What Artists Want

  • To grow as artists: continuous learning, knowledge of tools, techniques and styles
  • To work with people who provoke and inspire our imaginations and move us beyond the comfort of our current abilities and station
  • To produce memorable work that touches people’s hearts, changes their world view and moves them to power in their lives
  • To gain mastery of our craft through diligence, hard work, accountability and opportunity
  • To create “new” things that advance the state of the art of storytelling and the mythology of our time
  • To be valued and respected for our talents and dedication to our craft

The most challenging and revealing elements of “being” an artist are embodied in these statements from Carl Jung. Although he, from another era, uses the word “man” – his words, I think,  apply to all artists. (Please substitute the words “human” and “humankind” for “man” and “mankind”).

In Jung’s view, art is not what we do – it is Who We Are:

  • “As a human being the artist may have many moods and a will and personal aims, but as an artist he is ‘man’ in a higher sense – he is ‘collective man’ – one who carries and shapes the unconscious, psychic life of mankind.”
  • “Art is a kind of innate drive that seizes a human being and makes him its instrument. The artist is not a person endowed with free will who seeks his own ends, but one who allows art to realize its purposes through him… There are hardly any exceptions to the rule that a person must pay dearly for the divine gift of the creative fire”
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