The Artist Connection

I formed a group of community artist in 2009 who were friends engaged in some type of creative self-expression. I found the spirit and motivation of artists much aligned with mine -- -- I have spent most of my career with businessmen and computer scientists with whom I had a common interest. I felt however something missing -- -- about a more passionate commitment to new ideas and the adventure and wonder of creating new work. I often had trouble articulating this and when I did it didn’t quite resonate.
That all changed in conversations with friends who were painters and poets. Their total commitment to creating new work and the ironies of life it presents was music to my ears. And my creative adventures and misadventures likewise set a spark with them. The more we talked the more I realized the affinity and decided to do something about it.
So we formed a group called ‘The Artist Connection’ and decided to meet and discuss the path of creativity, how we motivate ourselves, how we see creative projects through, how we get new

ideas, how we nurture the creative spirit, ... I also set up a blog site where people post their poems, paintings, and observations: artist-conection.blogspot.com.  
The group is high energy and hilarious and feels like a blood brotherhood. It has stimulated me further than  my own initiatives. The way creativity is manifest and carries out in the different disciplines and the striking similarity of creativity’s spark in different art forms -- painting, poetry, writing, storytelling, reporting -- fascinates us all.
Here’s more description about the group and a few of the discussion topics taken from its own blog: artist-conection.blogspot.com:

Who are we?

'The Artist Connection’ ---- a gathering of artists to share, reinforce, and understand the dynamics of their creative trade. The idea is to share and have fun, and maybe learn something.

When we meet

Magic happens, creative people share their visions and inspirations. It's about the very early feeling of a rumbling of a new idea, of how a seed is set and how it grows and takes form. It's about creating space to let the new seed grow.

It's a brotherhood of creativity -- -- blood brothers bonded by the pursuit of a dream. It's the scaffolding and support system for ephemeral dreams. It's creating self accountability to have dreams come true. It's about listening to the calling and letting its meaning be felt. It's honoring the lifecycle of the creative process -- -- a support group for self-expression. It's the excitement of witnessing a new idea becoming manifest -- -- something from nothing, creation.

Members:

Thomas J McCabe -- mathematician, entrepreneur, poet -- tom@mccabetech.com
Keith Haller -- painter, poet, engineer -- kah250@comcast.net
Susan Kim -- author, poet, reporter -- susankim1@mac.com
Najwa Lamin -- painter, poet, engineer -- najwalamin@gmail.com
Timothy Gillen -- painter, executive, tennis pro -- tim.gillen10@verizon.net
Wardel Lindsay -- author, engineer, social activist -- wardelllindsay@yahoo.com
JoAnne Growney -- poet, mathematician, professor -- wow@joannegrowney.com
Stan Pickett -- author, entrepreneur, actor -- stan@stanpickett.com  

Synchronism -- discussion topic

Synchromism was an art movement founded in 1912 byAmerican artists Stanton MacDonald-Wright and Morgan Russell.
Synchromism is based on the idea that color and sound are similar phenomena, and that the colors in a painting can be orchestrated in the same harmonious way that a composer arranges notes in a symphony.
More broadly, Synchronism is deliberately achieved coincidence in a point of time..

Married to the Muse

Here is a challenge we all share that we should post on ----dealing with the lows and highs of the creative spirit.  That is accepting the loneliness of our thoughts and observations and then marshaling the courage to express them.  And then dealing with life's incompleteness when the creative muse strays -- -- as well as creating the space for its expression before it fades away, rather before it escapes into the night.