The 2012 of Creativity: Parisian Back Streets to the Imagination and Yann Tiersen by Diana Rivera

I have never met anyone with a developed sensitivity for films that abhorred the film Amelie. Sure there are people with gripes, but down right hate. No way. You’d have to be somehow cold-blooded, or at least luke warm, to not appreciate the capricious main character played by Audrey Tautou, the luminous Parisian cafes, and the mystical synchronicities in which I long 2012 to be etched. The realist may challenge idealism, stripping the essence out of belief as it slowly slips out of one’s powerful grip.

The Parisian streets of Amelie’s creative world are powerful routes into the cognitive road maps of the imagination. If they were, they would be composed by Yann Tiersen, the music composer to Amelie. I have personally fallen in and out of love, composed artistic and academic projects, serenaded by this soundtrack. I don’t think I stand alone in my interest–it’s a spectacular album.

Lately, I have been driving on a Yann Tiersen loop station to no clear end in sight. His other album, Dust Lane, has taken me momentarily out of Amelie’s Paris into other back lanes of the imagination: the desolate desert roads to let go to what you cling, and bizarre bridge crossings where longing and the ferocity of the future crash into subtle waves in the river. He makes it okay to ask: “what the hell am I doing with my life?”

I finally parked in a sonic dome with Yann Tiersen’s album, L’Absente. The album catapults the romance of courage back into the driver’s seat of the heart. For me, the song “Les Jour Tristes” is an ode to the creative artist who longs for the synchronicities and mysteries of life and art, yet balances the practicalities of the every day like bringing home the bacon, being courageous in the face of other people’s expectations or judgements, etc.

Here are the lyrics and the song:

It’s hard, hard not to sit on your hands
And bury your head in the sand
Hard not to make other plans
And claim that you’ve done all you can, all along
And life must go on
It’s hard, hard to stand up for what’s right
And bring home the bacon each night
Hard not to break down and cry
When every idea that you’ve tried has been wrong
But you must carry on

It’s hard but you know it’s worth the fight
‘Cause you know you’ve got the truth on your side
When the accusations fly, hold tight
Don’t be afraid of what they’ll say
Who cares what cowards think, anyway
They will understand one day, one day

It’s hard, hard when you’re here all alone
And everyone else has gone home
Harder to know right from wrong
When all objectivities gone
And its gone
But you still carry on
‘Cause you, you are the only one left
And you’ve got to clean up the mess
You know you’ll end like the rest
Bitter and twisted, unless
You stay strong and you carry on

It’s hard but you know it’s worth the fight
‘Cause you know you’ve got the truth on your side
When the accusations fly, hold tight
Don’t be afraid of what they’ll say
Who cares what cowards think, anyway
They will understand one day, one day

Yann Tiersen has led me through an emotional journey through music this season, and has taught me something fundamental to my resolution behind 2012. It is hard to believe in your artistry when there are accusations that hold you back. But, don’t be afraid of carrying on. Your art builds the streets, alleys, roads, bridges and freeways that drive others to feel, think and be. It is worth the battle, and there will be a major pay-off: sharing. Contributing. Offering your greatest passion to a world that could be otherwise stripped of beauty or meaning without you. It won’t be in the fantastical ways of Amelie. It will be in your signature form, led by the pulse of the Parisian streets, the dust lanes of resolution, the fortifying gates of courage.

Occupy Wall Street + Steve Jobs = a Wake-up Call for Creativity by Diana Rivera

“No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because death is very likely the single best invention of life. It is life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new.” –Steve Jobs

Right now matters. I often feel that way, but a surge has overcome me, the sound of which is a child crying and I am its parent. Right now matters. We are the matter. Have you heard the same cry these days waking you from a deep slumber?

Everyone seems looped in to the conversation of #Occupy Wall street and its reigning umbrella organization, Occupy Together. If you haven’t, it concerns every part of our collective future, please do. It may mean different things to you than it does for me, but I have a good feeling that as the collective mind may be concerned, we are all considering the future of our collective world. Here on this blog, dedicated to the passion, process and productivity of creative artists and professionals I ask, where does creativity fit in all of this? Or rather, how is this not about creativity?

