Creativity Sparks: Hilma af Klint + The Diderot Effect

Visit the spark file.com/tsf live to reserve your spot. We look forward to seeing you there. Bye Bye .

And make things how I like this podcast. Oh . Or a a birthday cake or a really tricked out terrarium. Yes. Girl. That's so true. So every episode we're going to reach into the spark file and exchange some sparks. And then we're going to talk to some folks who sparked us too . If you're not careful, you might just get your fish pond restocked. So without further ado, let's open up the spark file. This. Oh No , I did that. I'll turn it it . I'll take it.

Will you tell the people I'd never heard of the term a spark file or the spark file. Yeah. Until I heard it from you. From you. I got it from you. I love you dad. So tell me, tell the people what that means to you. I first heard the phrase a few years ago and up until that point I was like, like most people, I kept random ideas kind of everywhere in files called random ideas. Um, and that wasn't very inspiring. Uh, but this current randos randos in this file and 10 other files.

Yeah. So , um, the spark file is just that. It's the idea, it's the idea of place. It's where you put all those little gems . So whether when something, you read something or something pops into your mind and you're like, oh, that would be a great line, or great characters. Or you hear people talking on the subway and you're like, are he, he threw out any response , said I need that line

Um, that you know, that ideas are free flowing and they're everywhere if you're looking for them and we're not , uh, you know, we don't treat them like they're so precious that we won't ever get another one of them. That's right. We are, there's an Iran and we know that what you make with our , with the spark is going to be different than what we make from it. If we ever, we know you're going to make an amazing contemporary dance.

This , uh, he was like, do you know about helmet off Clint? And I was like, I don't know what that sentence means, so I want to thank him. Um, I pulled my info for this from four main sources, a New York Times article called Hilma who no more by Roberta Smith, a 2013 New York Times article by Natalia Rocklin . The website of the Guggenheim museum, including a video that they beautifully produced. Um, the Hilma Klint foundation website.

I think there's five and an article written by Jennifer huggy on the website frieze . And even with all of that, I'm not an art historian, so I'm probably going to fuck up some of these details, but the sparks remain baby. So , um , Helma off Klint Hilma , h I. L m, a lowercase a f Klint , k. L. I. N t Hilma off Clint, a woman, an artist born in Stockholm, Sweden about five foot, one inches of fun. So she's adult peanut. Just picture her. Um, Kim off.

Clint paintings for the future is the first major solo exposition exhibition exhibition in the United States devoted to her, the Guggenheim museum in New York. And if you don't know the Guggenheim, it's that museum on Fifth Avenue East of Central Park. It's big. It's white. It looks like the most stylish, beautiful spiral parking garage you've ever seen. Does that ring a bell? Um, I know what you're talking. Okay . Well, yeah .

Listen , I , I know I'm a little museum phobic, so how you really am , it gives me like a tired feeling immediately upon entering. I know . Not immediately. It's so funny, Zach was actually saying he was, I told when he was like, have you seen the show? And I was like, hmm , museums and made me feel tired. And he said, here's what you gotta do. You have to get either I like the recorded audio tour or if you're lucky enough, like a docent.

He's like, if you just go in and just try to ingest all that and read all those little placards and stuff, you won't let it all go in with some help and you will have a more pleasurable experience. And I think he's right. So I want to read to you from the New York Times review of this show, this exhibition, this is written by rumor , Roberta Smith, if you'd like to hallucinate but to stay in the requisite stimulants, spend some time in the Glucan. Hammies ha ha. You can ham .

That's what I call it. I don't know what you call it. That's what the kids are calling it in the Gugan Ham museums. Staggering exhibition, helmet off Clint paintings for the future. The museums high gallery. The name has added resonance in this context displays the show's a rapturous overture, a series of 10 paintings by Clint collectively titled The 10 largest. They may induced disorientation, not the least for the way they blow open art history. And um, I just want to show you, oh, okay.

Check out this work . Wow . Tell me what you're saying for the listener at home. Just to give me those description. First thing I thought was like, like orange crush. It's got a very pop poppy kind of feel. Yeah . At least that one there. Um, vibrant color colors. Big , big colors. Flowers. Another one little, yeah. Psychedelic. You could totally go there in an altered state. Yeah. Wow. Big Color . See you. Oh, don't you get ahead of me. Sorry. We'll find out when I'm up. Up, up, up.

Uh , the scale of the motifs and the painting, sheer size, 10 feet by nearly nine feet, invite you to step in and float away to the music of the spheres. Whoa. That was a crash with me. Oh yeah . All right . Sorry. That's okay . Ps, it's pretty baller to imagine this five foot one peanut doing these huge paintings songs back to Roberta, the 10 largest. That's what that series of 10 paintings is called. Seem utterly contemporary. Made yesterday fresh, but prepare for label shock.

