A Collage of Thoughts on Art and Process Work

The art in this article was created by the author.

The aspect of art that most attracts and interests me is the indefinable quality that moves the artist during the creative process and influences observers long after contact with the piece of art. Art as expression is much more than the object of art itself. One definition of art is that the degree to which an object is considered art is related to the artist's capacity to capture and express the essence of an experience.

This definition becomes especially interesting when considering art from the perspective of Process Work, or looking at Process Work from the perspective of art. I would like to focus on the following aspects of this definition:

1. The artist's creative process;
2. The captured experience, or the art object;
3. The art object's power to touch and influence similar areas of experience in the observer;
4. The intriguing similarities of art and Process Work.

What is the magic of art that touches us and draws our attention? Art can help us question habitual perceptions and reawaken our senses to the world around us. Art can express beauty and bring awe back into everyday life; it can portray ugliness and awaken us to disturbing situations we have come to consider "normal." Art can touch our essence and transform a moment into communion with what we might call the divine. Art can celebrate life, introduce new worldviews and challenge our senses. Expressionism and Cubism did this through subordinating "reality" to the expression of emotional experience. In other words, art connects us to new or forgotten worlds.

Art's influence is often profound and far-reaching. Novel artistic ideas often appear simultaneously with other large transformations, leaving irrevocable changes in the world. For example, when Expressionism and Cubism introduced another way of perceiving reality, ground-breaking thinking was also occurring in the areas of philosophy, psychology and physics. The causal view of reality was expanding into a less causal, more quantum-mechanistic way of perceiving reality. Because the nature of art is to search beyond consensus reality, it can absorb and express emerging trends of the times we live in long before these new ideas are absorbed into mainstream consciousness. One example of this is the work of avant-garde architects and designers in the 1950s and 1960s. Their aerodynamic space designs remain the primary inspiration behind current home, automobile and furniture design.

Art has the ability to excite and stimulate us, fill us with hope, wonder and inspiration. It can also annoy, irritate and disturb the status quo. Art finds fertile ground for inspiration at the edge of consensus reality.

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The artist

Generally, it seems that everyday life experience is not highly stimulating to creativity. Artists are often attracted to the incongruences of consensus reality, to poignant or contradictory moments, beauty, dirt and the incomprehensible. An artist's birthright includes license to express what is outside of consensus reality without the audience taking too much offense.

Since the rational world rarely inspires the artist, the total expression of an art object is much deeper than what first meets the eye. Inspired artists leave known spheres and enter other dimensions, capture and express experiences from other realms. The pieces of art which these artists produce speak to the same level in observers, bringing forth unusual perspectives on the familiar.

Artists hold certain similarities to shamans. Like shamans, many artists have a special sensitivity and love for the unknown, and travel between this reality and the dream-fantasy world. In the entanglement with the unknown, the inspired artist discovers the spirit in many forms: figures emerge from the uncarved block, pictures appear on blank canvas, tunes fill the flute or vibrate through the strings of the violin.

Anthropologist Carlos Castaneda tells a story about how the Yaqui shaman don Juan teaches him to use his peripheral vision (Castaneda 1972). Using peripheral vision, Castaneda no longer sees the consensus reality version of his environment, but the power aspects, or spirit, of things. On one of their twilight walks, Castaneda suddenly gets scared because he glimpses a coyote. When he looks again, he is relieved that he actually saw only a branch. Don Juan gets very upset about Carlos' lack of attention to the other reality, and points out that from the other reality, it was a coyote, which Carlos lost the opportunity to experience.

Similarly, the artist, without analyzing or having fixed ideas about where the spirit of creation is leading, may see "coyotes." She has no goal: rather, her love and appreciation of becoming one with the unknown allows her to unfold what don Juan calls the nagual, or the other reality (Castaneda 1972). The artist is pulled to struggle and dance with the nagual, and finally to manifest the creative impulse in a medium. The result is not a coincidence, but a manifestation of this captured inner experience.

