I mentioned recently how getting involved in a number of indie film projects has taught me a lot about filmmaking. Well, that’s true in a number of ways.
The Sociality of Filmmaking
Tag: creativity
Delany on “Talented Writing”
Marc Laidlaw recently shared a link on Facebook to a post on “Good Writing vs. Talented Writing”over on Brainpickings featuring some ideas by Samuel Delany. Essentially, Delany draws a line between “good writing” and superior “talented writing”: The talented writer often uses specifics and avoids generalities — generalities that his or her specifics suggest. Because they are suggested, rather than stated, they may register with the reader far more forcefully than if they were articulated. Using specifics to imply generalities — whether they are general emotions we all know or ideas we have all vaguely sensed —is dramatic writing. A trickier proposition …
Miss Jiwaku’s Film
I’ve never really participated in a filmmaking project involving people who knew what they were doing, and who wanted to make a successful film; I did teach a pilot class where students made a pseudo-documentary, but some of the people involved had lukewarm interest in the project, and none of us were properly trained in filmmaking. However, this weekend I participated (as a camera operator) in the filming of a short film (written and directed by Miss Jiwaku). I feel like logging my impressions, as well as what I learned from the experience; but since that’s not everyone’s cup of …
Jah Wobble on Balance, Another Lovely Subway Encounter, and a Countdown
I was listening to Jah Wobble’s album of William Blake-inspired music, which starts with this track: Doing a little more investigation, I found a neat interview with Wobble from around the time he put that out. He talks a lot about the struggle to balance anger and integrity with the mental, emotional refreshment and grounding that one needs in order to be creative: He’s right: a certain degree of anger and honesty is energizing, but too much of it will just embitter you, and I know I’m certainly on the unbalanced side of it — and I know how it …
Pearls Before Swine, Or, The Time Has Come to Saw off the Brakes
You know. You know better. You know most people would rather eat what they always eat, think what they’ve always thought, drink what they’ve always drunk, read what they’ve always read. You know that so many people have no idea how interesting a world of diversity and difference is. They say “Everyone does it this way,” whether explicitly or implicitly, because they wish everyone was just as boring as they are. So many people — is it wrong to say most? I’m not sure it is — couldn’t be bothered. They’d rather just stay in their rut. It’s comfortable, it’s …
Expatriates and Creative Bitching
I’ve often got this song on a loop in my MP3 these days when I ride the subways: Before you read the following, seriously, listen to this song, check out the lyrics, of which the following passage grabbbed me (hard, by wrist) when I first heard it: I understand the culture’s Of a different kind, But here [the] word celebration Just doesn’t come to mind! This resonates with me in the context of the story the song tells: a band that describes itself, in its early days, as “a bunch of immigrants jamming” who met at “a Russian wedding in …
Could I Get a Class To Do This?
I wonder. Saw a link on Boing-Boing for the product of the Stanford Graphic Novel Project, a graphic novel titled Shake Girl which is online for free here. Read it in one sitting. True story. Very sad. Good stuff. Make me wonder whether I could get my students to do something that good in a semester. Too bad I don’t have an elementary writing course anymore, it’d be a cool project. Perhaps I’ll pitch it for next semester, though I think it’s too late to get approval for such a thing, and this is my last semester here.
Oddunout: On the pain and pleasure of creating
In Laura’s post Oddunout: On the pain and pleasure of creating, I found something quite interesting. She discussed the offensiveness to her of sneakily using others’ creative works within her own works: So I had this conversation with the Dutch about the picture I was/am working on, and I was saying how I’d already spent like 20 hours on it, and I still didn’t have the map the way I wanted it to be. Being a programmer (or whatever it is he does, exactly), he suggested I could find a map I liked and just steal it for my own …
What is Art? What is an Artist? Does It Matter?
I posted about this over on New Sophists’ Almanac, but I cannot resist also posting about it here. There’s a woman named Judith Scott who produces all kinds of “fiber art”, which isn’t really remarkable in itself (unless you happen to find that the artworks speak to you in a wway that they simply don’t speak to me…). Nothing remarkable at all, actually, can be said about her, except… she’s got Down’s Syndrome, severe mental handicaps, some physical handicaps too. And she very likely has no concept of art that would be recognizable to us. And yet she works at …