They were created in 1907 stop it. Yep . Nothing like that. I've never seen anything like that. I know from the early 19 hundreds right, so let's back it up. Shit, they must have thought she was crazy. Crazy. Okay. It's on pockets. So helmet off. Clint was born in 1862 into a prominent Swedish family. Her father was a naval officer. Her grandfather was a nautical cartographer. Fancy Zomig word.

She was one of the earliest women to train at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Stockholm, graduating with honors in 1887 at the age of 25 while she was there, she painted what you would think a lady of the time would paint botanical studies, landscapes like the pretty lady portraits and self portraits.

But her interest in spiritualism and the science of the day sparked new ideas for Hilma off gland around the age of 17 part, perhaps in part because of the death of her sister, she began to conduct seances with a group of likeminded ladies. They called themselves the Friday group, also known as the five, which is fucking bad ass . Whoa . The Friday group or the five would both be great band names. Yes, yes.

The five would be a great band name for a rock duo , um , of five seem to be interested in a mix of spiritualism, science, Christianity, and the work of Rudolph Steiner, who was a proponent of a philosophy called anthroposophy was founded by this in the 19th century. And it postulates the existence of an objective, intellectually comprehensible spiritual world, accessible to human experience. You know, Wikipedia wrote that sentence cause you know, I sure as fuck didn't.

Okay. I'm still digesting it. I think it means ,

She seriously, these ladies were getting down. Uh, they did automatic writings and medium mystic drawings. Um, during trance-like states, the five eventually made contact with spiritual beings whom they called the high ones or the high masters. And I think in the original Swedish, it's de Holger again, I am just handing out great band names. Free people, free band names. Get free band aids right here. They even named the High Masters High Master Roll Call . Here we go.

Alma Lele , uh , Nanda Clemens , Esther George and Gregor, which are also choice baby names y'all I'm handing out, I'm dealing out free baby names here. Like conjured something by naming all of them. God Damn . Can you imagine the who got cut and podcast? Gosh, the WHO could come down the chimney. Um, by 1904, the high masters began calling for a t . So the spirit, the spirit guides, right in 1904, the spirit guys began calling for a temple, filled with paintings to be created.

The high masters wanted this work to be on artistic message for humankind when the four other ladies or the five declined the commission. So the four other ladies like, no, no good. No , no, I'm out. Um, they declined the commission and at the age of 43 helmet accepted it in a November, 1906 she began work on the paintings for the temple. Just to be clear, that commission was from the spirits. That's right. Where they were . They compensating her in some way .

Here's the thing, I had to like go back when I first heard I was like a commission. Doesn't that usually involve like, so we'll give you, we'll put 50% down, right? When we see the first round of paintings, we'll give you the next 25 ends . Right. But I , I think they just, I think what they mean is there was like a spiritual mandate. They asked for it. Yeah . He said, I'm gay. She said, I'm your girl. Okay. Should I love, wow.

The commission, which she painted in secret between 1906 and 1915 that's nine years, right. Would change the course of her life. It became her life's work. She claimed that she merely served as a medium for this body of work and that spiritual forces had guidance, guided her hand during the execution, the contact with spiritual guides who both inspired her and communicated with her, wore for Hilma as real as the impressions given by the five physical senses.

So that goes back to that Rudy Steiner, whatever I just called that I can't remember, but that, that it was as real as this table for her. It was that real by visualizing inner processes and experiences, and by describing these as concretely and precisely as possible, she proceeded to develop a very personal expression. She really believed that this work had essential meaning regarding how the world is put together.

So it's almost like it reminds me like if you did an exercise where you're like, I'm going to shut my eyes, I'm going to see what I see behind my eyelids, like what do I visualize? And then being like, and now I'm going to get it down on canvas. But for her it was this influence of the spirit world. But what's crazy and , and people when they look up her artwork, it is, it looks like the 1960s word. It's the 60s . I'm feeling sixties even into seventies. So how the hell, how the hell?

Wow. Yeah. I , I'm so fascinated. Um, she later said the pictures were painted directly through me without any preliminary drawings and with great force. I had no idea what the paintings were supposed to depict. Nevertheless, I worked swiftly and surely without changing a single brush stroke . Now could that also be called like amuse when people say something worked through me? I know [inaudible] like I wrote that song in five minutes and it was just like I woke up and it was fully formed.

I put that down on paper and I don't remember writing it. Yeah, it , it seems like she was just, when I hear that there was no, like she didn't do any sketches or studies in advanced . She was just sort of like, no , think of it, I think she, if I understand correctly, she was putting the paint on the canvas or the paper on the floor and working on the floor.

