Where does this powerful desire to make art come from? I wish I could give my own brilliant answer. But I am still intrigued by the question and have been researching the solution off and on for some time. The two answers below, to me, offer some insights. The first one may be true enough but it is the second explanation that provides a substantial answer to this complex and universal question.
The first is given in one of the many Buddhist Mandelas, this one being the The Wheel of Life that revolves through six realms, each an aspect of human existence. We humans travel back and forth through them all while some of us spend more time in one or another until we can break free from desire and attain enlightenment. The Beast Realm is driven by basic survival instincts like sexuality and hunger. The Hell realm deals with states of rage and anxiety. The Hungry Ghost realm depicts our insatiable yearning for relief and fulfillment usually through addictions; as we are constantly seeking something outside ourselves that we hope will sooth us inside. The one that I noted as hopeful and speaks to the question of why make art, is The God Realm where we transcend our suffering through a sensual or aesthetic or religious experience. Not that this pastime of aesthetics (art making) will save us from our spiritual truth as this Realm is also tinged with loss, but I suppose temporary relief is better than nothing. The other two Realms I cannot recall but I am fairly certain they are just as gruesome as the others.
So we can say that we make art to try to heal our selves so we may relieve our suffering.
The other answer as to why we make art and frankly much more satisfying to me is to be found in one of my favorite books on art, The Collected Writings of Robert Motherwell. I first read this book in 1996 and have re read many articles in it since. Motherwell gave a talk in 1963 when he was invited to participate in “The Creative Use of the Unconscious by the Artist and by the Psychotherapist” His talk was called“The Process of Painting”. In it he describes his studio/work habits and this section is rich and thought provoking. Yet what stood out specifically was when he speaks of “the intimacy of the marriage between the artist and his medium...” It is too long for me to retype here but well worth the read. I want to share the following section.
“Now, if a creative person in the arts is a person with an extraordinary capacity for love, who for whatever reason, say because of his early experience with his mother, as an example, cannot direct his love toward another person in full strength, but who nevertheless, must love, he therefore directs his love toward the other thing in human existence as rich, sensitive, supple and complicated as human beings themselves; that is to say toward an artistic medium, which is not an inert object, of conversely, a set of rules for composition, but a living collaboration, which not only reflects every nuance of ones being, but which, in the moments in which one is lost, comes to one’s aid; not arbitrarily and capriciously but seriously, accurately, concretely with you as when a canvas says to you: this empty space in me needs to be pinker; or a shape says: I want to be larger and more expansive; or the format says: the conception is too large or too small for me, all out of scale; or stripe says; gouge me more, you are too polite and elegant; or a gray says; a bit more blue, my present tone is uncomfortable and does not fit with what surrounds me.”
I found Robert Motherwells narrative to be very touching; that love and the experience of empathy between the artist and the artist’s medium to be a reason to make art felt so respectful, even humbling. The idea that the art itself has its own “life” and can and will flourish without the artist continually imposing one’s will upon it is a leap of faith I had never before considered. Beautiful.
Denise Carson Wilde Nov.20. 2012