Whatever diminishes constraint, diminishes strength · 2009-10-18 19:10
“For me, drawing is an inquiry, a way of finding out – the first thing that I discover is that I do not know. This is alarming even to the point of momentary panic. Only experience reassures me that this encounter with my own ignorance – with the unknown – is my chosen and particular task, and provided I can make the required effort the rewards may reach the unimaginable.”
“The very bleakness and constraints of this uncharted land seemed to hold an attractive potential, as Stravinsky claimed in Poetics of Music: ‘My freedom will be so much the greater and more meaningful the more narrowly I limit my field of action and the more I surround myself with obstacles. Whatever diminishes constraint, diminishes strength. The more constraints one imposes, the more one frees one’s self of the chains that shackle the spirit.’”
Bridget Riley on drawing and the creative process, in the LRB.
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Isn’t this the same reason why blogging (and later, microblogging) got so popular? Constraints of the blog format proved to create lots of innovation…