But it sounds like she would just, whatever that thing was, it was like moving through her and she, without , with great force, without changing a single stroke was just like going for it. Wow. But I mean, I feel like in my lifetime I've maybe had one of those moments where I was just like, it came to me fully formed. Yeah. She's had the, her body of work is not about that, but yes . Once you went there, she was able to tap back in. Yeah. How do I get back to that state?

Yeah. Wow. Um, as the commission progressed in the artwork developed from the organic and nature, inspired to the more geometric helmet explained that she increased control and influence over what she painted, serving more as an interpreter than as a medium, a mystical idiosyncratic geometry emerged. You know, I sure as fuck didn't write that sentence. That's somebody from the Guggenheim wrote that sentence. But it is a perfect sentence to describe her work.

And now remember the big swirlies up the paintings of the largest hand . So then we're moving into this and we're moving into, can you use your human language to describe what you're seeing, Laura? Oh my human language. Well it looks like a pyramid with a , like a graphic gorgeous sun at the top, but doesn't it? A mystical idiosyncratic geometry emerged totally, doesn't it? And it's so much more orderly than the last.

The last was like the 60s psychedelic and this is much cleaner lines and oh my God, that's a gorgeous, that's like a bull, a really colorful, like it's like a bullseye but with different colors , shades of like rainbow and black and white. Um, wow. You look at some of her work now and it really looks like it could be the cover of a pink Floyd album. Oh yes. That's exactly what that looks like. But you have to remember when it was being made in the early 19 hundreds.

Also, pink Floyd is a great band name. We should to , someone should definitely use that. Um, so a little bit about the secret codes. There's all sorts of code and helmets work, blue represented female, yellow represented male . Green was the unity of male. And female. And in her journal, she carefully charted all of these images and her corresponding philosophies, this extensive library of ideas that she created.

Um, so for instance, there will be botanical studies in there and then next to them there's these little diagrams and infographics depicting the energy of the plant. It is, when you look at that, those journals, her notebooks, it is like she's creating a new language and interpreting all of this sort of energy and organic. It's fascinating, fascinating. And it's pristine. It's just beautifully done.

Um, so the 10 largest, that group of paintings that I first showed you is known as the 10 largest, which is also a great name for a band. Apparently the, they're supposed to, each of the paintings is meant to represent the lifespan of humans from birth to old age. And I think you kind of need the helmet off Clint Dakota ring journals to know that.

Um, but these paintings were made in the early 19 hundreds and again, they look like they're painted in the 60 sixties and I want one so badly amazed . They are, they are so beautiful. Um, one completed the collection paintings for the temple, which had been commissioned by the spirits. The Ho Hooga encompassed 193 paintings subdivided into several series and subgroups. It was one of the very first pieces of abstract art in the Western world as it predates by several years.

The first non figurative compositions of her contemporaries in Europe. What does that sentence mean? Let's unpack it. Yes, please say it again. So I'm going to talk, I want to talk you through this cause this, this is like, there's so many pieces of this that rocked my world. At the turn of the 20th century, the world was on the brink of a dramatic change.

Political, scientific and cultural evolution was occurring and art was changing to painters like Mondrian and Kandinsky began to replace perceived reality. Like that's a tree. That's what we all agree on. That's how you paint a tree with signs and natural color with symbolic color. If you think of those Mondrian, those big blocks of color, like primary colors, primary , um, they started turning from representation to abstraction and a new expressive form known as abstract art emerged.

So the year 1907, apparently is important to remember , uh , for Marta modernize lovers and historians 1907 is considered like maybe the year at all became began when Picasso , um, started moving towards cubism with these splintered forms. And I don't speak French, but the lead dumb was l Devin, you'll the, the dams have an opinion, right? Yeah. So it's that painting of like one, two, three, four, five sexy nude ladies , uh , abstract starting to get into like a more, it's moving towards cubism.

That's 1907. But remember our home grow Hilma began creating radically abstract paintings in 1906, and she never would have seen that, knew she was in another part of the world. So this is years before Kandinsky and Mondrian and others would take similar strides and experience breakthroughs and their own work. Roberta Smith, again in the New York Times says, did you want to say something? I just wanted to say, isn't it amazing? I'm in a time where information doesn't travel that quickly.

Ideas aren't shared that quickly. Certainly visual representations of things can't be shared that quickly. How it is that change was happening all around the world. There's a phrase for that. There's a phrase where like in science where a kiss, I have to look up what it is, where more than one person will make a discovery but on different parts of the planet. But right around the same time, it's sort of like that discovery manifests.

It makes way more sense now because you might read about some exchange of information, you know , split second , someone posts something and visually you can see what's happening elsewhere. But in 1907, that was not the case. Right. I know. So I'm back to Roberta Smith. Roberta Smith, if you're listening, I'm sure not. You're a great writer for the New York Times and I'm sure in other places. Um, she says the idea that a woman got there first and with such style is beyond thrilling.

