PJ Harvey - Man-Sized: youtube.com/watch?v=E8ZE6XK89YA
"Artistic creation is by definition a denial of death. Therefore it is optimistic, even if in an ultimate sense the artist is tragic. And so there can never be optimistic artists and pessimistic artists."
There is a school of thought which dictates that one must feel pain, go through trials in order to create great art; one should know the deepest depths of human emotion before one can even venture to breach the skin. This isn't untrue. For joy only exists as to oppose misery. But it's not a necessity.
My favorite artist right now is Shary Boyle. I went to see her exhibition lately and it almost brought me to tears. Her work embodies something that attracts me most, is something akin to "terrible beauty." It approaches the horrific or repulsive but is done in a way that is compelling full of beauty. You can see this technique used strongly in the Brothers Grimm fairy tales (to which I've been indebted), the blood and death red with wonder. And I heard Shary Boyle lecture lately and she talked of her methods which are mostly practical. It's refreshing to hear an artist talk about being in the studio, searching out teachers of her particular art forms, all while this great moaning body of work looms behind her. She not once spoke of misery or ecstasy. Never did she speak of struggle. It was her work.
Not to say those tragedies and joys didn't necessarily play into her work, but their importance was downplayed to nil.
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