I hate being photographed #Bran

I've started creating pain-less portrait sessions for you who hates being photographed. If you avoid the camera, refuse to have your photo taken, never appear in family photos, are always the one taking the photos, whatever the reason just don't have beautiful photos of YOU for keepsakes... this is for you...

Elizabeth Gilbert on magical ideas

Love this. An extract from Elizabeth Gilbert's new book, Big Magic on the mystical, transcendent world of ideas.

"I believe that our planet is inhabited not only by animals and plants and bacteria and viruses, but also by ideas. Ideas are a disembodied, energetic life-form. They are completely separate from us, but capable of interacting with us – albeit strangely. Ideas have no material body, but they do have consciousness, and they most certainly have will. Ideas are driven by a single impulse: to be made manifest. And the only way an idea can be made manifest in our world is through collaboration with a human partner. It is only through a human’s efforts that an idea can be escorted out of the ether and into the realm of the actual.

Therefore, ideas spend eternity swirling around us, searching for available and willing human partners. (I’m talking about all ideas here: artistic, scientific, industrial, commercial, ethical, religious, political.)

When an idea thinks it has found somebody – say, you – who might be able to bring it into the world, the idea will pay you a visit. It will try to get your attention. Mostly, you will not notice. This is likely because you’re so consumed by your own dramas, anxieties, distractions, insecurities, and duties that you aren’t receptive to inspiration.

You might miss the signal because you’re watching TV, or shopping, or brooding over how angry you are at somebody, or pondering your failures and mistakes, or just generally really busy. The idea will try to wave you down (perhaps for a few moments; perhaps for a few months; perhaps even for a few years), but when it finally realises that you’re oblivious to its message, it will move on to someone else.

But sometimes – rarely, but magnificently – there comes a day when you’re open and relaxed enough to actually receive something. Your defences might slacken and your anxieties might ease, and then magic can slip through. The idea, sensing your openness, will start to do its work on you. It will send the universal physical and emotional signals of inspiration (the chills up the arms, the hair standing up on the back of the neck, the nervous stomach, the buzzy thoughts, that feeling of falling into love or obsession). The idea will organise coincidences and portents to tumble across your path, to keep your interest keen. You will start to notice all sorts of signs pointing you towards the idea. Everything you see and touch and do will remind you of the idea. The idea will wake you up in the middle of the night and distract you from your everyday routine. The idea will not leave you alone until it has your fullest attention.

And then, in a quiet moment, it will ask, “Do you want to work with me?”

At this point, you have two options for how to respond.

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU SAY NO

The simplest answer, of course, is just to say no.

Then you’re off the hook. The idea will eventually go away and – congratulations! – you don’t need to bother creating anything.

To be clear, this is not always a dishonorable choice. True, you might sometimes decline inspiration’s invitation out of laziness, angst, insecurity or petulance. But other times you might need to say no to an idea because it is truly not the right moment, or because you’re already engaged in a different project, or because you’re certain that this particular idea has accidentally knocked on the wrong door.

I have many times been approached by ideas that I know are not right for me, and I’ve politely said to them: “I’m honoured by your visitation, but I’m not your girl. May I respectfully suggest that you call upon, say, Barbara Kingsolver?” (I always try to use my most gracious manners when sending an idea away; you don’t want word getting around the universe that you’re difficult to work with.) Whatever your response, though, do be sympathetic to the poor idea. Remember: All it wants is to be realised. It’s trying its best. It seriously has to knock on every door it can.

So you might have to say no.

When you say no, nothing happens at all.

Mostly, people say no.

Most of their lives, most people just walk around, day after day, saying no, no, no, no, no.

Then again, some day you just might say yes.

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU SAY YES

If you do say yes to an idea, now it’s showtime.

Now your job becomes both simple and difficult. You have officially entered into a contract with inspiration, and you must try to see it through, all the way to its impossible-to-predict outcome.

You may set the terms for this contract however you like. In contemporary western civilisation, the most common creative contract still seems to be one of suffering.

This is the contract that says, I shall destroy myself and everyone around me in an effort to bring forth my inspiration, and my martyrdom shall be the badge of my creative legitimacy.

If you choose to enter into a contract of creative suffering, you should try to identify yourself as much as possible with the stereotype of the Tormented Artist. You will find no shortage of role models. To honor their example, follow these fundamental rules: Drink as much as you possibly can; sabotage all your relationships; wrestle so vehemently against yourself that you come up bloodied every time; express constant dissatisfaction with your work; jealously compete against your peers; begrudge anybody else’s victories; proclaim yourself cursed (not blessed) by your talents; attach your sense of self-worth to external rewards; be arrogant when you are successful and self-pitying when you fail; honour darkness above light; die young; blame creativity for having killed you.