It is at once sadly ironic that this week such an iconic innovator of our time, Steve Jobs, has passed in the wake of the international movement. Tapping on the keys of my MacBook Pro thoughts on the occupation while texting on my iphone to friends on wall street, this is a result of Job’s innovations and how protests of this nature are made possible through the advanced, creative technology he and others designed.

As I gaze into the eyes of the bull, sharpened by the smoke ring, the sound of the cry is made more symbolic with the fall of this innovator. It represents the passing of a torch, and that torch is creativity and innovation. My hope is that it’s not passed on to one or few, but to many so that these many can be the next creative innovators to solve the greatest challenges of our collective humanity, particularly the ones put into question by protestors. That the passing could be a rite of passage for them, where the innovators may wake from their slumber of unconscious self-absorption to question the world from the perspective of Steve Jobs, yet with the focus of a bull and balance of a dancer. It may come from the encampments in NYC, the readers of this blog, children at home bored restless and waiting for their imagination to be tickled feisty into excitement for the possibilities before us. May it be all of them.

Creativity is this. It is the design of the matter, the fabric of the innovators, the ring of hope circling the very posture of the pose. We are the creative occupation because we are what matters and how it matters is what we should creatively design. As Steve Jobs said, “Design is not just how it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works.” How the design of our times will work for all, not just a few, requires the awakened heart and mind of creativity.

To be a creative artist is synonymous with change-maker. Sometimes we do that in our community, in our studios, in our imagination and now we’ll do it on Wall street.

Hedy Lamarr: Patent Beauty, Patent Invention by Diana Rivera

“I have not been that wise. Health I took for granted.

Love I have demanded, perhaps too much and too often.

As for money, I have only realized it’s true worth

when I didn’t have it.”

–Hedy Lamar

Hedy Lamarr (1913-2000) is a Hollywood starlet in a luminescent observatory. She has been waiting for the exact moment to enter spotlight most likely to be reckoned with by you, by me, by the millions of others that’ll discover and muse over her. She planned it this way. Hedy was stunning, and her beauty was glorified at the exact aesthetic time to capture that quintessential black and white starlet look incorporating jewels, deep red lipsticks, silks and fur.

Hedy was an Austrian native, married six times, divorced, rose to fame. Somehow it reads like another starlet’s life, yet it would be simplistic to clump her along with everyone else because she is not like anyone else. Although Hedy is famous for her beauty, her style and her films, to me she is famous as a creative, collaborative inventor.

What you may know is that growing up in Vienna, she was introduced to the piano by her mother and mentor, Max Reinhardt. Her background in music and the future learnings from her first husband, a munitions manufacturer who did research on control systems, led to a major discovery.  After her divorce to him, once she had come to Hollywood, the U.S. went to war with Germany in World War II. She was determined to help the effort and she began to collaborate with her musician friend, George Antheil.

Hedy was constellar in her thought process. Together with George, they united her second-hand learnings of music, the german weapon systems, and his expertise with player pianos to devise a new invention. They created a frequency hopping system, which would protect U.S. radio-guided torpedoes in the Second World War from being intercepted by the Nazis. “However, the US Naval Department would not take an idea proposed by a beautiful actress and a musician seriously, even when that idea had the support of the newly established National Inventors Council. Hedy was encouraged to support the war effort by selling kisses to promote the sale of war bonds, and she did so very successfully.” (Crammond, p. 523).

Although Hedy and George patented their idea, it wasn’t used in U.S. ships until 20 years later after the expiration of the patent.

How are beautiful actress’ of Hedy’s era understood? In the broadest way, they are adored for beauty, not innovation. In the most creative way, they could be seen as prismatic as the diamonds they wore, not just a pearl on a pillow.

Conscious or not, legacy-driven or not, Hedy planned a beautiful room of innovation to greet her in. Close enough to the spotlight where she was personally driven to, the observatory hosts a constellar vision of what passion (in her case political), learnings from previous relationships and artistic experiences can be when in concert with another.

Points to ponder:

• What is a gift you have that might appear to be a secret to others?
• How might that gift be part of a larger, constellar vision of the world?

Crammond, B. (2011).  Women and Creativity. In M. A. Runco  &  S. R. Pritzker,  (Eds.), The  encyclopedia of Creativity, 2nd ed., Vol. 2. (pp. 521-524). San Diego: Academic Press.

