Alcoholism & artistic expression
13 May 2009
Join Date: May 2009
Posts: 83
I think you have all articulated the fear that kept be from getting sober, loosing my creativity. I paint, make edible art, sculpt and have published a book and created a creative business. What I realised, like you guys, was that I used alcohol in particular to loosen myself up, it was not the source of my creativity.
I think creative people create ROMANCE about drugs and alcohol, I romanticised booze and drugs until they became my creative lovers. Now my job is to ROMANCE sobriety. Now every time I think of the ROMANCE of booze and drugs, I look at Steve Adler (ex guns & roses drummer) on Sober House, Amy Winehouse, Britney Spears on 2007 MTV AWARDS and think about my own very public fall from grace.
Your talent is yours, it is precious ALCOHOL/DRUGS did not create it, Meditation, the right environment and the ROMANCE of sobriety can do the same things that A&D did. I am the most proflific and successful I have ever been creatively, I wish you all the best in fulfilling your own FULL POTENTIAL!
Thank you for sharing, I have gotten a lot from this thread!
I think creative people create ROMANCE about drugs and alcohol, I romanticised booze and drugs until they became my creative lovers. Now my job is to ROMANCE sobriety. Now every time I think of the ROMANCE of booze and drugs, I look at Steve Adler (ex guns & roses drummer) on Sober House, Amy Winehouse, Britney Spears on 2007 MTV AWARDS and think about my own very public fall from grace.
Your talent is yours, it is precious ALCOHOL/DRUGS did not create it, Meditation, the right environment and the ROMANCE of sobriety can do the same things that A&D did. I am the most proflific and successful I have ever been creatively, I wish you all the best in fulfilling your own FULL POTENTIAL!
Thank you for sharing, I have gotten a lot from this thread!
same planet...different world
Join Date: Sep 2006
Location: Butte, America
Posts: 10,946
I've 'sidelined' as an artist/designer for most of my adult life.
WHen I was drinking - I did nothing.
WHen I got sober - and got healthy again
on with the onslaught of ideas,
and the capacity to complete pieces.
Drugs and alcohol will only take you 'so far'
when you're using them for inspiration.
Even when used as spiritual enhancements.
They'll only go so far.
Then they 'take away'
rather than add.
Most artists and performers
learn that the hard way.
In a permanent way.
And our world is a bit less colorful
for their loss.
IMO.
WHen I was drinking - I did nothing.
WHen I got sober - and got healthy again
on with the onslaught of ideas,
and the capacity to complete pieces.
Drugs and alcohol will only take you 'so far'
when you're using them for inspiration.
Even when used as spiritual enhancements.
They'll only go so far.
Then they 'take away'
rather than add.
Most artists and performers
learn that the hard way.
In a permanent way.
And our world is a bit less colorful
for their loss.
IMO.
Guest
Join Date: Apr 2009
Location: Orlando Florida
Posts: 220
If anyone want's to see if Alcohol improves artistic performance one only need go to a Kareoke Bar (doesn't matter where). It immediately becomes painfully evident that the perception vs. the reality of the singing talent of the participants are not even in the same Ball Park. They think they sound like Whitney Houston. They actually sound like someone strangling a Cat.
same planet...different world
Join Date: Sep 2006
Location: Butte, America
Posts: 10,946
ok.
wait.
cat strangling .. isn't funny.
But I tended a bar for years that had monday and saturday night 'croakie'.
They all thought they were the next Celine..
and sounded like bagpipes in a garbage disposal.
Member
Join Date: Jun 2007
Location: New Orleans, LA
Posts: 70
The only creative outlet I have found to "benefit" from alcohol is writing, and only because you can take what little good there is to salvage and apply it with a more sober foundation. The thing about writing while drunk is that you don't need an editor - it's you, tomorrow. If you can face it.
Even this "benefit" is a lie. True artists do not need motivation to turn on some fabled emotional spigot. That's all the "inspiration" is - a cheap cheat to being in touch with feelings a more versed artist can express on his or her own. In other words, study your art and become more efficient at the art itself, and not in being too afraid to face your creative depths on your own. Bonus: You won't need to scrap it all the next day.
As for music, oh no. No, no, and NO. I've seen brilliant musicians ruined by alcohol. Even when sober, the quick synaptic response required for it (see the cognitive thread) is severely damaged. You want to know frustration? Try hearing the music in your head but being unable to physically make it happen.
Playing and composing while loaded FEELS great.
To you.
Everyone else wants their money back.