Gertrude Stein (1984) tells a related story in her book about Picasso. Picasso painted Stein's portrait in Paris. Despite repeated attempts, he could not express his experience of her face. Only after he returned from a trip to Africa, where he saw masks that fascinated him deeply, did he realize what he had been trying to capture. Previously he was not able to give form to this inner experience, to what don Juan would call the power aspect of her face.

Jytte Vikkelsoe

The observer

A couple of years ago, I met the nagual through some pigs. A Danish artist cut up and sewed back together a number of pigs, which were exhibited in the finest museum in Denmark and later sold for a large sum to a German museum. When I first heard about the pigs, I was appalled, and found cutting them up decadent and disrespectful. These pigs became a koan for me, challenging my moral and aesthetic values. They made me wonder about the "why" and "what for" behind the art event. I began to think deeply about living flesh and about how easily I can take for granted that awesome something that inhabits the flesh.

Is such an expression art or social activism? It is certainly different than the art of Rembrandt, Da Vinci, Michelangelo. Will anybody admire the remains of these pigs 100 years from now? Does it matter? When I finally saw pictures of the pigs, I was actually amazed by the aesthetics, spirit and challenge in these "sculptures." I said "yes" to them as art. The pigs became an unknown reality for me; they took me into an irrational world. They disturbed my status quo, and my everyday world changed after encountering them. In such ways, the observer is pulled into the experience of the nagual through the artist's ability to capture and express the essence of an other-worldly experience.

The muses and inspiration

Sartre, Picasso and Stein, to mention a few of many, hung out in the same Bohemian areas of Paris (Stein 1984). From my own experience of living in a Bohemian milieu for over a decade, I imagine they created an environment that celebrated and dwelled in the spirit of the unknown, a mysterious, fertile atmosphere that loosened and freed creative thinking and inspiration. This sort of atmosphere is a slightly altered and weird twilight zone between two realities, where one is no longer caught by the necessities of everyday reality. Like fish need water to swim in, an artist needs an atmosphere that frees the internal muse, that provides inspiration

In one of her short stories Karen Blixen (1974) describes a young writer's experience of fear, loneliness and despair when inspiration fails. Her character has just been celebrated for his first novel. He now feels an internal pressure to increase his fame by writing a second book even better than the first one. Not considering the effect goal-orientation has on inspiration, he is overwhelmed by fear. Convinced his muse has abandoned him, he believes he will never write another word. The writer grows close to suicide. In the depths of his despair, the struggle of depression and frustration becomes the very point around which inspiration accumulates. His artistic mind is fertilized and inspired by an experience bigger than himself, which once again opens him up to his muse.

Many creative people share a fear of losing contact with creativity and inspiration through making the unknown too known. Many artists have an intuitive sense that creativity has to be captured in its own realm. This perspective gives rise to a belief that if one starts working on problems psychologically, one will get "straightened out," lose contact with creativity, and return to a consensus hypnosis. This, in the artist's reality, means leaving the twilight zone of inspiration and creativity, with its freedom to explore and dance with the unknown. In this area Process Work offers the artist another view (see section on Process Work).

Art as a therapeutic tool

Most psychotherapies use language as their primary expressive modality. This preference may inhibit free expression, since the mind often judges and censors verbal content, leaving little room to freely explore the mysterious reaches of experience. Among other functions, art serves as a means of communication, fulfilling the same basic human need as verbalization. Art can thus be used as a tool to access material which the mind might censor. Art can be a vehicle for emotional expression, reflecting emotional states and unknown aspects of oneself.

For example, when I find myself stuck in relationships, not only unable to communicate what I am thinking but not even allowing myself to think, I often experiment with colors. Through my painting, unexpressed feelings and thoughts pop out, along with what I want to express, bringing me further insight into what blocked me and who lam.

Used as a therapeutic tool, art taps into our dreams and ultimately into our self-expression. Art as a treatment approach tends to be playful and non-threatening, able to navigate around the censoring mind and reach directly into the unconscious world. Depending on a client's experience and a therapist's tendencies, artistic approaches may include drama, dance, painting, singing or writing. Art can create a container that can "hold" individuals and support them in expressing themselves.