The Echo Park of Ganesha and Creativepreneurs by Diana Rivera

Every period in humanity has a power source they are connected to. By that I mean the engine of the vehicle, the mega watt electric tower, or as Shakespeare said,  ”the bigger light.” Artists can feel it happening in their blood, their bones and some times a work of art can even show proof of that power as it eloquently typifies the times.

Observing the status of the mega-verse we live in with high-speed travel, milisecond-sent-to-your-box techno-media outlets and the tweets of the twitter, we are the flapping wings of a hummingbird. Arriving to the edge of the wing is fantastic when you are ready to fall unto the lap of Ganesha, the deity elephant.

I was at a cafe in Echo Park, Los Angeles, contemplating the edge of humanity as I sourced the right name for the audience I serve. This was the perfect neighborhood to do it in as it has become a haven for the creative professional in LA, still looking for a raw, yet hip-to-the-beat, community-spirited place in what could be streets of superficiality.

I came up with Creativepreneuer. This is you: the individual, the friend, the family member, the entreprenuer, the creator, the artist who envisions and shapes our times through your creative passions, products, projects, etc. You, the creativeprenuer, are getting it done, and sometimes faster than the speed of light.

As I stumbled from the cafe, I saw Ganesha, the elephant, painted on a garage door. Ganesha is a deity of the Hindu pantheon. He represents the removal of obstacles and is a patron of the arts. It stood bold and beautiful, up against the light, fearless.

I thought of you, I thought of me, I thought of the small artisans who have opened up shop on that small street trying to make it in today’s economy. We, the creativepreneuer, step out of one’s comfort zone as a daily meditation, fall off the wings of what-is to worship what-could-be and answer to the higher creative source as a daily prayer.

To be the creativepreneuer of our time, we must overcome the tangible and intangible obstacles around us. As the elephant on the garage door reminded me, many obstacles crawl their way back, far from Ganesha’s view, to be dealt with again, and again, and then again. It takes courage to deal with every one of them.

I felt something deep in my heart, a gift from Ganesha in Echo Park that day: the creativepreneuer is someone I honor without obstacle. I serve you in my writing and my programs. I am here at this period of humanity to support you and the power source that brought Ganesha to a garage door opening.

Real Dali’s, Fake Dali’s and I am like Dali by Diana Rivera

I recently read the book Dali and I by Stan Lauryssens and the content left me twisted me up inside like a crumbled piece of paper written with non-sensical verbage resembling, I am a lot like Dali. You might read that and think it was a nasty, horrible book–who wants to feel like a war-torn piece of paper? Fortunately, we all read to expand our intellect, emotions, senses, perspectives so it is safe to now say that this one expanded mine.

I stumbled upon the book at the library, gravitated by the title which immediately glossed on a smile. I read the first chapter standing in the aisle, enthralled by Stan’s voice as this introspective yet cunning investigator of his own life story as the international dealer of Dali’s, fake Dali’s and fake-fake Dali’s.

I won’t spill the details of the story, the laundered money, the characters who manufactured the Dali you think of, or the way Mr. Lauryssens paints the rippling mountains of Cap de Creus or the crushing waves of the Costa Brava. I wouldn’t do that because it wouldn’t allow you the pleasure to see where you sat alongside the elements of the experience: the leather clothing of the 1970′s, the languid cafe-side conversations, the backward, up-side down, all-around image of Dali, his home and his art.

For me, I became the body of a paloma with a tail of a sting ray, the brass horse-head on top of a cane held by a fat Italian or the piercing 1-2-3-4 eye balls of an absurdist two-headed Gala in Dali’s painting. From that vantage point, themes become clear, inspiration whistles a greco-roman opera and a phrase locks into my consciousness, I am a lot like Dali? What the heck does that mean?

At the time that I was reading the book, Amanda, my dear pal/ filmmaker collaborator, and I wanted to create a web-series that would allow us to develop something together and with our friends, given the distance between her living in Barcelona and me in Los Angeles. We mulled over concepts. Then, there was something that mulled over for me about the title, I am a lot like Dali. I shared it with her and the details of the video series began. We decided to call it, ‘I am like Dali.’

