Two long-time friends that we love to host here in Tetouan!
In my wife’s favorite film, It’s a Wonderful Life, George Bailey hears the sound of a train departing and asks his Uncle Billy, “You know what the three most exciting sounds in the world are?” When Uncle Billy responds, “Uh huh. Breakfast is served; lunch is served; dinner…” George interrupts with a far off look, “No no no no. Anchor chains, plane motors and train whistles!”
There is something magical about the call of far off places to stir the imagination to dream big and to see with new eyes. There is something deeply human about creativity that flows from life experience and observation into new works that invite others to see, feel, and think … about far off places. If you were made to create, then you were also made to be inspired by both the beauty and brokenness of this world as you pour out your creative energy to tell the story. And travel has a unique way of getting you to that zone where you have to photograph that glint of light on pottery, sketch that man sleeping in the barber’s chair, or write a few phrases about the egrets on the dumpster behind the fish market … or you’ll burst … even if it means getting separated from the tour group.
Half the fun of the travel is the aesthetic of lostness. – Ray Bradbury
For centuries painters, writers, poets, dancers, architects and sculptors have sought fresh perspective and escape from ‘normal life’ by immersing in new cultures and places. Today ‘artist mobility’ is on the rise. Artists of all types are traveling the globe on self-assigned forays of inspiration and research. They are collaborating with people they had never imagined knowing, getting an inside view to cultures they had never dreamed of seeing, and returning back ‘home’ forever changed by humanity in all it’s beauty and brokenness.
And it’s not only artists who are initiating the adventures of Art & Travel in increasing numbers. They are also being sent by cultural and academic gatekeepers who see the rich benefits of connecting their constituents with the world. Municipal arts councils and educational institutions are funding creatives (even commissioning them) to spend time in other cultures so they will bring back works of art that will influence and inspire the people they represent locally with the riches of other lands. Not mere postcards either … but painting exhibitions, poetry readings, children’s books, fashion and product design, culinary arts, and novels.
Dear Mom, Wish you were here. Having a grand time in the jungle. Your son, Edmund W. Greacen
Where will YOU go this year to get out of the usual places where you have been too long inspired in normal ways by the same ole stuff?
For I assure you, without travel, at least for people from the arts and sciences, one is a miserable creature!… A man of mediocre talents always remains mediocre, may he travel or not – but a man of superior talents, which I cannot deny myself to have without being blasphemous, becomes – bad, if he always stays in the same place. – Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Consider coming for that much-longed-for season of art residency abroad and get those two old friends, Art & Travel, together again.
Artist Residencies – Apply now and hear back from our Selection Panel in less than 10 days! >>>>
Plein Air Morocco 2015 – Register for an exciting workshop by Sam Paonessa in May 2015 >>>>