'Art is Life and Life is Short'

We hear the idiom 'art is life and life is short' which means that the life of art is longer than human life.  Phrases rearranged and 'life' is replaced with 'long',  'life is short; art is long', known to be the famous saying of Greek medical doctor Hippocrates means 'good work takes a long time to accomplish'. Taken together, 'art is life' and 'art is long', a good artwork (which takes long time to finish) has a life longer than human life.

When I was young, my mother always took me to church regularly -- Wednesdays and Sundays. I admired the paintings which symbolized some hidden meanings, on the church ceiling. At an early age, I connected some interpretations in my mind -- and formed stories which the artist wanted to convey to viewers. It was a hugely transforming experience for me -- to live many, many years ago by just looking at the images. Artworks with angels and clouds inspired me to glorify the gift of life. I looked at some objects that normally were ignored by others, and I tried to find a meaning why the artist included them, or painted them that way. Sometimes I thought of it as the artist would like to lay bare some questions, and the answers were there but I had to find out.

My mother, a dressmaker with her own little dress shop, used to draw some dress styles for her customers. They chose from her fashion catalogue and she suggested which would look better for them. My interest in drawing was stimulated, and I began to use tracing paper to sketch the illustrations with patterns found in the last pages of the catalogues. In school, music and arts was one of our subjects and we were taught how to be creative in different ways.

In high school and college, we had some projects which required some illustrations. There was no internet then so we had to do researches in the libraries. I saw an opportunity to earn because other students could not draw so I accepted some drawing jobs, to my mother's delight as I gave her extra money, buy some groceries for the family or gifts to make my brother happy.

When I got married, I did some mixed media artworks, with wooden framing done by my cousin. I consigned the items to the top department store in the locality. After actual point of sale, it took two months for them to pay me so for a mother of three (3) children with a husband jobless for four (4) years I did not see the opportunity to trade my extra hours for the right monetary value.

From then on, I have never stopped creatively expressing my individuality in my own authentic way if there is a chance to do so. There is a reservoir of creativity inside me and I find ways to rediscover and unleash it.

'Else' is something for me. Connecting everything with everything else. Connecting my mind, my eyes and my hands. Connecting my past and my present. Connecting ideas on a graphing paper. As I do so, I develop my senses, particularly my eyes, and there are many times that I can see what our eyes cannot. As they say, "Only heart  can see the invisible." The connecting experience leaves a massive impression in me, and sometimes it spills out which I express through writing or painting.

According to Dosteovsky, "Beauty will save the world."  See paintings that have lived for thousands of years preserved in musea and valued at very high prices.  In the The Louvre Abu Dhabi, the top art and civilization museum in the Middle East, the guests will be mesmerized by a different world of beauty, treasured by careful preservation. In Dubai, UAE, the Museum of the Future, 'a unique incubator for futuristic innovation and design', is under construction and will be open in 2019. So it's a grand blend of the past and the future creativity being housed and staged in one country, only in the UAE.

If only people would look at life and earth with an artist's view -- that there's beauty in everything -- the world would be saved. There would be no any form of destruction to life and properties.

Time will come that due to modern technology, the average life span will rise from 65 to 100 years, but still 'art is life and life is short'.

We need to pause for a while, appreciate beauty of life despite all chaos and challenges, preserve that beauty, find ways to be creative, connect everything with everything else, and ultimately we find beauty in humanity. This is thinkable. This is possible.

With these thoughts, my hands will be passionately mettlesome in some creative activities.

We all die, but we can leave an expression of ourselves that will live longer than we do. By our creative works we can tell our children and our children's children a very strong message -- that we appreciate the beauty of life and humanity, and that we are here now not by chance, but by purpose. Somehow they feel that we are there tomorrow.


Are you creative? In what ways do you unleash your creativity? Kindly comment below.

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Photo credits:  Pixabay