Frida Kahlo quote: ”I paint flowers so they will not die.”

Whatever we create makes that image live, long after the thing may be gone. A still life eventually will dry up and die. But if you have painted it, it will live on for other people to see.

This is definitely true of photography. Digital photography is wonderful, you can do all kinds of things with it, I understand that. But there is something about holding a photo of someone in your hands. Unless you print that photo out from that digital flash drive, you can only see it on a phone or computer.

What about music? Think about that for a moment. Does music live on in your mind after the sound is gone? Of course it does. It’s a matter of recall, but it does live on just as photographs or paintings. You don’t have to mentally recreate the tune and words to Happy Birthday. It’s there from repetition, and association. A lasting memory with meaning. It is like getting a piece of music stuck in your head. You can’t see the music but you can hear it all day.

This is one of the miracles about what we do as artists. How many people in the world really think about this? I would guess probably not that many. We do because we are the creators; we create so the images and sounds will endure, live.

What we get as creators far exceeds what the viewer or listener receives. The image or music was there, but not in the form we made it permanent. It was transcribed in our minds to make that happen.

Don’t let the flowers die~