Yes. I know art is not a competition, but still off Colin's work seems so radical. So unlike anything else going on at the time, her paintings definitively exploded the notion of modernist abstraction as a male project. Wow. Get it Roberta Smith. Get it Helma off cleanse. Yes. I love it. Did she like, did people appreciate her in her girl? We're gonna get there . We're going to get there on the edge of my seed .

Yes. So she, she's nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing like this is being made at the, in the world at the time that she's making it. Nothing. And I just said her work predates Mondrian Kandinsky Paul Klee who have long been considered the pioneers of abstraction. There's no evidence. To your point, there's no evidence that she was involved in an abstract movement of her male contemporary colleagues that she participated in the development of early modernism in central and western Europe.

Nevertheless, she invented a similar non-representational aesthetic on Flint . Working apart from those artists doesn't fit into the story of the progression of abstract art, I think. I think she was, she's not easily, she doesn't easily fit into like the accepted art history. And just make a note here. So it has obviously been studied and looked into to find out whether or not she was influenced by these men. And I think the jury says No.

Jury says no, but I'm just curious, has anyone looked into whether or not these men were influenced by her? It's an interesting question. Just Carrie . I am not an art historian, but I think I may have an answer. Um, so Laura Cambian is the first person that introduced me to this idea that the, how did you use to say that the gene that makes you a great artist is not the same gene that makes you confident about picking up the phone or sending the email of self promotion?

Yeah, different, different. Those are different skills, business acumen, different skills, self promotion , the desire to be a maker or the desire to be a creator. Right. Um, Kandinsky was actively campaigning for himself as being the first abstract artist . Constantly writing his gallery and saying, Hey, you know, I was the first, I painted the first abstract painting in 1911 this came from an art historian named Julia.

He was obviously successful as, he's widely considered the father of 20th century abstraction, but all the while off Clint, much more privately had already been creating these striking abstract visuals for years. Right. And who will tell your story? He was obsessed, obviously with someone telling his story and sometimes the squeaky wheel, the one who's asking for that for legacy, just like, okay, dude , I'm interested in the motivation, her motivation. Yup .

Which was, I felt like it was largely coming from what was very real to her, which was the, you know, these high masters, these spiritual guides moving through her and sending a message to the world through her. And I don't know, I'm not an art historian. I don't know what was moving these men, but clearly in addition to whatever was moving them creatively, some of them also had the acumen to say, that's right. Remember I'm the first, write this down. Write my name and the history knowledge .

Yeah , yeah .

Marise [inaudible] but you are a visionary on music. He was a curator. I don't know if he still lives at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art Contemporary Curator. He explained that there's several reasons why her work might sometimes be left out to a large degree of modern art. History is made by the marketplace off . Clint hasn't been out there to be seen and traded. She hasn't been purchased by important collectors and more importantly, major museums.

He said of her work, which is exclusively owned by her foundation. Wow. Yeah. So it's not out being sold. It's not out being , uh , even viewed , uh , pieces in museums around the world. But there's reasons for that. Um,

She had a vision that her work would contribute to influence not only the consciousness of people in general, but in its extension also society itself. However, she was convinced that her contemporaries were not ready to perceive her work. She had received strick orders from the high ones, her spiritual leaders not to show the paintings to anyone. She never aimed at exhibiting her esoteric and abstract works during her lifetime.

The works of art belonged to the future and would only then be understood by the public. Oh Shit. Excuse me. Chills. It's kind of like, it's kind of like she knew that it was going to blow minds and ps, look at that work and think about it being created at like at the tone of the set, like at there's 19 hundreds hostile way you would get. You would place it in that, I think they'd be like burn the which way they'd be like burn the wedge.

Um, but it's kind of like she put a message in a bottle and cast it into the sea of time and it bobs along for decades and then it gets opened up and then it gets read and appreciate . Is it allowed ? So 20 years after we get was when , um, so the first large format show to include helmets , abstract work actually wasn't , um, it came 42 years after her death in 1986 that Maurice took them in touch , man . I'm so sorry sir.

Uh, included w from some of her work in the Los Angeles County Museum of art show. And so it was not until 1986, 86. Holy Crap. Yeah. Wow. I just, I'm so

It was an immediate, it was sort of like, I have this message from the spirit world. [inaudible] and you're not ready for it. So I'm just going to work quietly and secret and it can be, it can be shared. I don't know. I think it's fascinating. It is. Especially because so often now we've really put the value on how many people saw something, how many people bought a ticket to it. Yeah . How many Instagram followers, how many Instagram followers.

Yeah. And we don't put the value on the art itself, like just being in existence, just having been made. I will say this, I will say I get, I get the impression from her just a little bit. Again, I'm not an [inaudible] , but I get the impression that her, she , her family was affluent and, well, yeah. I mean you kind of have to assume that if you're going to work in secret and never sell work and be able to live and eat and have coal for the fire, yeah.

