No More Secondhand Art

by LONDON, PETER

• ISBN13: 9780877734826
• ISBN10: 0877734828
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Trade Paper
• Copyright: 1989-11-18
• Publisher: Shambhala

Summary

This book is about using art as an instrument of personal transformation, enabling us to move from an inherited to a chosen state of being. Peter London offers inspiration and fresh ideas to artists, art students, and art teachers-as well as to people who think they can't draw a straight line but want to explore the joys of creative expression. Inside every person, he believes, there is an original, creative self that has been covered over by secondhand ideas, borrowed beliefs, and conditioned behavior. By freeing the capacity for visual expression-a natural human language possessed by everyone-we can awaken and release the full powers of that original self. Among the topics and exercises included are: How to increase the ability to visualize, fantasize, and dream Obstacles to the creative encounter and what to do about them Experimenting with art media as true mediators between imagination and expression Making masks to reveal the hidden self Painting with "forbidden" colors Arranging found objects as metaphors for one's life

Author Biography

Peter London—painter, author, art educator, and art therapist—has taught the approach presented in this and other books to thousands of students, ranging from teens to octogenarians, from "art phobics" to professional artists. Professor Emeritus at the University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth, and a 2002 Distinguished Fellow at the National Art Education Association, he lives in Fairhaven, Massachusetts.

Table of Contents

Preface	xiii
Acknowledgments	xvii
Introduction	3	(4)
Drawing from Within: Rediscovering the Transformative Powers of Art	7	(35)
The Creative Enterprise as a Journey	7	(1)
Beyond Beauty and Novelty	8	(6)
Inside, Not Out	14	(5)
Toward Meaning, Not Beauty	19	(3)
On the Difficulty of ``Capturing Life''	22	(4)
Exiting and Reentering the Ordinary World	26	(8)
Art and Life: A Necessary Isomorphism	34	(2)
Art and Unpredictability	36	(1)
Representation, Abstraction: A False Dichotomy	37	(5)
Advice to the Journeyman	42	(36)
No More Secondhand Art	42	(1)
Uncovering the Original Me	43	(2)
No One Knows Better than You	45	(2)
Self-full, Not Selfish	47	(1)
Dreams: Our First and Native Language	48	(1)
A Map Is Not a Journey	49	(3)
See for Yourself	52	(3)
Am I Good Enough?	55	(1)
Beyond Right and Wrong	56	(4)
Beyond Interpretation	60	(6)
Neither Judgment nor Interpretation: Description	66	(8)
Seeking and Finding the World	74	(4)
Designing Creative Encounters	78	(33)
The Nature of the Encounter: Introductory Remarks	78	(1)
Elements of Transformative Rituals	78	(11)
Daring to Be New	80	(1)
On Not Knowing	80	(2)
Bearing Witness	82	(3)
Being There	85	(1)
You Are Both Agent and Subject of Change	86	(1)
Stopping the World	87	(1)
Solitude and Communion	88	(1)
Responding from Within	89	(1)
The Subject of Creative Encounters	90	(1)
Universal Application	91	(1)
Nonrhetorical	92	(1)
Depth Rather than Correctness	93	(2)
Beyond Memory and Illustration	95	(4)
Feelings	99	(1)
Sequencing	100	(5)
Timing	105	(1)
Approaching Closure	106	(1)
Closure	107	(4)
Twelve Creative Encounters	111	(58)
Introduction	111	(2)
Metaphoric Objects	113	(5)
Seeking Your Natural Mark	118	(6)
Going to the Infinite Well	124	(4)
Visual Dialogues	128	(4)
Forbidden Colors	132	(5)
Yin/Yang	137	(5)
To the Land of Peace and Well-Being: Guided Imagery	142	(7)
The Nub of You	149	(3)
Janus Masks	152	(5)
Eden Lost and Regained	157	(5)
Random Acts of Kindness, Senseless Gifts of Beauty	162	(3)
Becoming New	165	(4)
Media	169	(15)
Not Art Supplies---Media	169	(7)
Media and the Sacred	176	(1)
Media in the Service of Expression	177	(4)
Papers I Have Known	181	(3)
Commencement	184	(5)
Will You Join the Dance?	184	(1)
On Returning to Old Friends, in New Ways	185	(4)
Notes	189	(2)
References	191