Feng Shui and Creativity

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Feng Shui has been quite popular in California for the past few years. Feng Shui is composition in a house. Just as there are natural movements of the eye over a piece of sculpture or across the surface of a painting, there are natural pathways for the body to move through a house. Walking into a room, sitting in a chair, how easy is it to do? Is there a lot of clutter around? Is the path to the chair open or blocked by other items of furniture? Good Feng Shui is good composition of movement.

Before orchestrating movement, a Feng Shui consultant will look at is the amount of clutter in a space. This can be visual clutter or actual stuff all over the place. In my studio, it was visual clutter because of all of the open shelving units I had holding supplies. There is nothing extraneous in my studio. The "clutter" was not due to "pack-rat-resistence" to clearing things out. Everything has a use. Putting up elegant curtains cut down on the visual clutter in the space and made the room feel bigger. Cutting down on visual clutter helps to calm the mind and leads to clear thought. That's good for creativity.

Madeline (an artist who also does interior design for lofts) gave me the raw silk for the feng shui comparison pictures of the studio space on the front page of this site. I said, "Silk in the studio?!!" Madeline said, "WHY NOT?!" Then she went on to add that silk is a very strong, durable fiber and also filters energy. After living with it for a while now, I agree. The space is much cleaner feeling and the energy in here is very clear. I'm enjoying it immensely. The shimmer of the curtains in the light is extremely beautiful. As my psyche delights in the beauty of my surroundings, you can imagine how my creative process would be affected. (You can read more about my interactions with Madeline in the Minature Worlds link below).

I pay attention to the environment as it has an effect on what I produce. I use specifically choosen music as an ambiance when I am working. I work with recorded Mantras (Om Tara), listen to teachings by Thich Nhat Hahn, His Holiness the Dalai Lama, and Aramaic translations from Douglas Klotz on Christian Mysticism. Listenting to spiritual teachings while painting has an effect on my work. Many people have commented at exhibitions that my work looks spiritual. The reason is that what is in the mind and emotions of an artist while working will be imbued in the work. I want to put the highest and clearest of visions out into the world; thoughts of beauty and the higher potentials for human evolution. In order to imbue my work with these ideas, I listen to these ideas while working. I also listen to music. Again, I choose music that is uplifting. Mozart is excellent. Steven Helpern, The Harmonic Choir, Gregorian Chant and Hildegarde Von Bingen are very good. I'm always searching for celestially uplifting sounds. My latest is to work with the music of Jacotte Collette. Her music was intuitively composed and works to balance the functioning of the right and left brain. I have been doing some experiments with paint and color using her music in the studio and the results have been very intriguing. I have started to use my left hand while painting and my colors have gotten immensely brighter.