You have to have some support, financial support, a hundred percent so for some of us, your work, you , there's a financial imperative that your work is seen. But I think for a lot of us, there's a bigger piece around ego that there is a financial imperative, but there's really a, you know, a legacy. Hey , hey, look at me. Yeah. Behind. Yeah. What am I accomplishing? Yeah , I live so spirals.

We're a big recurring motif in her paintings and you could see that and the 10 largest, some of those spirals, but it wasn't just on the page or the canvas. It extended to her vision for the works future exhibition.

She made sketches for a circular building to house her paintings where viewers would take in the work as they ascended a style skincare case towards the heavens girl and in the catalog for the Guggenheim Exhibition, they point out that Hilma conceived of this structure, the spiral structure around 1930 just as a Hila Renee don't if I pronouncing that right, just as Hillary Bay , the female abstract painter who was a founder of the Guggenheim, began imagining its architectural spiral.

Okay. Now where was she from? Is there any possibility that those two connections were just sitting watching a game of croquet? Aaron , Erin sparks an idea . I don't think so. Hey, I see a circuit . I don't think so. I think , I think that Hilmas vision for that came from the spirit world. I think it was a case of whatever that thing is that we were just describing where on different corners of the planet, because the planet just big square on different sides of the planet there.

Um, that's one of the sparks. I was actually, I'm an earth flattest what do they call those people? Flat earthers um, I do think that those thoughts were happening separately. Wow. Yeah. I'm sure they were. I was just like thinking in my mind, isn't that, I know we want to make it connected, but I want to make it disconnected. So specific. It's so incredible that health , it's these women around the same time, we're imagining a building that is truly unique.

There's a beautiful short little video on the Guggenheim website about the Hilma off Clint exhibit. It's a really great , um, it's been a source for a lot of this stuff that I'm sharing with you now, but the way that they, it's brief, but the way that they depicted visually about her in envisioning this, this ascending spiral where her work is exhibited. Yeah . Leading up to the heavens. Yeah. And the way they use the images of the Guggenheim and that is worth a watch.

It gave me, it gave me chills. Um, so in 1944 as war again raged in Europe, Mondrian and Kandinsky , two icons of abstract art died with their legacy secured that very same year, 1944, another artist passed one whose work was yet unknown to the public, a female artist who worked to make the invisible visible.

When Helma passed in the autumn of 1944, she left behind around 1300 non figurative paintings that had never been shown to outsiders and more than 125 notebooks and sketchbooks in her will Helma specified that her life's work should be kept a secret for at least 20 years after her death. Her last wish was also that the collection should never be split up. Whoa. So , no, no. I will not have a whole lot in my house. Well actually there is a chance, but um, but we'll get to that in a second.

Um, yeah. How about that? What , and she said that the spirits told her this , that it couldn't be seen, that people aren't ready for it yet. Yeah. At, I know that they said don't, don't show it until 20 years after your death. I don't know if it was her wish that the collection should never be split up, but that prohibits people owning a piece of this Australian. Yeah. Yeah. Um, which again, I think is so baller because there's something about making something that isn't for commerce.

Eventually it will be for, you know, consumption and appreciation and you know, even receiving a spiritual message from the, the, the Heuga but like, it's not about, it's, I don't know, it's almost incomprehensible in our day and age where everything is commerce. Everything. Yeah. Wow. [inaudible] wow. Um, so the collection of abstract paintings and notebooks is today owned and managed by the helmet. Off Clint Foundation in Stockholm, Sweden.

And on their website it says helmet off Clint painted for the future. That future is now. Ah, and so true. And that is my spark. Um , I think it's worth mentioning that her life and work have also sparked an opera. Uh, so it's interesting how creativity can be, get creativity and can live in different forms. So , um, it's called Hilma and opera about hidden art and it's a two person.

It looks like a parlor opera that was produced fairly recently and I think if I'm reading it correctly, but it's a man and a woman play the two performers, one plays Hilma and one plays. Um, Rudolph Steiner , I think they both had the last, both opera singers have the last name off. Clint, I think they're both relatives of hers, but I don't know a ton about that.

Um, but I also found like just when I was searching and you know, I found address, address for sale right now on the worldwide webs with fabric inspired by her work. What, so how can that be someone is inspired by it. So it's that, that sort of the in the largest 10, those paintings that I showed you. Yeah. Those, it's sort of that color of that dusty made that fabric and then doesn't look like that though. It's inspired by it.

Like they took that spark and yeah, it's like that color purple with like, it's not even flowers but it's like little , um , a little graphic detail. It doesn't look like you're wrapped up in one of those paintings. But I thought it was interesting that people were taking sparks and then anything you do let it come from you, then it will be new. They were like, yeah , to get move through them. This is how I see it.

