Anytime I go into a classroom to talk about zines, there are inevitably students who tell me, I am not creative. I answer them the same way I answer anyone who states they are not creative---You are creative because we are all inherently creative. The truth is, creativity is your birthright but so many folx go through their lives thinking that are not worthy or capable of creative expression. This untapped well of soulful living is available to all of us. We just have to admit we are thirsty.
Most people confuse creativity and talent. They are not the same thing. Talent takes dedication and practice over a long span of time. Creativity is all around us all the time. Trees shed and sprout new leaves, birds lay eggs and caterpillars turn into butterflies. Creativity at its core is to sustain life just as we all need creativity in order to think outside the box, make meaning of life's intricate and often conflicting textures, and bring something new into the world.
Creativity is not the end product or result but rather the process. It is playful exploration that is often messy and beautiful and sometimes painful but it almost always leads us to new ways of thinking and being.
If you are still hesitant to admit that you are creative, I invite you to:
You are a creative being & capitalism is bullshit
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Mini-zine I made about creativity. The second page (or interior of the zine folds out into a poster).
Just print double-sided.
The Artist's Way Toolkit
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Experience the essential Artist's Way philosophy in this practical, accessible collection of tools from "the Queen of Change" (New York Times) author Julia Cameron. Dive into the genius behind The Artist's Way with exclusive, never-before-published Q&A's, instruction manuals, and an Artist's Way glossary. In this streamlined edition, Julia Cameron lays out the essential foundation of her Artist's Way philosophy for anyone looking to get to the heart of her practice and begin immediately applying it to their own creative processes. Distilling the Artist's Way philosophy into a precise and accessible collection of ready-to-use tools, The Artist's Way Toolkit is the perfect entry point for aspiring artists looking to hone their craft and reinvigorate their creativity. For those new to the Artist's Way or for those who have been following it for years, The Artist's Way Toolkit offers refreshed and updated insight into Julia's creative program that has already inspired more than five million readers.
Imaginary Power, Real Horizons
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Political theorist and philosopher Richard Gilman-Opalsky's Imaginary Power, Real Horizons is a tribute to the imagination and to its necessity for liberatory struggle. ''Impractical' is the name given to anyone who imagines something radically other than what exists,' he writes. However, many things-such as the abolition of slavery-were dismissed as impractical before they came to be. In a warm, plainspoken manner, these essays chart the affects of creativity and utopianism through topics as varied as the cyclical nature of popular movements; the international history of May Day; the experience of teaching political theory and Marxism in contemporary China; and the revolutionary aspirations of Free Jazz. The human imagination is a real, world-creating power, and those who would declare otherwise have a poor understanding of history.
Your Brain on Art
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NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * A life-altering journey through the science of neuroaesthetics, which offers proof for how our brains and bodies transform when we participate in the arts--and how this knowledge can improve our health, enable us to flourish, and build stronger communities. "This book blew my mind!"--Angela Duckworth, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Grit A BLOOMBERG BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR * Finalist for the Inc. Non-Obvious Book Award and the Porchlight Business Book Award What is art? Many of us think of the arts as entertainment--a luxury of some kind. In Your Brain on Art, authors Susan Magsamen and Ivy Ross show how activities from painting and dancing to expressive writing, architecture, and more are essential to our lives. We're on the verge of a cultural shift in which the arts can deliver potent, accessible, and proven solutions for the well-being of everyone. Magsamen and Ross offer compelling research that shows how engaging in an art project for as little as forty-five minutes reduces the stress hormone cortisol, no matter your skill level, and just one art experience per month can extend your life by ten years. They expand our understanding of how playing music builds cognitive skills and enhances learning; the vibrations of a tuning fork create sound waves to counteract stress; virtual reality can provide cutting-edge therapeutic benefit; and interactive exhibits dissolve the boundaries between art and viewers, engaging all of our senses and strengthening memory. Doctors have even been prescribing museum visits to address loneliness, dementia, and many other physical and mental health concerns. Your Brain on Art is a portal into this new understanding about how the arts and aesthetics can help us transform traditional medicine, build healthier communities, and mend an aching planet. Featuring conversations with artists such as David Byrne, Renée Fleming, and evolutionary biologist E. O. Wilson, Your Brain on Art is an authoritative guide to neuroaesthetics. The book weaves a tapestry of breakthrough research, insights from multidisciplinary pioneers, and compelling stories from people who are using the arts to enhance their lives.
Liberating Scholarly Writing
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Robert Nash argues for the validity of an exciting, alternative approach to doing scholarly writing which he calls the scholarly personal narrative. This book is the result of 35 years of supervising student papers, theses, dissertations, and publications.
