Mary Stewart lectured about creativity, but it was more of a workshop than a lecture. I was struck by a lot of the phrases that she used or ways she described things without stating them outright. She talked about creativity as a way of being "born" every day, of "piercing the mundane" or "having new eyes." She said that sometimes we focus on finding an answer to a question or problem that we don't realize that the question is more important, she urged us to "get rid of answers you already know."
She gave good advice like "try failing more" and "never hope more than you work." She also discussed Robert Frank's photography project, The Americans. Last year I saw this exhibit at the National gallery in DC and then again at the San francisco museum of modern art and it was especially inspiring to me. She made the point that Robert Frank took 27000 photographs for a book of 83 images. She also brought up several different ways of problem solving. She said, "The best ideas start at a place beyond conciousness."
During the lecture, I started remembering a lot of art that has been inspiring to me and scribbled a lot of artist names in the margins of my notebook. This came at a time when I was struggling with the vector self portrait project and it was really helpful in clearing up some of that frustration.
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