The Art and craft...

Now its an interesting thing to do, making stuff, and as with all jobs or hobbies there are times when you take a good hard look at what you spend your time doing.

The borderline between Art and craft is pretty vague at times, and to my mind it doesn’t matter too much which you prefer to do (they overlap a lot), but it is a different viewpoint.
Thinking about yourself as an artist can put a strain on your creativity to always come up with a new idea; as an artisan or craftsperson the pressure is simply to make another well made piece.

Mastering a craft is a lot to do with honing a technique til it gets about as near to perfect as you need it to be to feel satisfied with your labours.

Art, if it is, as quoted here before, “long, immense and deliberate derangement of the senses” has a kind of inbuilt escalation. There’s a desire or need to make the piece more and more.... deranged? Not quite the right word. ... but you maybe get the idea.

So, if you feel able to make anything.... what do you make? It’s a common problem for builders, and SL offers lots of new avenues for creativity, when you are competent in one field you can simply move on to the next. Good with prims?...learn scripting. Good with scripting......learn anims. etc. etc.

The thing that gets lost, however, is the idea that, actually, the thing you make, the product, the piece.... is really speaking a bi-product. It is the physical/virtual husk or shell which, like a photo, is only a reminder of the process you went thro to get to where you are.

The real Art is what happens in yourself. Alchemy is called The Art for this very reason.

A craft has a similar effect on you psychologically, but with a craft it is your interaction with Matter (or virtual matter) that is the crucible in which you cook your alchemical potion.

My favourite saying of all time, possibly, is one from Gerald Dorn, a 17th Century Alchemist,
“You will never make from others the One thou seekest save first there be made one thing of thy self.”
...which means, roughly, that striving for perfection outside of yourself is gonna be fruitless unless you aim for a harmony inside too.

Luckily, for us poor imperfect beings, there is Grace, and Grace sends us the occasional visit from the god Genius (or her daughter, baby genius) and the joy that brings us is remembered most of our lives.

:))