Does it work, this method?

Yeah, sure. It works great. Till it kills you.

So you can do it this way if you really want to. (By all means, do not let me or anyone else ever take away your suffering, if you’re committed to it!) But I’m not sure this route is especially productive, or that it will bring you or your loved ones enduring satisfaction and peace. I will concede that this method of creative living can be extremely glamorous, and it can make for an excellent biopic after you die, so if you prefer a short life of tragic glamour to a long life of rich satisfaction (and many do), knock yourself out.

However, I’ve always had the sense that the muse of the tormented artist – while the artist himself is throwing temper tantrums – is sitting quietly in a corner of the studio, buffing its fingernails, patiently waiting for the guy to calm down and sober up so everyone can get back to work.

Because in the end, it’s all about the work, isn’t it? Or shouldn’t it be?

And maybe there’s a different way to approach it?

May I suggest one?

A DIFFERENT WAY

A different way is to co-operate fully, humbly, and joyfully with inspiration.

This is how I believe most people approached creativity for most of history, before we decided to get all La Bohème about it. You can receive your ideas with respect and curiosity, not with drama or dread. You can clear out whatever obstacles are preventing you from living your most creative life, with the simple understanding that whatever is bad for you is probably also bad for your work. You can lay off the booze a bit in order to have a keener mind. You can nourish healthier relationships in order to keep yourself undistracted by self-invented emotional catastrophes. You can dare to be pleased sometimes with what you have created. (And if a project doesn’t work out, you can always think of it as having been a worthwhile and constructive experiment.) You can resist the seductions of grandiosity, blame, and shame. You can support other people in their creative efforts, acknowledging the truth that there’s plenty of room for everyone. You can measure your worth by your dedication to your path, not by your successes or failures. You can battle your demons (through therapy, recovery, prayer or humility) instead of battling your gifts – in part by realising that your demons were never the ones doing the work, anyhow. You can believe that you are neither a slave to inspiration nor its master, but something far more interesting – its partner – and that the two of you are working together towards something intriguing and worthwhile. You can live a long life, making and doing really cool things the entire time. You might earn a living with your pursuits or you might not, but you can recognise that this is not really the point. And at the end of your days, you can thank creativity for having blessed you with a charmed, interesting, passionate existence.

That’s another way to do it.

Totally up to you.

Sir Ken Robinson, educationalist

A morning chatting to Sir Ken Robinson about the importance of lifelong curiosity, and how our destinies are guided by imagination – the wellspring of creativity.

Full interview at imaginomics.org.uk

© Alexandra Dao

© Alexandra Dao

“Our lives are a constant process of improvisation – what you find inside yourself and what you create around yourself”
— Sir Ken Robinson
“Everyone’s life is full of these dog-leg curves, and there’s a good reason for it, which is that we create our own lives. The best evidence for imagination and creativity is your own biography”
— Sir Ken Robinson
“Our lives are a constant process of improvisation – what you find inside yourself and what you create around yourself”
— Sir Ken Robinson
“Imagination is what sets us apart”
— Sir Ken Robinson
“We’ve been bought up to think there is a fundamental divide between intellect and emotion, but there really isn’t”
— Sir Ken Robinson
“Imagination is the stuff of human intelligence, and creativity is the executive wing of imagination, it’s putting imagination to work”
— Sir Ken Robinson
“Some people watch apples fall from trees and don’t care, but Newton couldn’t get over it! ”
— Sir Ken Robinson
“Life is its own meaning, and we can construct our own purpose within it”
— Sir Ken Robinson
“This is a package deal – body, soul, mind, spirit, it’s all one. We are not software”
— Sir Ken Robinson
“Inspiration is a cocktail of curiosity. A big part of becoming more creative as you grow up is remaining curious”
— Sir Ken Robinson
“For me, life is simply about being here – we have all these sensibilities and capacities and it’s enough to ask what we can do with our common humanity to make life more congenial and fulfilling”
— Sir Ken Robinson

Alastair Thain, photographer

I chatted over lunch to internationally acclaimed photographer and artist Alastair Thain about society, education and how imagination can change the world. His latest project is a manifesto for empathy entitled ’10 Studies of Love and Everyday Cruelty’.