‘I am like Dali’ is a collection of short videos in English, Spanish or Catalan created by artists on iphones, flip cameras, and laptops. Each visual exposee would be about the person people say you are a lot like…not at all like…or always wished to be like. “Part comedic journal entry captured on an iphone. Part tragic performance art piece filmed in a bathroom. Part magnifying lens into the bedroom of your brain.” I love those lines.

Check out the project here. Content coming soon: http://iamlikedali.com/

I stand in awe, outside of the frame of the fiction, at how one piece of stumbled upon art inspires a new way of interpretation in others. This is what Dali did for the art world (real, fake or fake-fake). This is what Dali did to Stan Lauryssens. This is what Stan Lauryssens did for me, and apparently Hollywood too since the book is in pre-production for the 2014 release. You can check that out here: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0893399/

I wonder what content will surface from the site, how it will inspire viewers and what that will do for them creatively.

Feel free to follow the stream of upcoming content on Facebook.

Points to ponder:

–Have you ever read something that propelled you to create something out of it? How did the details of the story content connect for you in building the content of the project?

Creative Miami: Nina Surel’s Studio, a Touch of the Feminine by Diana Rivera

On a recent trip to Miami, I came with a question: What is Creativity Today: Miami? Inside of me I was curious about the people and places that make up a synergistic artist community in the southern most cosmopolitan city of the United States, crowned and arranged in la hispanidad. Beyond Art Basel Miami, and the hoopla that international, art festivals bring to any community, what happens when the lights dim and the curtain closes? Who is still performing the fine art of their own personal performance in creativity?

I went on a hunt through the city like a fox with a compass, a clown with a note pad, a detective with a wand.

I arrived at to the Art Center SF of Miami to learn more about their artist community and organization, and was given a tour by their Executive Director, Chris Ingalls. As we walked through the corridors of the 40 + artist resident studios, we were invited into Nina Surel’s Studio by her welcoming smile and a canvas of a Klimt-esque, succulent collage painting of a majestic woman.

I had an opportunity to meet with Nina a couple of days later. The same smile welcomed me into her studio and I was drawn to how it was adorned with glass jars of costume jewelry, antique buttons, porcelain flowers and lace strings falling from shelves. Looking at the details of the room, I felt the rarity of my fingers turning into rose petaled syrup.

I came to learn about how Nina creates. When she was a young girl in small town Argentina, she became ill with a form of rheumatism. As someone who studies the psychology of creativity, I was flashing back to many research studies that had been done on well-known visual artists who tapped into their artistry as a result of illness. The symptoms left her unable to be physically rigorous. It did allow her imagination to tune her fingers into another frequency: one where she could orchestrate with clay and other materials such as fabrics, paints and sewing.

Nina described her training and mentorship with a Spanish ceramist in her town. She spoke of leaving her ‘day-job’ to claim her artistry. She offered a timeline of her experience coming to Miami as a personal revival. In the background of her explanation was the silhouette of her paintings, many of which featured a digital image of her as the principal subject adorned with flowers and arranged in jewels.

From her interpretation, I learned that her new series of paintings included her as the primary subject. Each series expressed her own personal transformation as a woman and as an artist. It was a collection of conscious and unconscious stories that propelled the play of her femininity on canvas. I encourage you to check out her collection by clicking here.

It’s interesting to wonder about why one is drawn to a piece of art. Perhaps it is this conversation between her story of the feminine that had catapulted my attention consciously and unconsciously  to be curious and seek out a conversation. As she poured me jasmine pearl tea, my fingers wrapped around the dainty floral painted porcelain cup. I sat back with the peace in knowing that any artist’s work is a result of an intrapersonal conversation and it is in moments of  inquiry and authentic listening, that I heard an artist’s personal journey as if it were my own.

What is creative Miami? Within that hour, creative Miami was an authentic exchange of experience, shaped into a conversation, distilled onto canvas. It was the antiquated pieces of jewelry, paints and fabrics that defined the collage as a story where I became a character within it: a crowning flower with wings of an ear.

Points to ponder:

Have you met an artist recently that has sparked your curiosity? What would you care to know about in that person? How does that question relate to you?

