Wings over my wind

Last night,Musicman invited me to join him at Anka gallery in Old Town. A group of people had been taking classes in "Process painting" and they were 'sharing' their work in a spacious gallery-the sort of open space where aficionados stand rooted to their spots lost in contemplation while the uninterested shift edgily,wondering how much time one spends looking at a work of art from various angles. To be honest, I didn't know anything about process painting until last night. One of the artists there explained to us that the form is all about putting emotions to paper in a continuous, unchanelled fashion where figures,shapes and colours aren't picked for a reason. In other words, you just let your creativity flow sans objective, aim or direction. Pretty soon, the creation begins to direct you instead. The experience is more about the journey than the destination itself.

What is the destination then, I asked. If you are putting expressions down on paper without any specific direction or vision, how do you know you're done with your work? Apparently, you don't on several occasions. It is a tough decision to figure out when you need to stop. The easiest way is when your creative source has been exhausted and you don't continue to feel that urge to keep painting.

If that sounded lofty to you, it seemed improbable to a cynic like me when the lady explained all this to us. The artists encourage visitors to pick up brushes themselves and explore their creative side for a few minutes. It was this attraction which made me resist the temptation to dismiss this method as yet another hoity-toity art jargon. After spending a few minutes examining several pictures (I won't share my honest opinion here since the artists insist you neither commend nor criticize one of their works), I felt the urge to don an apron and reach for a palette.

Musicman and I started working on 2 sheets of paper pinned to a wall. I felt a familiar rush as I reached for the tub of black paint. I could see it in my head. The idea excited me in the same way I favour my composition or craft project as soon as I have completed it. I am not unreceptive to criticism or comments (seemingly hard to believe given the title of this blog) but in some slight measure, I like to give myself a little bit of uncompromising credit for conceiving any idea.

My fingers flew across paper as rapid brush strokes filled up almost every spot with the idea bubbling in my head. Occasionally, I'd glance across at Musicman to find his brush casually caressing paper with soft curves, free-flowing forms and ultimately an attractive amalgam of colours. After almost 30 minutes (didn't seem that long), I stepped back to examine my effort in temporary satisfaction. More form needed to be included, white spaces to be filled and features to be detailed. But what lay in front of my eyes was quite satisfactory in no small measure.

In a flash, my bubble burst and with resignation, I informed Musicman that I was ready to go. Locating a funky coffeeshop a few doors away, we sat down with cups of chai to discuss the experience. Talking it out helped me put words to that bubble burst.

When I picked up my brush, I hadn't opened a door to my surge of expression. I had desperately tried to give form to a vision in my head, granted that vision germinated during the first few minutes I'd spent in the gallery. I knew exactly what I wanted to say, how I wanted to say it. When I put down my brush, it wasn't because I had depleted that creative source. It was because I knew I couldn't complete my work (a word the other artists actually don't encourage you to use) at that time. I also knew that I had filled up enough space on my paper to prevent another artist from continuing to express on my sheet (an idea these artists actually encourage, since the idea is about expression,not ownership). In every possible way, I had flouted the basic principle behind process painting.

And that was simply because I couldn't let go.

I like to think of myself as a creative person. But truthfully, it is channeled creativity that I actually possess, possibly due to my cultural upbringing. Eastern cultures almost unanimously insist on striving for stability from cradle to career. That stability almost readily comes from the next rung on an infinite ladder. Competition is so fierce that switching ladders or staying put on any rung aren't viable options. The need to succeed drives parents to egg their children to outperform their peers and strive for the goals they themselves couldn't achieve. I read somewhere that no parent wants their child to lead the exact same standard of life they had to lead. The aspiration is admirable indeed but the repercussion is equally damaging. Teenage suicide resulting from unsatisfactory academic performance (not failing) is probably the worst fruit this egging has resulted in. While this happens on a smaller scale (but happens nevertheless), the majority of children grow up with their parents' vision ingrained in their head, their own dreams either nipped in the bud or compromised with regret. One of the greatest tragedies in our lives has to be the continuation of our existence without an evolution of the self. When some of these individuals find themselves living and/or working in a western society, the discovery of tremendous opportunity is overwhelming and liberating to the point where it restores the self-confidence they had once lost to follow their dream.

Western cultures celebrate the idea of the self almost to the point of glorification. The development of the self and the idea of respecting personal space is of such prime importance that it is self-evident at every stage in life-letting babies sleep separately, assigning children to their own rooms with individual beds, allowing high school students to pick their electives, encouraging college freshmen to explore their interests before picking a major, urging working singles to date frequently and engage in relationships before ultimately identifying 'the one', relocating to a different city or country to experience a change, changing careers or quitting work to follow a dream. The consequence, in my opinion, is that people tend to be so focused on achieving what they want, they lose sight of a bigger picture. They spend hours trying to thread memories and experiences to explain why they are the way they are, where they have come in life and what it means to be in that position. A vast majority of them are constantly besotted with the dilemma as to why they aren't happy ever. In an ironic fashion, some of them decide to examine eastern faiths to understand the nature of the self and its purpose in this world.

I hasten to mention here that I do not wish to condemn or criticize any one faith or culture. I am perfectly happy and in many ways extremely grateful for the wonderful upbringing my family was able to provide for me. It has taken me this long to pause and understand what essentially defines me. While I am all for the idea of people discovering and pursuing what they truly believe in, I must honestly admit that I have grown to enjoy a good bit of control and stability in any undertaking. I find its absence very unsettling and the idea of relinquishing it absolutely impossible.

"I just don't know why I wasn't able to let go. I couldnt let my mind wander when I needed to pick shapes and colours. I knew I wanted orange right next to blue.I knew it'd bother me too much if I'd picked purple instead.I might be judging myself too much but I can't stop judging.Maybe it's not that I couldn't let go. Maybe I didnt want to let go..".The words gushed out of my mouth as Musicman stared directly into my eyes in that coffeeshop.

"I think you just said it there yourself. You can let go....you just don't want to.", he replied quietly.

Perhaps it is best that I stay this way. My behaviour might appear to be neurotic and in some ways obsessive-compulsive (talk to my friends!), but atleast I am now aware of who I am, what makes me happy and why I do the things I do.

I might have failed in process painting but I learnt a truth that day which was just as personal to me as the realisations every other artist has discovered in this class.