breakTHROUGHArts
a free newsletter for visual artists

Use your e-mail Forward button to share this newsletter with friends who want more creativity in their lives. To subscribe, click: connect@dianereardon.com.

March 2005 Contents
I. Finding and Expressing Your Voice in a Visual Medium
II. Energy Management: Translations from the Psych Research Lab, the Board Room, and the Shrink’s Couch
III. Friends in Print: When you feel like reading
IV. Creative Links
V. Newsletter and Info: Share this newsletter, subscribe, or unsubscribe
 
I. Finding and Expressing Your Voice in a Visual Medium
It’s mostly writers that talk about finding their voice, but the metaphor of voice has also been adopted by other artists.

Singers, of course, study voice literally. A useful example is opera star Renee Fleming’s recent biography where she focuses on the voice itself as the main aspect of her career. She describes the years of apprenticeship it took to train and understand how to use her own particular voice. And even now, as an internationally acclaimed diva, she details the ongoing work needed to maintain that voice in the face of myriad unpredictable events (The Inner Voice, 2004; Viking Press.)

If only visual artists had that kind of straightforward voice! Singers know they need a second pair of trusted ears just because the mechanics of making sound preclude directly hearing how your voice sounds. They traditionally have teachers and voice coaches and also recording devices to give them feedback from others and clearer feedback for themselves. What the teacher can provide that the tape recorder can’t, is the feedback on a particular passage within the larger context of knowing the voice as a whole.

“If we follow the individual wisdom and uniqueness in each of us, we will find expression and creativity beyond our widest dreams.”                                    ~ Lane Arye

Writers, of course, can read their own work and learn to self-edit, and they traditionally have editors and sometimes agents. But how do you, as a visual artist, look with a broader view at your own work to understand your own developing “voice”? And when will feedback to from a trusted objective second pair of eyes help identify and develop this voice?

One way to do this for yourself is to take a day to review your own work. Clear a space to display pieces in the order they were created, including slides and photos. Start a list of images, icons, and motifs that repeat. When do they appear and then no longer appear? Do the same for color palettes and compositional elements. Start another list of odd, singular elements that just catch you eye as especially energized.

Now look at the lists by date and see how later pieces grew out of earlier ones. Or in reaction to them. Or in reaction to another artist’s or teacher’s style. Write at least a one-line answer to the following: Where did you start from in terms of style and voice? What phases have you been through? What has remained throughout? What singular elements are tempting you to explore them more?

You may also consider the risks and benefits of having an objective person review your work. There are various possibilities including one of your own teachers or one who has not been part of your development. Ask artist friends who they would recommend. However far you go in exploring your own voice, keep a record of your findings for comparison at each stage of its development.
(Return to Top)

II. Energy Management: Translations from the Psych Research Lab, the Board Room and the Shrink’s Couch  
Steven Covey. The 8^th Habit; From Effectiveness to Greatness. 2004.
Well, Steven Covey has done it again. He has added to his immensely popular “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People” with an 8^th habit. Guess what it is…”Find our voice and inspire others to find theirs.”

“When you engage in work that taps your talent and fuels your passion – that rises out of a great need in the world that you feel drawn by conscience to meet  - therein lies your voice, your calling, your soul’s code.”                                     ~ Stephen Covey

He continues his basic model which says that changes in your outer life or in the world can only be built on changes made inside the individual. Having laid out body, mind, heart, and soul as the four working elements, he describes finding your voice at the overlap of the world’s needs, your talent, passion, and conscience; voice is your unique personal significance

Even though this volume is less down to earth than his previous ones and is a bit of a stretch for artists translating his examples from organizations to the studio, his writing continues to inspire to excellence. Especially if you already are a Covey fan, you’ll enjoy this next level, where he uses “voice" as an ongoing metaphor and his phrases (“permanent whitewater”, “pathfinding”) continue to be in his own memorable voice. 
(Return to Top)

III. Friends in Print: When you feel like reading
Kemp, Martin. Leonardo. 2004. This view of Leonardo differs from the previous chronological biographies by analyzing each sector of his life in turn: the workshop settings, money, patrons, household, etc. Kemp’s examination of Leonardo’s artworks and journals makes clear how his voice is apparent in everything he produced and was based on constant observational study. Examples show how drawings were influenced by the physics, mechanics, and biology of the time which often explained one phenomenon by analogy to another. Not always a flowing read but worth visiting for the specifics of how one voice permeates a person’s work.

Rilke, Rainer Maria. Rodin. 2004
The “voice” of Rodin is beautifully described in the prose of a poet. This presentation of Rilke’s essays (1902, 1907) is paired with unusual photographs of selected sculptures and finely produced by Archipelago Books (see links below). Rilke tracks Rodin’s elements of style all in context of the time in which they both lived and what sculpture had been up to that time.
(Return to Top)

IV. Creative Links.
www.bravotv.com/Inside_the_Actors_Studio/  This is a site to check out the weekly TV show’s schedule of actor and director interviews. Inside the Actor’s Studio is taped before an audience of students at the Actors Studio Drama School in New York and the whole tone is to help students understand the “point of view” of successful stage and film artists. If you don’t have a TV or get Bravo channel, you still might want to catch it at a friend’s for a refreshing variety of creative styles.

www.archipelagobooks.org This publisher takes great pains to craft paper, bindings and art work with the contents of recently translated poetry and prose so that the books themselves are small works of art. They are my new-best-friend publisher (the only one I’ve ever written a fan letter to) and clearly are developing a unique voice in the publishing world.  
(Return to Top)

V. Newsletter Info
E-mail changes. To change your e-mail address, subscribe, or unsubscribe please e-mail connect@dianereardon.com. If you use a spam filter, please add this e-mail address to your list of approved senders. This material is included on the breakTHROUGH Creativity Coaching website (www.dianereardon.com). All material is copyrighted ©, 28 February 2005, Diane Reardon. All rights reserved. Visit the website for back issues and details on scheduling a complimentary one-hour coaching session.