Even this "benefit" is a lie. True artists do not need motivation to turn on some fabled emotional spigot. That's all the "inspiration" is - a cheap cheat to being in touch with feelings a more versed artist can express on his or her own. In other words, study your art and become more efficient at the art itself, and not in being too afraid to face your creative depths on your own. Bonus: You won't need to scrap it all the next day.
As for music, oh no. No, no, and NO. I've seen brilliant musicians ruined by alcohol. Even when sober, the quick synaptic response required for it (see the cognitive thread) is severely damaged. You want to know frustration? Try hearing the music in your head but being unable to physically make it happen.
Playing and composing while loaded FEELS great.
To you.
Everyone else wants their money back.
Administrator
Join Date: Apr 2007
Location: Australia
Posts: 211,439
I've seen a few brilliant writers destroyed, or nearly so, by drink too - Jack Kerouac, Truman Capote, Dorothy Parker, Jack London, Charles Bukowski, Raymond Chandler, F Scott Fitzgerald, Dylan Thomas, Edgar Allen Poe, Herman Melville, Tennessee Williams, Brendan Behan....and that's just off the top of my head
D
D
Member
Join Date: Jun 2007
Location: New Orleans, LA
Posts: 70
Originally Posted by Dee74 
I've seen a few brilliant writers destroyed, or nearly so, by drink too - Jack Kerouac, Truman Capote, Dorothy Parker, Jack London, Charles Bukowski, Raymond Chandler, F Scott Fitzgerald, Dylan Thomas, Edgar Allen Poe, Herman Melville, Tennessee Williams, Brendan Behan....and that's just off the top of my head
D
D
Administrator
Join Date: Apr 2007
Location: Australia
Posts: 211,439
Brilliance, and squandering or not of talent, are subjective values, for sure 
My point was I don't think alcohol respects writers, or ultimately aids their creativity, anymore than it does for musicians.
The consumers almost always end up the consumed.
D
My point was I don't think alcohol respects writers, or ultimately aids their creativity, anymore than it does for musicians.
The consumers almost always end up the consumed.
D
Member
Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: in the present moment
Posts: 2,060
i'm a writer.
when i compare the simple clarity of what comes through these days with the inflated, uber fascinating points i had to make when not sober, i cringe.
sobriety has given me my inner editor back. thanks gods!
when i compare the simple clarity of what comes through these days with the inflated, uber fascinating points i had to make when not sober, i cringe.
sobriety has given me my inner editor back. thanks gods!
Member
Join Date: Jul 2008
Location: Los Angeles, California
Posts: 8,326
Not that this compares to artistic talent, but I kept a much cleaner, tidier house and person while drinking. It was all about keep up appearances and part of my denial.
I have many friends who are writers and artists. I swear I can tell when they "picked up" the first drink as I read their work or view their art. It's not better, IMO. I can't say how I know, but it's pretty obvious to me.
Just my thoughts.
Love,
Lenina
I have many friends who are writers and artists. I swear I can tell when they "picked up" the first drink as I read their work or view their art. It's not better, IMO. I can't say how I know, but it's pretty obvious to me.
Just my thoughts.
Love,
Lenina
Member
Join Date: Apr 2007
Posts: 2,299
When I first came to SR I was performing regularly as a stand up comedian here in N.Z and doing fairly well.I was terrified that once I stopped drinking I'd no longer be funny-that my 'best' material was written when I'd been drinking and felt 'free'. It was a load of rubbish but I really thought that was true at the time.
I think drinking may have helped me loosen up more quickly perhaps?But it was never the reason for my creativity and in the end it made me extremely unfunny and ultimately, unable to perform at all.
I can still be comical.It didn't die when I stopped drinking.It was always there.But for a long time I believed I couldn't be that without alcohol when in fact it was killing any ability I had to create.
I've hung out with many comedians over the years, and sadly alcoholism is rife in that industry.But there are many out there who are also sober now and still doing it.I find that encouraging.I don't believe alcohol makes us more creative.I think it's been romanticised to a ridiculous degree.
I think drinking may have helped me loosen up more quickly perhaps?But it was never the reason for my creativity and in the end it made me extremely unfunny and ultimately, unable to perform at all.
I can still be comical.It didn't die when I stopped drinking.It was always there.But for a long time I believed I couldn't be that without alcohol when in fact it was killing any ability I had to create.
I've hung out with many comedians over the years, and sadly alcoholism is rife in that industry.But there are many out there who are also sober now and still doing it.I find that encouraging.I don't believe alcohol makes us more creative.I think it's been romanticised to a ridiculous degree.