See full interview at www.imaginomics.org.uk

©Alexandra Dao

©Alexandra Dao

“It seems to me that creativity, empathy, consideration and the value of social connections should be the foundations of education”
— Alastair Thain
“Whether you are an artist or a genocidal imperialist or a religious leader, you are driven to find a sense of meaning and purpose.”
— Alastair Thain
“I don’t think you’ll ever meet anyone who shines creatively who hasn’t been encouraged to pursue a passion through love, affection, happiness and joy”
— Alastair Thain
“There is something inherent in British culture that is both very individualistic and very creative. And this is despite the elites and the government, not because of them.”
— Alastair Thain
“Every human being has the possibility to improve and develop themselves and society”
— Alastair Thain
“Let’s understand that all our social constructs are imagined and synthetic, and only exist in our brains. Let’s see the world as it really is, a precious gift.”
— Alastair Thain
“The free-thinking evolution of creativity from early childhood will be enormously beneficial at helping us create realities driven by the full beauty of our consciousness”
— Alastair Thain
“It’s absolutely crucial that what we imagine is as informed and creative as possible, and the things we choose to build our cultures from are grounded in positive, pro-social ideas.”
— Alastair Thain
“The way to challenge and build better societies is to be liberated to ask the questions that are really difficult, the iconoclastic questions. That’s what real creativity is about.”
— Alastair Thain

© Alastair Thain

The art of Sarah Moon

“Thanks to art, instead of seeing one world only, our own, we see that world multiply itself and we have at our disposal as many worlds as there are original artists, worlds more different one from the other than those which revolve in infinite space, worlds which, centuries after the extinction of the fire from which their light first emanated, whether it is called Rembrandt or Vermeer, send us still each one its special radiance.” Marcel Proust

Gaylene Gould, Cultural Explorer

I spent morning talking to Gaylene Gould, Cultural Explorer and Head of BFI Cinemas and Events about storytelling, about using imagination to explore vulnerability and kindness, and about making space for creativity. See full interview at Imaginomics

 © Alexandra Dao

 © Alexandra Dao

“The thing that most pulls me through life is to understand who I am as a human being”
— Gaylene Gould
“If you are looking at creativity and imagination, you are driven by curiosity rather than goals. Creative endeavours are driven by exploration rather than outcomes”
— Gaylene Gould
“There needs to be an environment where you can feel that it’s ok to be curious and to simply explore”
— Gaylene Gould
“Everything is creativity in childhood, it’s how you navigate the world. And we all still have that.”
— Gaylene Gould
“What the imagination can do is condition us to spend our time watching and reading about really kind, compassionate people, and then believing that the world really is a kind place.”
— Gaylene Gould
“What we need to do is build more space for creativity – going for walks, looking out of the window, taking our minds off the task – and then the ideas start flowing.”
— Gaylene Gould
“Compassion really helps me. There is nothing that can erase the fact that we are human beings who feel pain. Life is hard and our feelings will get hurt – how can we move with some grace through this?”
— Gaylene Gould
“I think creativity is about honouring your own unique voice.”
— Gaylene Gould
“We have to make kinder stories.”
— Gaylene Gould

Spring passes...

The end of spring in the social garden...

This oasis of beauty in south east London is my neigbours work of art. I will be featuring it a lot over the seasons. He has an eye for form and is very aware of colour; a lot of artifice has gone into his wild garden. It is full of big arty drifts of colour and self seeders. He is inspired by Beth Chatto and Christopher Lloyd and Mirabel Osler's 'A Gentle Plea For Chaos'.

Robin Stevens, author

My morning at the British Library taking a journey of discovery into the imagination of Robin Stevens, author of best-selling children’s detective series ‘Murder Most Unladylike’. See imaginomics.org.uk for my full interview

©Alexandra Dao

©Alexandra Dao

“For years, I thought that writing was telepathic.”
— Robin Stevens
“Because I was a kid who was on her own a lot, I got to experience many other things and connect with other people through reading”
— Robin Stevens
“As a child, my imaginary friends were simply the stories I was creating, and I became part of the story.”
— Robin Stevens

Fragile...

More from my Angelique tulips...

"The unreal is more powerful than the real...it's only intangible ideas, concepts, beliefs, fantasies that last. Stone crumbles. Wood rots. People, well, they die. But things as fragile as a thought, a dream, a legend, they can go on and on. If you can change the way people think. The way they see themselves. The way they see the world. You can change the way people live their lives. That's the only lasting thing you can create." - Chuck Palahniuk

©Alexandra Dao

©Alexandra Dao

Tulipomania

... walking amongst the tulips with the early evening sun. These are from my favourite social garden here in south east London

“A tulip doesn’t strive to impress anyone. It doesn’t struggle to be different than a rose. It doesn’t have to. It is different. And there’s room in the garden for every flower. You didn’t have to struggle to make your face different than anyone else’s on earth. It just is. You are unique because you were created that way. Look at little children in kindergarten. They’re all different without trying to be. As long as they’re unselfconsciously being themselves, they can’t help but shine. It’s only later, when children are taught to compete, to strive to be better than others, that their natural light becomes distorted.” // Marianne Williamson