Every person seems to have a desire to communicate. Work with people in comas and other extreme states demonstrates that often part of the person is still available and wants to communicate (see Bernstein 1979; Mindell 1988,1989). Often, communication difficulties occur because the people around individuals in extreme states don't know how to communicate with people in these "unusual" states. Art can assist people to externalize feelings which cannot readily be expressed in speech but can be shared through a symbolic medium. The early art and dance therapists demonstrated this when they communicated with psychiatric patients through movement, dance and painting. Art therapy has been especially successful in reaching people in states outside consensus reality, i.e., schizophrenic states (Bernstein 1979). Nonverbal symbols can cut across communication barriers, providing a medium through which individuals can recall previous experiences, journey into undiscovered territory and communicate with the outer world.

Generally the medium of art offers a great tool for going beyond conventions, morals, fixed ideas and frozen situations. When an internal situation is given shape externally, it may be possible to relate to the experience in new ways. This provides an opportunity to stay with something difficult, painful or unknown without feeling stuck within the problem. Art can give the freedom to explore and mold a situation from novel angles, often creating experiences which lie beyond judgments of good or bad. Art can help the individual experience the essence of an event and describe its nature without getting overwhelmed by difficult emotions. This freedom may eventually bring forth the capacity to alter and transform the situation.

During difficult moments in my years as an artist and designer, my most useful tool was expressing my desperation through painting. In the middle of the creation, I never knew where it was going. I just followed the feeling of Tightness until the experience became rich, full and somehow complete. Something deeper and new emerged in me. I often felt a strong connection to a larger part of myself, a part that was less disturbed by the situation. On this level, transformation of the pain could happen. It didn't always last, since I didn't know how to bring new insights into other areas of my life (see section on Process Work). But for the moment I felt freer, and a sense of meaning entered my experience.

Jytte Vikkelsoe

Process Work and art

...I look for the absurd, the nonsensical thing in an individual or group, the thing which others ignore. I look for the spirit of the incomprehensible statement, gesture or error and then care for it and let it unfold...the gold lies in the messages we do not intend to send...thus the process-oriented mode is interesting because you must reverse your normal mode of consciousness. (Mindell 1992: 19)

Therapies that tend to stay within consensus reality miss the creativity found in the twilight-zone. Process Work, with its concept of the dreambody, the idea that part of us is always dreaming, supports and focuses on the unknown.¹ In this way, it is similar to the artistic process. Additionally, Process Work brings new perspectives to artistic expression.

While artists are intuitively sensitive to unknown aspects of life, Process Work offers other possibilities to access unknown areas through consciously identifying primary and secondary processes and edges.² These aspects of Process Work can assist in rapidly catching and unfolding creative energy. By consciously concentrating on mysterious, unknown or disturbing things which catch our attention, we can use disturbances as focus points for inspiration. Instead of hindering creativity, disturbances can open gates into creative worlds.

One way Process Work explores the unknown is through amplifying it. Amplification methods include expressing disturbances in color, movement or sound. For example, the process worker might ask, what is the "feeling" of a disturbance? How does it sound? Move? What color is it? Exploring the unknown through different means multiplies the possibilities of exploration for the artist and encourages more than one expressive modality. Also, exploring color by using movement and sound helps the artist really get to know the emerging creative energy.

Even while certain elements catch the artist's attention, the emerging experience as a whole is still unknown. Frequently, what fascinates the artist is also personally meaningful. On a therapeutic level, Process Work provides an opportunity to continue and complete the creative process to gain more awareness of oneself. After the artist creates an object, Process Work can be used to go on with the experience. A next step could be for the artist to experiment with becoming the object of art, to see how the experience of the created object relates to her life.

This may not be of interest from an artistic point of view, but it can provide enjoyment and insight for people who like to approach their lives as creative projects. Looking at the world from the viewpoint of the piece of art, or finding how this art is trying to manifest in one's life, can be fun. The artistic process also offers a helpful approach to problems, often providing » sustainable solutions to difficult situations. Remember my example about painting my pain? I experienced some sense of relief through giving creative outer expression to my feelings. When interacting with my art, I can go further. I may discover how the point of view of the piece of art is meaningful, how it is relevant to my present life situation, and if it contains the beginning of a solution to my problem.

