Author: James Chiang

learn by Doing

“The Hanging Cloud” is one of 30,000 woodblock prints Japanese master printmaker Hokusai made in his lifetime. On his tombstone reads the epitaph “Old man mad about painting”.

Any fool can know. The point is to understand. ― Albert Einstein, Scientist

There is, ultimately, only one way to learn and that is by doing. We can accumulate as much knowledge or technique as we can, and have them beautifully and clearly explained to us (the job of the teacher), but if we don’t actually practice it (the job of the student) it never becomes a skill or ability. True understanding comes only from direct experience and realization.

To live as real artists — as true professionals — we must take solid consistent and persistent action. This means of course two big things: one, disciplined regular practice and two, continually pushing the boundaries of our abilities. Failure in either of these areas will ultimately cause one’s learning to stop, or worse, one’s interest in learning to stop.

It is not that I’m so smart. But I stay with the questions much longer. ― Albert Einstein

Alberto Giacometti’s studio. I love seeing the workspace of artists and craftsmen — they remind me of scientific laboratories where all kinds of experiments take place.

To stay with a question, an interest in the what, why and how requires a life devoted to learning, devoted to craft and devoted to life itself. This is challenging because when it comes to sustained practice there are few caveats. We must be aware of our natural tendencies to give up. Entropy is a very real thing. Yes, succumbing to fatigue, boredom or laziness is NORMAL (i.e. average, typical, and common). That’s why I like to say that real professionals are not normal — they don’t think, do or act in normal fashion. Because such normal behaviour would yield normal “mediocore” results. Mediocre or average, of course, isn’t professional; that’s the layperson’s level of knowledge, understanding and expertise (which is almost none at all).

To sustain a level of excellence — or the passion required for excellence — we must also continually find ways to surround ourselves with the right kind of people, places and things. Passion, of course, means love/empathy for something. Some people say we shouldn’t rely on inspiration or require it. To that, I say hogwash. No human being — not even the most creative and talented — can sustain a mental capacity that is always upbeat, vibrant and innovative. All time great artists such as Van Gogh, Lucien Freud and even the legendary Picasso often looked to and even copied themes, compositions, and colours of artists that come before them. Same goes with the numerous musicians, animators and filmmakers out there. We all do this and must do this because from time to time, we all need a good boost. Nature, great art, and unique stories share and inspire the human experience. Why not use them?

One of Ian Davenport’s beautiful puddle paintings inspired by the work of Vincent Van Gogh.

So ask yourselves, what do you do, either regularly or randomly, that helps you stay inspired and glued to that beautiful but challenging path that makes you a true artist? It’s an arduous task to be aware and to keep looking and listening. Delaying, walking away or giving up is always gonna be easier. Unfortunately (or fortunately!) the price of the easy, of the comfortable, is always a life imprisoned by ignorance, boredom, and meaninglessness. For professionals or those who aspire to become professionals, we know that that kind of living is far more painful and dissatisfying than facing the challenge of actually doing what we need to do. Doing is process and process is everything.

A path is made by walking on it. ― Chuang Tzu, Philosopher

Look, Listen, Learn

Self-portrait by Lucien Freud. Deep attentiveness was a predominant trait of this master realist.

A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices. ― David Bohm, Physicist

Why are so many people stuck within their own ideologies? Whether it’s an issue related to their craft or beliefs about politics, economics or religion, it seems that humans just can’t seem to keep an open mind. And despite the fact that society has made fantastical advances in science and technology, human psychology seems to want to remain living in the past — a past ridden with repeated prejudice, hate and violence. Somewhere in our history, mankind has made a wrong turn and it still hasn’t been able to develop or act on the kind of insight that would move us away from what seems like constant conflict.

“Kill the Wabbit! Kill the Wabbit!” — Chuck Jones’s comical masterpiece What’s Opera Doc deliciously captures the plight of human existence.

As artists, we’ve been privileged to partial insight due to a heightened sensitivity to the deeper rhythms of the universe. But we don’t possess total insight for we remain vulnerable to the pangs of our ego, which endlessly tries to lead us astray; greed, fear and vanity plague the artist as much as the next person. That said, creative people can see with a higher level of precision the immense beauty of the world and can help others to discover it. But they can also more readily see the darker side — the irrational ugliness that is the result of our selfish behaviour. Perhaps this explains why artists can seem so positively inspiring but also so depressed, appear immeasurably grand and generous one moment while at other times come across as narcissistic or self-indulgent. This gift and plight of the artist has been duly noted by the greatest of thinkers from Aristotle to Krishnamurti. While in tradional eastern cultures artists were seen to possess both knowledge and wisdom, western thinkers such as psychologist Carl Jung were often confused by and critical of artists, citing them as neurotic or even demonic, the gift of insight accompanied by the curse of mental suffering.

Saraswati, the Hindu goddess of the arts, knowledge and wisdom.

So what is the creative person to do? To maintain a modicum of sanity, I suspect the artist must find balance in his life; he must continue his development of this fine sensibility while reducing the level of selfishness. It’s a tricky proposition. The artist needs to express himself (the word expression coming from the root word meaning to press out or press on) because if he doesn’t he will not only feel unfulfilled, but be haunted by his daemon*. At the same time he must be careful not to be overwhelmed with what he sees and experiences. Should success or failure reveal itself, he can not and must not personalize it too much, for therein lies the danger; excessive thinking and personal attachment clouds the mind and burdens the heart.

* today the word “daemon” has been culturally distorted to mean demon or devil, as in “the devil made me do it.” In Greek origin, it was meant to relate to the bestowed actions of the supernatural or divine intervention.

Famed illustrator Normal Rockwell was always busy creating and did so late into old age. I believe that to him work and play were synonymous with each other.

I slept and dreamt that life was joy.

I awoke and saw that life was duty.

I worked and behold, duty was joy. 

— Rabindranath Tagore, Poet

For myself as an artist, I can only say I keep things as simple as possible. Big lists and fantastical ambitions might sound inspirational and in alignment with the so-called “American Dream” but it’s too easy to get lost in all that and forget about the process, which is what really matters most. Therefore, I spend most of my attention on being attentive, and to do so on the few things that I find matter. In essence, I work daily to keep my mind empty and clear, my body strong and flexible, and expend the rest of my energy towards creating. To some, that might sound like work or duty, and depending on how one defines those words, I guess it is. To me, that’s living and life worth living — a lifetime devoted to looking, listening and learning thru doing. But we can only do so effectively by possessing a mind that looks free of prejudice, eyes that listen in deep awareness, and a humble intellect that triggers the courage to take action. Anything else that comes as a by-product of such living — increased knowledge, enhanced skills/ability, wealth or social respect — are ultimately insubstantial and irrelevant. After all, virtue is its own reward.

As a difficult year approaches its end, I’d like to extend my blessings to all my readers a future occupied with looking, listening and learning and to love every moment of living in such manner.

… the ability to learn in this way is a principle common to the whole of humanity. Thus it is well known that a child learns to walk, to talk, and to know his way around the world just by trying something out and seeing what happens, then modifying what he does (or thinks) in accordance with what has actually happened. In this way, he spends his first few years in a wonderfully creative way, discovering all sorts of things that are new to him, and this leads people to look back on childhood as a kind of lost paradise. As the child grows older, however, learning takes on a narrower meaning. In school, he learns by repetition to accumulate knowledge, so as to please the teacher and pass examinations. At work, he learns in a similar way, so as to make a living, or for some other utilitarian purpose, and not mainly for the love of the action of learning itself. So his ability to see something new and original gradually dies away. And without it there is evidently no ground from which anything can grow. ― David Bohm