Friday 16 August 2013

A Thing of Beauty - John Dougherty

You might remember that about a year ago I reviewed Richard Wiseman's 59 Seconds. For those of you who can't be bothered to click the link: it's a sort of self-help book, but based entirely on proper psychological research.

I said in my review that one of my aims for the summer, inspired by the book, was to work with my children to produce a piece of art for my shed. It appears that artworks which are "designed to evoke a sense of unconventionality" boost creativity, and I wanted to make one.

Perhaps I should go back to the section on procrastination. Here we are, a year later, and I still haven't created my creativity-inducing masterpiece.

What I have done, though, is to buy a work of art. And here it is.


Isn't it lovely? It was created for me by the very clever & talented Emily Joy. I visited Emily's  studio in the Stroud Valleys Artspace during the Site 13 festival earlier in the year, saw some similar pieces that she'd created, and I wanted one. So I asked her to make me one for my writing shed.

Now, I don't know about you, but this beautiful porcelain pomegranate certainly evokes a sense of unconventionality for me. I think it's the fact that the fruit itself is so clearly an artificial and lifeless creation, and yet the seeds inside look so very real and alive. There are all sort of metaphors for writing in there, aren't there?

And I could sit here and analyse my new possession, and think about why it speaks to me as it does, and write about the reasons I think it fits the criteria Wiseman gives for inspirational art...

But I'm not going to. I'm going to put it in my shed, and look at it as I write. And I'm going to smile.

4 comments:

adele said...

Beautiful! Hours and hours of pleasure and inspiration await you!

sensibilia said...

Ahem. I thought it was a model of a fruit meringue! Never mind, it is beautiful, and I would definitely have one in my shed if I had a shed!

John Dougherty said...

Fruit meringue???!!!!???

Ok, I can see that, now you say it - but that's down to my photography rather than Emily's craftwomanship!

Nicola Morgan said...

Very beautiful indeed! The post and the pomegranate.