The Art of Physics and Beethoven by Diana Rivera

Energy can be neither created, nor destroyed. It can only change form. This is a law of energy conservation and also a premise for creative activity. It could help to explain the energy it takes to create a product from one’s imagination, as well as the challenges artists overcome, to direct energy toward their artistic product. All that creative energy is neither created, nor destroyed, but changes form in relationship to thoughts, beliefs, social and cultural milieu.

Let me fasten this connection with Leonard Shlain’s book, Art and Physics, to Beethoven.

Shlain’s book looks at a history of art through the lens of science to assert that scientific phenomena was, in many cases, first looked at, grappled with and explored in visual art. Artists were either consciously asking or working within the consciousness of exploration that scientists were invested in, specifically space, time and light. Listen to a lecture by Shlain here.

The book expanded the galaxy of imagination to consider artists as scientific phenomena. Take Beethoven and the vast talent in his form: he struggled intensely in his personal life with memories of a verbally abusive childhood, to medical issues affecting his stomach and ultimately his own hearing. As the savant composer began to make his mark in music history, he slowly became deaf.

For many, a disability to this extent could be the end of their career. In fact, Beethoven also struggled with depression and thoughts of suicide.

An artist’s drive to create is an energy and that energy can not be destroyed, it just changes into form. In the epoch of Beethoven’s weakest physical state, that energy was a force that thrusted into the galaxy of the imagination. As a result, he produced the 9 symphonies that have marked his career in the history of art, music and culture.

Thinking of this reminded me of Symphony #7. Whenever I listen to it, I feel an incredible potential moving toward the center of the unknown. In my youtube research, I discovered the exact visual experience, and it was deeper. It was symphony #7 to hubble space images.

The energy that had changed form in Beethoven resembled the luminous spirals in our galaxy. If it were a song, this might be the one to serenade an experience through the outer unknown manifestation of our imagination. If not, then what a fascinating voyage through the art of physical phenomena and the physical phenomena of art.

Points to ponder:

What is the role of energy in your personal, professional and creative life?

Pina Bausch and Leonardo da Vinci at the Goodwill by Diana Rivera

Since I was in middle school, I have had a very synergistic relationship with vintage shops, garage sales and sidewalk peddler products. Not sure how it could be that one day I’d be imagining some ambiguous silk chinese cocktail dress, and then I’d get an instinct to go to the Goodwill (a salvation army style thrift shop), and all of a sudden, it would be there. The one I had imagined. Besides no one, I am the only person that has such a rare existence with a thrift shop. It’s clearly a conversation with destiny: goodwill represents a space where my imagination materializes.

I go there to find things to repair, rip up and recreate. I go there to salvage treasures. I also call in creators from the past. I know this one seems like a stretch, but I have some evidence.

A year or so ago, I wrote a piece on Pina Bausch (read it here) whose work has stunned me, haunted me, left a trace embedded forever in my imagination. Recently I realized that Wim Wenders had produced a film in honor of her.

The day I saw this trailer, I had been thinking of Pina, and as I was driving by the Goodwill, I knew I had to stop in. Like a whisper-of-an-instinct of where to go, I quickly walked to the poster section and there it was. An original framed poster of the women of the Wuppertal Theatre, Pina Bausch’s theatre company. Here is a picture:

To me, it’s highly unlikely that a poster like this is circulating regularly around Goodwill, untouched and only $20. In fact, I am so positive about it, I felt that feeling that I had been gifted with a present from the creator herself. Perhaps it was a recognition of the work? Or perhaps she knew she was on my mind?

The next evidence of said relationship is with Leonardo da Vinci. I had been reading of his contributions as a scientist of the arts and an artist of the sciences in Leonard Shlain’s book, Art and Physics. I was driving by the Goodwill and I had that same little voice go off. It was clear: go to the magazine section. I went and guess what I found:

How is that I have been called by instinct to the Goodwill to find these little treasures? The beauty is that they could be meaningless garbage to everybody else, but for me there is clearly a greater message: Pina and Leonardo had their eyes on me too.

It made me think: what if there were creators from the past who you follow that also follow you? The one I refer to is a more transpersonal approach to following, something that twitter could never compare to.

Point to ponder:

What if it took a little faith in believing that you are taken care of by the creative entities you most admire? How would things be different for you right now?