Um , when I interpret it, I also found, you know, the painting that I showed you that look like the cover of the pink Floyd album we have . Yeah. Like the Rainbow Pyramid and the big sun geometric sound behind it. I found that as a poster on overstock.com so apparently you can get a little piece of, hang on. That can't be right though. They can't . I'm sure they, you don't think they licensed that you don't think the foundation has licensed that?

So how does that not break the rule of splitting up the paints ? I don't know. And if you do split up the paintings, is it like that episode of the Brady Bunch where they took a piece of like volcanic lava off the island and you get the curse put on you? Well that the high ones curse you. I out would be shocked if that was a real print, like a licensed print . I Dunno , it was on overstock. Um , I feel like they would shut that down though, wouldn't they? I don't know. I don't know.

But I'm going to follow Das . You can follow him on Twitter at Hilma off Clint, who's tweeting? [inaudible] foundation? I, I know that. I know. Maybe it's the spirit's still , so I'm, so maybe it's Asrael or whatever the fuck the name of that spur was. Just as curious about this foundation because rail was the name of the cat on the smurfs, not the name of one of the high ones. Sorry. Do a SPEC . The high ones was.

Um , I'm curious about this foundation though, because if at some point have they found a way or determined that commercializing it to a degree is important, it's important that people see it . It's important. I mean Twitter or Instagram page. I mean, I mean, I don't know. I don't know. Curious. I also was curious because it sounded like in her for that first time, her work was shown in the eighties like in 86 in Los Angeles. It didn't sound like it was the full collection.

It sounded like some of her pieces were part of a larger show and I thought, oh, you're going to get the Hilma curse for splitting up the collection. No, can do. That's not, no. Can doozies. I'm so curious. I want to know, but I'm not. I got, that's what I got for you because you know what people thought of her in her lifetime. I want to know like those other women, did they say, hmm , this has gotten a little too weird. We're stepping on . I don't know.

I would think that the other four woman would be down to clown. I would think like the world outside those walls that were like, oh, I just wonder. Or if they're like, we never see her. She's locked away thinking weird things that she won't show us. Can you imagine like , because she spent, clearly this was her life's work, so you have to figure her days were quite full with this work.

Yeah. And then when people came over were where they like the lock doors and we're like, we don't go into those rooms. Right .

I think that there was some of that [inaudible] again, I don't know what the fuck I'm talking about, but that's not going to keep us from talking then . Just so you know, we know we're experts on nothing. Um, I don't need those details, but that's, and let me just show you a picture of what she looked like just in case you were wondering the game. We're going to need to post all this stuff too. So please what she look like. That's wow. Sitting there bad-ass.

I , I think that she was, is there, is there a movie in the works? Is there plays? Who living in la ? Her mean like her story needs to be told. I'm going to give you [inaudible] just don't, don't shut it down yet. Okay . But if we're going to go with an American actress. Okay. I'm gonna give you Jennifer Lawrence. Ooh, maybe I,

Yes. Bye Bye. Little Dogs for little dogs where you buy little dogs. All right. Here we are. What you got for me, sparky as will ever be. Um, the name of my spark this week is beware the Dinero effect be where the did a row effect . That's just the title. [inaudible] it has nothing to do with the spark that's about to hit you in the face. That's the name of it. Wow . I like it.

No , this is um, essentially, have you ever had that sort of feeling of like, if I could just accomplish one more thing, this one thing and then life's going to be easy for me from then on out. Can I jump in right in at the time? My meditation teacher, the Great Emily Fletcher. Yeah. Do you mean like is that like, I'll be happy when syndrome a little bit. If I could just have x number of dollars in the bank and then I could be happy if I could just get out of eighth grade.

If I can just get to high school, then I'll be happy kind of thing. It's more like something that you accomplish if or if I get this done, if I cleaned the house, then it's , it feel that every single day, every day I have a feeling you may feel some things when I talked about this feeling, I want you to have them all. Okay. I'm going to have them all over you and you, the listener at home. Does this, is a Blackwell telling you to fuck off? Um, yeah, I don't really mean that. I'm just joking.

No, sorry. Go ahead. Spark it up . So , um, the thing is that if you, you have this , um, this feeling that you know, this one thing, I need to change this one thing and then I'm going to be good. But then of course you do, you accomplish that thing or you change the thing or what , whatever it is. And then there's one more and then there's one more. There's one more, right? Yeah. Okay. So there's a name for this. This, this, I live in this zone. It's about to get real, real for you.

