There is a sacred obligation for the artist to create. A beckoning deep within them to make freely, in utter honesty. A longing to uncover the deep subterranean fears, thoughts, desires, dreams, and things of note they experience. This we as artists should do free from that great engine and demon of Western culture; that basic question we can avoid as easily as the air in our lungs as we're so intertwined with it: how will this be profitable? How does the artist answer this question? That enigma ground my creative soar to a screeching halt and plummet. What's the endgame? That is a question birthed from the dark corner of my western mind: how will this be profitable?
Profitability here I speak of is not just monetary justification for expense of the effort. I'm also thinking about the value it brings to an audience. In my mind, that's where the creative process enters the temple of the sacred. That mysterious communing with others in genuine heart to heart communication. I'm convinced the artist must some how perform a ritual of sacrifice before he can honestly perform that sacred act of conversing and making. I've tried to create in haste, cramming it in over a lunch break, or late at night so I don't interrupt the natural flow of life with little people running about under foot. And the art suffers. The artist suffers! And the audience suffers from lack of value to enjoy. This is me taking what is precious and full of potential and degrading it to the disappointing and commonplace! Deciding this work is of not much value before any intentional action is taken. No the artist must seek to "protect that place he creates from" —Dave Kopp. That idea is brilliant, and taps this reality of the sacredness I'm seeing take form before my mind. I'm thinking this process of preparation for the act of making is a kind of purging of the mind, a cleansing. Settling down to intentionality, achieving an undivided attention. Only in that context, is an artist prepared to dive into the rich waterfall of creative expressions.
A work of art's first fruits are to be offered as a sacrifice. First to the One who gave it, secondly as a service to the audience, and third as a gift echoing back to the Artist through the first two. Art is that rendering of service to an audience which, when done rightly, is an act of love. The presentation and even the creation should be intimate communion with another soul feasting over an object of story worthy of that communion.
