Driving home through the mountains of northern LA last night, I heard a rock block of Little Richard on a local radio station. I forgot how hard he rocks, and the contagiousness of his excitement.
He played a live version of Born on the Bayou (circa 1970s I think?), a song originally written and recorded by Credence Clearwater. To introduce the song, and give it his Little Richard flair, he opens with a story about his own poor, but happy childhood, and his rise to success.
He tells his audience of enthusiastic, active listeners about being called to music. His monologue is delivered with a lot of charisma and effervescent joy- a Little Richard trademark.
The part that caught me was a moment in which he acknowledged that at times his hyperproductivity and wide musical range have confused his audience. He says,
“People always ask me, ‘Richard, how come you change your mind so much? How come you do so many different things?’” (1:25)
The implication is that if you do too many things creatively, you must be somehow unfocused or confused about what drives you as an artist. As a podcaster, blogger, and painter who changes her work every few years, this question calls out one of my biggest fears - that by doing too many different things, none of it will be recognized, valued, or understood.
But then, the revelation:
And I tell them, all my life I’ve done the same thing: spread love and happiness, and the kind of excitement that shapes the world!” (1:38)
YES, I thought. Thank you for saying that, I think I even said out loud.
What unifies our artistic practice is us, or rather me, you, the artist who is making the art and the feeling behind it. Whether you do painting, writing, singing, or dancing - it’s all coming from the person who has walked the earth for X number of years and is now telling their story via whatever medium to, as Little Richard says, spread love to the world. In grad school, I had at least one professor that I remember say this to me, but at the time I believed it but wasn’t ready to act on it. Would the world accept the multitudes that my creativity contained?
This sentiment also made me think a lot about what brings us into art and writing in the first place - a pure drive to create. And how there is pressure as we get older to fit our creations into a consumable package once we are invited to do the thing seriously, possibly for a living. It can feel disheartening and confusing to try and communicate the bigger picture of your creative vision to others, especially when you are passionate about more than one creative enterprise.
Even just within my painting practice, my work changes every couple years.
While I envy someone like Brice Marden, whose approach to a studio practice was to expand on a theme for the last 30 years of his career, I just don’t operate that way. I have to go in feeling like every day is a blank slate or I will start to get hives at the thought of all the limitations.
I have to respond to the world, and my inner-most feelings - both of which will change depending on where I am in my life. When my worldview is hit by a force majeur like covid, the loss of a parent, or a major move, it feels natural to change my subject matter, my color palette, and maybe even my medium.
The tension comes when the demands of the market, and the way that information is communicated over social media to our tiny attention spans, starts to influence the way we make work - or get recognized. We as artists can feel expected, encouraged, or even explicitly pressured to make a certain kind of work. We are supposed to find our lane and stay in it until people take notice. And then even more so once they do take notice because of the various institutions that want their investments to stay of value. And I guess I can’t blame them. We all live within a capitalist society and if you want to make art for a living, you can’t be naive about the forces that drive the machine.
But what would it look like to have a career where the main goal was to spread joy and happiness? Would we need all the strategy and branding? Or would the work find its way and tell its own story? What if we decided we are just players in the game of capitalism, but not defined by it?
These are the propositions that Little Richard offers in his short, but inspirational little speech/sermon. What if the unifier is not some high-brow concept but a desire to spread joy and love to a world that desperately needs it?
Just some small thoughts over coffee this morning, no biggie.
Side note - Doing research for this piece I found that Little Richard (RIP) throughout his life was outspoken about his identity as a gay man, and then towards the end of his life made homophobic statements after becoming a born-again Christian. I don’t want readers to misinterpret this post as a support of his politics. It’s sad, really, considering the message of spreading love that led him to music, and the pro-LGBTQ+ stance that he embodied throughout much of his career. Humans are complicated.
Happenings:
SAVE THE DATE | The Side Woo x ICA SF: a live panel conversation about creativity and the blocks that get in the way. I will be hosting guests Rupy C. Tut, Cate White, and Heesoo Kwon to talk about their creative journeys and the tricks they have learned for getting over creative obstacles. Sunday, November 5, 3-5pm at the ICA San Francisco. Free to all. (More details coming soon)
New weekly tarot reading for artists released every Sunday on The Side Woo, my Youtube channel and a new TikTok account @the.side.woo