The , um, there's a name for this, the deterrent effect, and I might be pronouncing this man's name wrong. It's French de [inaudible] . Dennis [inaudible] . Yeah. But I'm just gonna say did around, yeah. Um , so I'm getting it wrong. I'm going to boldly repeat it 70 times distant about it. That's what I'm going to do. Strong and wrong . Wrong, wrong. Maybe wrongly wrong. Okay. So , uh, Dennis was a French philosopher. He was an art critic.

He was a writer and he lived in the time of Voltaire, the enlightenment 117 hundreds. Yup . Yes. This is where we start to learn how bad I am at history dates, geography. Thank goodness. We have a podcast strap in folks, Jesus things. So , uh , did roe was very well read. One of the things that he did was found like the encyclopedia basically with, with others, but , um, but when he decided to be a writer in the first place, his father disowned him.

So he became like a Bohemian and he lived always without very much money. Okay. Okay. Um, so we later, a little bit later in his life, he needed money for his daughter's dowry and it pretty much wiped him out of any of that. That was it. He was bone dry and he decided he needed to sell his prize possession, which was his library because he's an intellectual. He was like himself. [inaudible] oh no. It was his library.

So because he was a smarty pants and had collected and written and you know, he had all these great books in his library. So Catherine the great over in Russia. Yeah. Um , here's of this. And she offers him a ton of money to , uh, keep that library for her and she gives him the greatest deal known to man. She's like, I'll give you a thousand a year. You maintain it until you die. I'll even give you 50 years advance. So it's like a shit ton. Like , and where do the books live with him?

Oh , he's essentially, he gets to keep his library until she dies and then she takes it. Oh. But he gets infused with like 50 years of money. Cash. That's right. He has now he's down and he's loving it. Yeah, so he have very, regretfully, one of the things he did was buy himself a new scarlet robe. This story . Got It all. Okay. I have no idea where you're going. [inaudible] is he the scalpel ?

Scottish robe and this robe was so beautiful, so luxurious that he suddenly felt compared to the rest of his life. Everything else looked dingy and I needed to be done. Girl taken away since I know that. Right. I'm going to tell you a story. Do it. Do it.

Do you want him on your theory? Yeah, I think that there is a chemical rush that we get when we get our scarlet robe and I think we're chasing, we're chasing that brush of the scar , the road we're chasing the Raj . I think at [inaudible] you cannot, you can't win. You know you could win the lottery. That's the curse of the lottery. I was just going to say it's a lottery winners, right? Yeah . And so a lot of times those are my favorite . I love the curse of the lottery shows. It's so tragic.

I know, but we're all like odd . Not mean I do it differently. Woodley Woodley, no, probably not. That's what the detero effect usually is referring to. Um, our inability to like stop consuming thing that we don't need. This is how you're actually putting language to your organizing.

And as a girl who grew up in like a dirty, you know, kind of a poor, I love my family, I love my life, but I'm like, I never thought I'd be a girl with a watch like that. Watch like that. Yeah . Yeah. So that's essentially his robe. And he was like, he literally said prior to the purchase, his sense of self was as the writer, the man who works, this is how he saw himself his entire life. And suddenly there was a disconnect when he put that robe on.

Now he was like, I suddenly have the air of a rich good for nothing, but rather than get rid of the robe, he changed his entire life. He rewarded life. This makes sense. Right? Cry For some reason. I don't know why it's me . It does give me feelings and we're gonna we're gonna work it out. There's something about this that is um, it's like a Oh Henry . Yeah . Story or something. There's tragedy.

Yeah. But you know, one of the things I think we'll find as we go episode episode, like I love to take , um, you know, a psychology term or scientific term and kind of, you know, cause it doesn't really have to be proven to be anything, but I'm not alone in this. Cause I did, you know, I did , I dug around and research this a bit and, and there are other people who are like, this effect can apply to other things.

So beyond just the purchasing of of stuff , um, which it's most frequently referred to in relation to that, but um, but it can also refer to like ideas and plans and our human nature at large. So for example, I might have an idea for um, rewriting a script, one of my scripts. I'm like, yes, I need to like, you know what I need to tweak that character's arc, whatever.

That then leads to me thinking about, actually all of my scripts need a little bit of reworking, but you know, before I rework those, I might need to organize all of them. I should put all of those notes into an enormous list of things that I need to do and I should organize all of those things into a new organization system and I, my holy Shit. Each one of those things.

It's just like on and on it like it won't be done or it won't be satisfying until I do all of that, which is ridiculous and overwhelming. Or like I just mentioned to you the other day, when you take a vacation and you have time off and you're like, you can't just say that you need to do the one thing I need to do while on vacation is this. It snowballs into expectations about all the things you're going to accomplish. That's right.