Member
Join Date: Apr 2008
Location: Htown, baby!
Posts: 384
I play classical piano and clarinet and when I'm really drunk or on pills I really can't focus on playing. However, pot has never be so strong as to affect my playing negatively. Don't want to sound cliche, but I think pot is useful in it that opens us more to the different layers of music a bit, we might become stupid but music isn't all about intelligence. Even people who arent potheads say that music is much or enjoyable to listen to stoned. Just my MO.
Member
Join Date: Sep 2008
Location: San Francisco, CA
Posts: 679
Alright it might seem a little off the topic, but I think it is relevant. I worry though because I am not positive about the reference. However, my mom (a psychiatrist) has told me about this study about musicians a few times. Half of the musicians took benzos or beta-blockers (I don't remember which, I'm leaning towards beta-blockers?) to help with nerves before going out to play in front of a large crowd. The other half took nothing. After the concert, the musicians who had taken the pills felt better about their own performances than the musicians who played without taking any drugs. However, the interesting part, is that the audience (without knowing anything about who took drugs) thought that the musicians who played drug-free were much better performers. I think that it is a really interesting study. From it, one might conclude that the artist might believe that substances are extremely freeing and aid their artistic expression. However, from the viewer's perspective it is the unadulterated expression which ends up being most appreciated.
Member
Join Date: Sep 2008
Location: San Francisco, CA
Posts: 679
So while I really liked my little story that my mom told me, I either remembered it incorrectly or she told it incorrectly. Because I did some searching and I think found the study she was referring to. Here is an excerpt from an article by David Alan Harris (Medical Problems of Performing Artists 16.2 (June 2001): p.72(5). (3926 words)) I must say that the SF online library resources are an amazing thing.
Brantigan and colleagues evaluated 29 subjects in two separate studies: among 13 student musicians in Nebraska and 16 instrumentalists, primarily from the ranks of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra and Manhattan's Juilliard School. (13) All participants performed on two consecutive days, once with placebo and once with [beta]-blockade. Administering propranolol and placebo in double-blind fashion, the investigators deployed continuous telemetric electrocardiogram monitoring, blood pressure screening, and a questionnaire designed to assess subjects' overall performance, nervousness, and physical symptoms. In the Nebraska portion of the study a system was used for measuring salivary sodium and potassium concentrations as part of an attempt to collect useful data on the dry mouth phenomenon that is associated with stage fright. Findings underscored the intensity of the stage fright problem, particularly in terms of heightened heart rate, and confirmed the efficacy of propranolol in controlling symptoms. The researchers observed that despite the fact that their New York "conditions did not seem very stressful--a solo performance on stage in front of an audience of five," six of the eight accomplished musicians who took placebo on the first day had heart rates above 150 beats per minute. Explanation for the intensity of such symptoms focused on training. Theorizing that conservatory study often inculcates a link between performance and the fight or flight response through a routine or overly critical and "negative feedback" that discourages the "subtle intellectual decision making" and "nuances of interpretation" that are central to musical performance, the authors pointed to the success of [beta]-blockade in eliminating the physical discomforts caused by stage fright. Indeed, propranolol produced a dramatic decrease in maximum and average heart rate, and caused a significant increase in saliva production. In addition, evaluators in New York, comparing each subject's performances with the drug and placebo, expressed overwhelming preference for the performances with propranolol. The musicians themselves concurred, favoring the experience with the drug in all categories surveyed: "nervousness, anxiety, tremor, sweating, accuracy, style, ease of performance, control, tempo, rhythm, patience, memory, and comfort."
Member
Join Date: Dec 2007
Posts: 120
I can relate to this topic, and associate very closely with a lot of what's been posted.
To me, to be creative is to be alive... and vice versa. I think for a lot of creative types, we feel emotion so strongly that there is no other recourse than to let it out through artistic expression.
I think there's a certain romanticism associated with creativity, especially with that of the lone wolf touring musician/artist/poet. I've seen that life and it's very solitary and hard to deal with...
The Absolute Best advice I have seen about any of this is here: Elizabeth Gilbert on nurturing creativity | Video on TED.com
To me, to be creative is to be alive... and vice versa. I think for a lot of creative types, we feel emotion so strongly that there is no other recourse than to let it out through artistic expression.
I think there's a certain romanticism associated with creativity, especially with that of the lone wolf touring musician/artist/poet. I've seen that life and it's very solitary and hard to deal with...
The Absolute Best advice I have seen about any of this is here: Elizabeth Gilbert on nurturing creativity | Video on TED.com
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