Author Jeanette Winterson has written a thoughtful article, "In Praise of the Crack Up" on the relationship between creativity and madness. She discusses the role of art to be transformative -- a resource to which we turn to address traumatic wounds:
"Creativity takes the heavy mass of our lives and transforms it back into available energy. Taking the mundane or the weighted, the overlooked or the too familiar, art is able to re-show us ourselves and ourselves in the world. Art holding up a mirror to life is commonly misunderstood as realism, but in fact it is recognition. We see through our own fakes, our own cover stories, we see things as they are, instead of how they look, or how we'd like them to be."
Goblin Fruithas a terrific new issue up, just in time for the season of gloom and monsters. As always, I am so impressed with this wonderful online poetry journal, edited by the industrious trioof Amal Al-Mothar and Jessica Wick, and Oliver Hunter. While there is something here for almost every taste (from ghoulishly gothic, to twisted fairy tales, and poems with teeth and fangs) I'd like to recommend Megan Arkenberg's "The Fawn Prince," a gorgeous and quiet poem about a fantastic encounter.
In this issue of Goblin Fruit, Oliver Hunterintroduces us all to the sublime work of French illustrator, Roseau, whose work handsomely illustrates the current Autumn 2009 issue. Of her work, Hunter says: "Living and working close to the sea, she creates jewel-like miniatures on pieces of handmade paper and teabag packaging...Roseau invokes a diverse range of traditions, including medieval manuscripts, the surrealism of Joan Miro, Paul Klee and Leonora Carrington, and the contemporary revival of journal drawings shared amongst friends over the internet." Treat rather than trick yourself to peek at her beautiful work on Flickr and Etsy.