I remember a young woman who painted a big fat hen laying an egg; the egg was the world. She painted the hen out of a body experience of feeling too fat. Afterwards, she started to move around, experiencing being the hen. After she had been walking for a while, she started to speak from this experience:

This hen feels so well and at home on the earth. If I were like this hen, I wouldn't be afraid of the world. I would see it's just my egg developing. And as such, everything becomes my concern, not something to shy away from. Every hurt, every joy on this planet becomes my concern if I am the big mother hen.

The artist can be a model for the process worker as well. A process worker may tend to remain the observer and analyzer of mysterious material instead of helping the client live it. During the creative process, the artist becomes one with secondary experience. Like the riverbed, the artist is shaped by as well as shaping the stream of water. The artist is the medium for, as well as one with, the experience that is channeled through her creativity. Until its completion, the art object lives and breathes within the artist.

The known and the unknown in the creative process

The creative process can be described as shaping inner experiences into outer forms. The word creativity implies that something beyond mechanical skills is applied. Although most artists study extensively and practice for years, fine-tuning their skills, the creative process itself is actually something else. All people, regardless of their skill level, have an inherent source of creativity.

Because many of us have very fixed ideas about creativity and art, especially high art, it is easy to believe that art and creativity only appear in certain forms. When too much focus is placed on the outcome, aesthetics or craftsmanship of art, the creativity is stopped before it enters the unknown. The creative spirit needs freedom to unfold.

The artist identity, which enters the creative process with an intent to create, for example, a good picture, has to "die" in order to provide space for whatever wants to emerge. The most useful tools in letting go of ideas about what is "good" are attitudes like the beginner's mind, which sees everything for the first time, openness to all aspects of experience, and freedom to let go of familiar ideas.

The spirit of creation, the artist as process, rather than the artist as identity, spontaneously emerges through meeting with the unknown. The artist as a process allows, embraces, follows and serves the unknown, and then expresses it. Temporarily losing self-awareness, not having any idea of where things should go, just following the impulses of the moment, is being on track in the creative process. Once the spirit has been captured in its own realm, insights will come, and the expression can be completed and polished.

Edges

Even when the unknown is followed, the creative process may be interrupted by creative blocks or self-criticism, by what Process Work calls the edge. The edge is the significant moment where the process is stuck. There are no answers to questions of what to do, how to go on, where to turn the new creation. Momentarily, the boundary of the creative identity is reached, and all roads seem blocked. Fortunately, the edge concept adds another very significant piece of information to the situation. An edge can be crossed! Process Work offers both a framework and tools that support interaction with the situation of being stuck.

Awareness of edges in my artwork often comes through body experiences. As long as what I am doing increases energy in my body or excitement in my being, I know I am on track. When the energy decreases, I know I am off track and on some sort of edge, losing the creative impulse. I then return to the point where I started to lose my excitement and continue from there. The energy usually picks up again. Imagine making a collage, adding bit by bit. As the picture builds up, excitement builds as well. A few more pieces are added, and the collage suddenly starts to look too "normal," or to become a little too familiar. The tension in the f composition vanishes, and so does the excitement. Removing collage pieces until the visual image becomes an exciting challenge again helps me deal with my creative block. This helps me back into an experience of flow. Following my happiness about what I am doing through my body sensations is useful, as my eyes often criticize partially completed work.

Process Work offers other ways of dealing with edges. Changing the mode of expression, from color to movement or sound, or imagining how some great artist would continue at this point can be helpful. Sometimes the awareness that you are on an edge is enough to know exactly what to do next. At other times, the courage to try something outrageous may be the missing piece.

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Jytte Vikkelsoe

For the fun of it, imagine that Picasso reached an edge when he got stuck painting Gertrude Stein's face. From Stein's story it is clear there was something specific he wanted to express, which he was not able to do before he went to Africa. On his return, he immediately completed the face. The African masks brought him in touch with what he had been trying to grasp and express. A guess is that he must have known what it was all along and recognized it once he saw it. Who knows, if Picasso had known more about channel changes, he might have found the face by starting to dance and sing the energy he was trying to express in the picture. Perhaps an image of an African mask would have emerged.