And then you just struggle with the disappointment that you let yourself down. That's right. With regret of it. And you know how I spend my time, your vacation. Exactly. Big F on that one. So you know, it's basically like a little bit of a warning. So my, my spark applies to , it's like the success and the self worth that we attached to these things. Like if I, if I would do this one thing and then the next and before know it, like my entire

Um , long way to grandma's house. Here we go. Uh , it came out of this , uh , year and end of 2018 I'll over a month long creativity challenge where I, and anybody who wanted to join me online , um, we set out to just do something creative every day and by just setting that little challenge but also compassionately.

So we weren't just like what you must like, it was just sort of like, it could be that you buttered your bread differently, like some , um, active applied imagination every day and it really reordered and reprioritized a lot of stuff for me in a really surprising way. And I had a realization that I think sometimes when I buy stuff, I don't even think compulsively because I live within my means mindfully . Yeah .

But , uh , but I'll still be like, I'll still buy stuff when I'm like, you know, I didn't really have the money to me knowing that. Um, but I'm , I'm not, it's not extreme, but I realized that when I was making something every day, I was like, oh, that consumption is a counterfeit. I'm trying to counterfeit the feeling that I get when I actually create something creative. That's right.

I'm trying like as easily and lazy as possible to counterfeit, whatever that wonderful thing is that I think it's like a , I feel like it's like a , uh, uh , what's the word? Like endorphins or something that moved through you when , when you're in creative flow. That's right. And I'm like, I think that I'm trying to replace it with the dopamine that I get when I pushed purchase. That's right. You know what I mean? That's right.

And we probably could have talked for an hour just about like the consumerism side of this, you know, of this dinero effect because there are so many reasons psychologically why people do it and consume more than they need or things they don't want or like there's a whole lot of theory out about that. But I think it is interesting as it relates to creativity to like is it a distraction? Is it something that mirrors that feeling? They're like, Oh I feel like I did something today.

Is it that's covering up fear of , of the , the vulnerability of making something. That's right. And so my spark, I was just, this just sparked a reminder for me to just do, just make the thing and, and don't get caught up in like what's next or what else needs being done. And if I just make a list first, if I just do these 10 things first, then I can do the thing . No, just fucking do it. So that's your was going to ask you and I thought she's going to get there. She's going to get me there.

Your t I just want to say it again because I want to iron it and, and try to remember it for myself. So your a god, this is sometimes when I'm learning something like this moment right now it gets so slippery for me. It's so slippery that it's just like smoke and it just like you got it.

I can't get my hands around it but, but what you're saying is when we as creative people have a creative impulse to um , Polish a script or tweak a script for instance, sometimes f thing can con can occur a distraction or, or this blooming blossoming compulsion to , well, if I'm going to do that then I should, I should Polish all these other scripts and if I'm in there already, if I'm in the documents that I might as well do that.

Like Master Bible of, you know what, if I'm going to do that, I need to take all the, I'll do it on that wall in my office, but that means I've got to move all the art to the other side of the room . You know what , I'm going to clean the office. Like that's sort of when that sort of thing happens, just to stop, like sort of let your conscious mind insert itself and say, or how about you just Polish that script, that , that initial creative impulse that you had. How about you tend to that?

Just where the scar did again and don't, don't imagine transforming your life around it. Just where the road in the rest of the apartment keep your bedspread with your new and fancy chandelier. We our master bedroom all well I might yeah, yeah , yeah. But no, we're not reinvisioning the entire bedroom around the chandelier's because it's not necessary and it's literally, it's just a distraction. Is there any part of this too ?

I always think one of the things I love about you, Laura came in and I feel like listeners will learn this if they hang in this podcast with us. NPS, if we keep making this podcast, we will. I don't know. Oh , we will. We will see. We will, I like your commitment to um , waybill I like your commitment to goals.

I like you, you often see the positive side of things and the, there's a positive side to this, which is maybe you do receive the the plush scarlet robe or maybe you do receive the watch and maybe you strive to make a better life or maybe you like clean up your act in some way or like, yeah, you might, but you also might

I can finish a script, Polish it and send it off to someone to read before I clean your entire the others before you Marie Kondo your entire house, right? That's right. I don't have to, you don't have to do all of that. All things can exist. I can be a great writer and send my scripts out and have a completely disorganized pile of other scripts and thoughts and you know, all that, all that is okay. All of it can be true.

Um , it , you know the problem in terms of this deterrent effect, it comes in when you think, oh, everything has to be transformed before I can take an action. Wow. Not so we are here to just do it. So the house can be, the laundry can be undone, the house can be up, there can be dishes in the sink and right. You can still, if you have a creative impulse to, you can put on your sound , that room you can put on your fancy watch and then you can pay it out.

Your water colors and just on the dishes will still be there. We'll be there. That is awesome. And say the name of it again, the deterrent effect Tetiaroa found though, I'm sure were , I might be saying [inaudible] well done. That's newsy can use, let's use , you can use right here.

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