Creativity Today in Los Angeles: Poster Art and Trash Art by Diana Rivera

I was thinking about that song from the 90′s by Missing Persons, “Nobody Walks in LA.” The song is essentially about how nobody does walk in LA and how ironic it is when even teenagers and cops don’t. Having grown up this side of the pond, I used to agree with the punky thrasher lyrics, but nowadays I have seen some real shifts in its transportation culture, street culture and therefore urban art culture. Uniquely and not quite ironically, the city is bursting with little nooks and crannies of artist expression in little back alleys, corner store holes and underneath cars. You have to have an eye toward the the less obvious ways that creativity presents itself in our culture.

That’s when I enter the stage with my evidence of creativity photos and Creativity Today web-series. Here’s a couple of examples of creativity that I have seen as of recent.

Shepard Fairey’s poster designs on Sunset Blvd:

This one was next to his studio in the Echo Park neighborhood and shows the multidimensional strength of Lance Armstrong. This could have been a hard one to spot if one was speeding up Sunset Blvd.

The second photo is of another poster art design I spotted in Downtown LA. The once decrepit sector of LA, has been experiencing a renaissance in neighborhoods like the Barker Block district where on one brick wall, I found another Fairey bombing of an artist warrior of sorts and a contrasting piece on hope. Inspiring for a neighborhood that has struggled with hope.

The third photo is a piece of trash. Yes indeed, trash on the street has meaning and this one was quite delightful. As I was walking in Silverlake, I was crossing a street to notice a shredded piece of paper for priority admission to a Tim Burton film. Check out the imagery though: a tilted staircase with a forlorn fellow walking up the stairs.

The last evidence of creativity is a collage image on a trash can. Check out my video:

Points to ponder:

Have you been out of your car and noticed the evidence of creativity around you?

How might you contribute to the everyday creativity on the streets?

Yo-Yo Ma and the Silk Road’s Message about Creativity and Children by Diana Rivera

Taken from KPCC

I am a ponderer. I’ll write something and I am mulling over things for weeks later. I discussed in the last blog, and consequently ranted for days later, about the nature of having a message in one’s art work. Does it give more sound to the painted colors on canvas? Does it give more texture to the music of your orchestration? For me, it’s a rhetorical question about the relationship between a creator, their work and an audience that led to some spicy commentary.

In one case, I spoke to TV/Film Composer Roger Neill and his partner about art–be it works in the visual and performing arts–having a message. Roger explained to me that he disagreed and thought it was too didactic. In fact, I agreed with his disagreement: art should allow people to experience ‘universalities’ or ‘truths’ (lower case ‘t’ on that one), allowing the audience full reign to create the bridges of comprehension. Whether it be take-away messages, morals or themes, art should raise the bar of its audience allowing them to be thinkers and multi-sentient comprehenders in the process.

Fair enough. That’s how I like to experience art like a grown-up woman: one who can think on her own and create her own meaning with sand, water and a shovel.

Then the day I met Yo-Yo Ma and the Silk Road Ensemble, I got to thinking again. At a recent stop in L.A., Yo-Yo made sure to roll into Inner City Arts Organization before his performance that week at the Disney Hall. Yo-Yo played and showed the power of music with the help of dancer Lil’ Buck. He called it a “creativity strike.” Here is a glimpse of that day.

Yo-Yo later explained to journalists at KPCC that our creativity crisis in the U.S. can be best challenged through creative practice. As Yo-Yo  explains, “The best way to get to innovation and creative imagination and the most efficient way is through movement, visualizing, sound and writing.” He went on to say that we can build community through imagination and empathy. Empathy shows that we care. To listen to the full interview: click here.

Is this about message? Maybe. For me, it’s all about the depth of this artist. Yo-Yo Ma doesn’t just roll into LA, play and hit the road. What makes him a talented and multi-layered cellist is his empathy. He cares about others. He sees the power of his work and his colleagues as a basis for humanizing and fomenting community.

If that were a message and if messages were important, this would be a powerful one. Show that you care. Show that your work matters. Show that your art has meaning to others. If not, that empathic could be a descriptor  defining a world-renowned artist puts my thoughts to rest.

POINTS TO PONDER:

Where does empathy exist for you?