A Body of Work for the Bin?

The concept of creating a body of work was a concept I had heard of before, but when I came across the book by Pamela Slim, that was where I found the idea expanded upon. This wasn’t just about books or paintings or films or whatever creative venture we turn our attention to. She describes our body of work as how we bring ourselves into the world.

It was a really good read! Then a couple of weeks ago I had a chat on Skype with Doug Shaw who I had met on the Social Age Safari in Bristol. He shared with me his thoughts about creating / painting for the bin. We had begun by talking about our common interest in Impermanence. For Doug, this was at the heart of his ideas of creating for the bin. The concept was very much about seeing creativity as a process that has taken from it all of the preciousness that we can so easily apply to it. If we are not careful we restrict ourselves by seeing ‘creativity’ as a high level action that requires great skill and genius to achieve. This is the basis of a view that helps the Inner Critic and the Procrastinator-in-Residence to grow and flourish. Using Doug’s idea we can let go of this and see creation as something we do without any thought to an end point, an audience waiting with expectation or a ‘career’ in the arts. Instead we work from a space where the child can play, where there are no judgements.

After the conversation I was struck by the way that this idea is at odds with the concept of building a body of work.

Could I bring these two seemingly conflicting ideas into alignment? I think this is possible. Regarding the creative process as disposable is a way of freeing ourselves up to be playful and experimental. We can try things out and not worry about what the end result looks like. Above all, we can be ready to throw things away if they don’t work.

Generating volume, being prolific in the generation stage without worrying about quality is a way to open ourselves up. At a later stage in the process we can go through the work that we have created and decide what is ready for the bin and what we will keep. This is the stage where we are forming defined ideas about the body of work that we are building.

So, they are different stages in the overall process.

Doug referred to the prolific output of Matisse as we spoke – a big influence on his own art work. Matisse’s jazz prints are a stunning example of experimenting, taking things back to simple ideas and creating something that has endured and can be found in many forms, on T-shirts, mugs, prints, postcards etc etc. So many ways to share these images – and all of them impermanent, disposable. Another example of impermanence.

HT to Doug for inspiring these ramblings!

Also published on Medium.