Our Stories Matter
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Our Stories Matter explains and exemplifies the methodology of Scholarly Personal Narrative (SPN) writing for marginalized, underrepresented, and previously «disappeared» students at all levels of higher education. Presently no book looks at the whys and hows of scholarly personal narrative writing that focuses on this particular audience of underrepresented students. SPN writing has its origins in early slave narratives; 1960s feminist liberation stories; religio-spiritual autobiographies; existential, postmodern, and postcritical theory; and memoir/autobiographies of victimization and victory. Our Stories Matter attempts to fill a huge vacuum in the literature on the art and craft of personal narrative writing for undergraduates and graduates, because it appeals to a hugely expanding, previously underrepresented audience. It also provides faculty with a substantive pedagogical rationale and a writer's guide for teaching this kind of scholarly research - not just to underrepresented students but to all students who are ready to tell their stories in their own original, creative ways.
Your Art Will Save Your Life
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A candid guidebook about art-making in the midst of oppression--"a slim, necessary revelation" (Maggie Nelson, The Argonauts). Visiting the Andy Warhol Museum as a teenager, Beth Pickens realized that art was imperative for reflecting--and thus remaking--the world. As an adult, she has dedicated her life to arts nonprofits and consulting, helping marginalized artists traverse the world of MFAs, residences, and institutional funding. Writing in the aftermath of the 2016 election, Pickens reminds emerging artists that their art is more important than ever. She gives advice on fostering creativity and sustaining an innovative practice as conversations about grants, public programming, and arts funding in schools grow ever-more heated. Part political manifesto, part practical manual, this resource reminds us that art has always been a tool of resistance.
Make Your Art No Matter What
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The Artist's Way for the 21st century--from esteemed creative counselor Beth Pickens. If you are an artist, you need to make your art. That's not an overstatement--it's a fact; if you stop doing your creative work, your quality of life is diminished. But what do you do when life gets in the way? In this down-to-earth handbook, experienced artist coach Beth Pickens offers practical advice for developing a lasting and meaningful artistic practice in the face of life's inevitable obstacles and distractions. This thoughtful volume suggests creative ways to address the challenges all artists must overcome--from making decisions about time, money, and education, to grappling with isolation, fear, and anxiety. No matter where you are in your art-making journey, this book will motivate and inspire you. Because not only do you need your art--the world needs it, too. * EXPERT ADVICE: Beth Pickens is an experienced and passionate arts advocate with extensive insight into working through creative obstacles. She has spent the last decade advising artists on everything from financial strategy to coping with grief. * PRACTICAL AND POSITIVE: This book is both a love letter to art and artists and a hands-on guide to approaching the thorniest problems those artists might face. Pickens offers a warm reminder that you are not alone, that what you do matters, and that someone out there wants you to succeed. * TIMELESS TOPIC: Like a trusted advisor, this book is an invaluable resource jam-packed with strategies for building a successful creative practice. From mixing business and friendship to marketing yourself on social media, this book can help. And it will--again and again. Perfect for: * Visual artists and makers * Writers, musicians, filmmakers, and other creatives * Art and design school graduates and grad-gift givers
Doing Rebellious Research
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The ways in which research and scholarship are co-produced, co-performed and proclaimed as particular kinds of knowledges and truths in and beyond the academy is radically changing. The capacity to write rebelliously, in varying registers and voices, tempos and volumes, as featured across this book, is boundaryless. In this edited volume, we ask new questions which simultaneously trouble and open up what the 'product' and 'performance' of academic work, words and worlds might come to be. At the heart of this book, we move between departing radically from academic writing to arriving at a new academic endeavor and transaction between reader and text driven by the invitation to open rebellion in academic research and writing. This unique volume brings together an extraordinary range of international scholars, researchers and artists, that include contemporary social scientists, critical theorists, visual artists, poets, musicians, hip-hoppers, choreographers, activists, film-makers, theatre-makers, magicians, and circus artists from both within and outside the academy in Europe, UK, India, Africa, USA, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. They articulate new concepts for thinking differently, generate new theories differently, and present new methods of writing differently. This book provides 'permission' to depart radically in academic writing and creative practice - particularly for doctoral and higher degree research students, and those who work alongside them as supervisors and advisors and higher research degree educators. The claim here is that rebellious departures and performances in academic research and writing are the future of academia. This book provides a series of steps toward preparing for that future.
Uncreative Writing
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Can techniques traditionally thought to be outside the scope of literature, including word processing, databasing, identity ciphering, and intensive programming, inspire the reinvention of writing? The Internet and the digital environment present writers with new challenges and opportunities to reconceive creativity, authorship, and their relationship to language. Confronted with an unprecedented amount of texts and language, writers have the opportunity to move beyond the creation of new texts and manage, parse, appropriate, and reconstruct those that already exist.