The inner critic

Blocked creativity can also be related to internalized criticism. The inner critic personifies the ways we inhibit ourselves by telling ourselves that we're no good. Too much self-criticism freezes us within the realm of the known, where the critical aspect is in charge, leaving little space to further explore who we are.

Creating art, which follows no known path, is a pioneer's journey. The pioneer creates the path as she walks, leaving room for trial, error and individual expression. This provides an antidote to the inner critic, since it is difficult to judge the unknown. For this reason, art has always made me happy. Art provides amnesty from a strong inner critic. When inner work has a tendency to be dominated and structured by the inner critic, art can make it more playful and fun. Art can help to go beyond the critic. Conversely, inner work can help free the creativity when an inner critic inhibits it.

A couple of years ago, when Amy Mindell and I taught a class on Process Work and art, we did a fun experiment with the inner critic. Realizing that many people get stuck and blocked around the critic early in the creative process, we used a process-oriented idea to create an exercise. In this experiment, we transformed the inner critic into the artist. When the critic appeared, the trick was to listen to the critic and follow it as if it were the artist. For instance, someone was drawing and the critic suggested tearing up the picture because it was too stupid and awkward. The person followed the critic's instructions. Tearing up the drawing was not the end; the critic introduced an impulse that indicated a new direction and added to the creative process. Through the tearing, the drawing transformed into a sculpture. This exercise was very successful in leading the creative process into new areas. Many unusual pieces emerged, and the exercise gave everybody a new openness toward following all kinds of impulses that emerge during the creative process. Personally, it transformed and liberated my own creativity more than anything else has.

The process worker

My beginning definition of art stated that the degree to which an object is considered art is related to the capacity of the artist to capture and express the essence of an experience through her medium. Another way of saying this is that art equals the degree to which the unknown is given "life" or expression. This holds true for the art of Process Work as well. When she works with a body symptom or any other problem, the process worker uses a similar approach. The body symptom becomes the sculpture to be sculpted. The subjective experience of the symptom becomes the muse that leads the process worker beyond consensus reality into the nagual. Once the energy of the symptom emerges, it can be amplified through dance, sound and color until the message of the symptom is chiseled free. A new art piece is unveiled. Thus the process worker and/or client become both the artist and a living piece of art.

I chuckle inside as I imagine people walking around as art pieces with different colors, stripes, dots and funny things sticking out everywhere. A lot of behavior actually becomes much more understandable from this perspective! In a sense this is what Process Work is about. People go beyond ideas about who they are, and unique angles of creation emerge, taking shape, form and color through their work. The individual makes sense in new and unique ways. Like a piece of art, the dreambody is sculpted, painted, danced or sung according to the individual. The observer who witnesses this transformation is pulled in by the essence of the expression, recognizing parallels to her own uniqueness.

Notes

Secondary: All the verbal and nonverbal signals in an individual's expressions with which the individual does not identify and would probably disavow if asked about.

Edge: The experience of not being able to do something, being limited, hindered from or scared of accomplishing, thinking or communicating. The edge separates the primary process from the secondary.

References

Bernstein, Penny, ed. Eight Theoretical Approaches in Dance Movement Therapy», Vol. 2. Dubuque, IA: Kendall/Hunt, 1979.

Blixen, Karen. Vintereventyr. Copenhagen: Gyldendal, 1974.

Castaneda, Carlos. Journey to Ixtlan. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1972.

Mindell, Amy and Mindell, Arnold. Riding the Horse Backwards. London: Penguin-Arkana, 1992.

Mindell, Arnold. City Shadows: Psychological Interventions in Psychiatry. London: Rout-ledge & Kegan Paul, 1988.

Mindell, Arnold. Coma: Key to Awakening. London: Penguin- Arkana, 1989.

Stein, Gloria. Picasso. New York: Dover Publications, 1984.

Jytte Vikkelsoe is a diploma candidate studying the art of Process Work. She is writing a dissertation on moral values and crime prevention. Jytte has a background in art and design and spent many years in an artists' community.