servant.
Writing for other artists helped me figure out that magic you have to capture to make everyone connect with a song.
If a man comes to the door of poetry untouched by the madness of the Muses, believing that technique alone will make him a good poet, he and his sane compositions never reach perfection, but are utterly eclipsed by the performances of the inspired madman.
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