“I think the misconception people have about artists is that artists walk around with sort of unrealized things in their head. And the process of being an artist is making those become real. But I don’t really know any artist that works that way. You might have an idea of where you want to start, but the process of making something is the process of starting to understand it as well… You find your way through making it.”— Brian Eno, Inside Brian Eno’s Studio | Zane Lowe Interview

I can feel every artist nodding in understanding when Eno said these words. I certainly felt the truth in it within my own work. Every day I sit to write and get swept up and away by the process of finding something to say. The work takes me where it will. My job is simply to show up and to stay politely focused. Eno emphasized his thoughts on this process by referencing the famous Picasso quote about it during this interview:

“Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” — Pablo Picasso

It’s a relief to step into Eno’s studio in such a loud, jarring time in our collective history. Doesn’t the world need more thoughtful immersion in art? Now more than ever. And that’s where we come in, friend. We are here to do the work, however it comes to us, and to find out just how far we might go.

This all transcends art, of course. We’re all just channeling life through our work, whatever that work is. Inspiration sweeps us up and away in a state of flow to someplace we hardly imagined when we began. And when the work is done, we have a quiet moment of realization with it where we discover what we have created before releasing it to the wild and beginning again.