Our Recommended Books, Music & Movies for The Creative Fire

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Last updated 4/6/2005

  Books

1.   The Creative Habit : Learn It and Use It for Life

    by Twyla Tharp (Hardcover - 2003)

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    From Amazon.com: Perhaps the leading choreographer of her generation, Tharp offers a thesis on creativity that is more complex than its self-help title suggests. To be sure, an array of prescriptions and exercises should do much to help those who feel some pent-up inventiveness to find a system for turning idea into product, whether that be a story, a painting or a song. This free-wheeling interest across various creative forms is one of the main points that sets this book apart and leads to its success. The approach may have been born of the need to reach an audience greater than choreographer hopefuls, and the diversity of examples (from Maurice Sendak to Beethoven on one page) frees the student to develop his or her own patterns and habits, rather than imposing some regimen that works for Tharp. The greatest number of illustrations, however, come from her experiences. As a result, this deeply personal book, while not a memoir, reveals much about her own struggles, goals and achievements. Finally, the book is also a rumination on the nature of creativity itself, exploring themes of process versus product, the influences of inspiration and rigorous study, and much more.

2.   The War of Art: Break Through the Blocks and Win Your Inner Creative Battles

    by Steven Pressfield (Paperback - 2003)

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    From Amazon.com: If you have a passion in your life -- writing, painting, music, sculpting, dancing, acting -- and if this passion is the reason you believe you're alive, then check out The War of Art. One of Pressfield's premises is that we're all MEANT for something, we're each here for some reason, to create something in the world ("Eternity is in love with the productions of time") and if we don't live for and through this, then we're wasting our time. He blasts away even the most stubborn and alluring resistances -- the excuses we tell ourselves for not doing the work. This book can rev you up -- it's short (165 pages) and powerful. I breezed through the book in a few hours and felt energized. Pressfield puts art-making in perspective, puts procrastination in perspective, and delivers in a direct, conversational tone -- as one human who is trying to live a life that means something to another. I've read a lot of "how to" books and most don't live up to their hype. The War of Art deals with how to overcome the obstacles of ambition and how (and why) to discipline yourself. As much as a cliché as it may sound, it will make a difference in how you look at what you do. Give it to anyone else you know who wants to write, paint, act, dance, compose -- and wants to follow their dream.
 

3.  The Artist's Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity

    by Julia Cameron (Paperback - 2002)

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   From Amazon.com: With the basic principle that creative expression is the natural direction of life, Julia Cameron and Mark Bryan lead you through a comprehensive 12-week program to recover your creativity from a variety of blocks, including limiting beliefs, fear, self-sabotage, jealousy, guilt, addictions, and other inhibiting forces, replacing them with artistic confidence and productivity. This book links creativity to spirituality by showing how to connect with the creative energies of the universe, and has, in the four years since its publication, spawned a remarkable number of support groups for artists dedicated to practicing the exercises it contains.

  Music

1.   The Creative Fire: Myths and Stories About the Cycles of Creativity

    by Clarissa Pinkola Estés

     (Audio Cassettes - July 1993)

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From Amazon.com: The author of Women Who Run with the Wolves offers a marvelous series of stories and myths to help artists nurture their creativity. Society looks down on the unshaped, unconventional forces that must be released for people to create. A unifying theme of the stories is how these creative forces fight with the dark and the dead--the forces that suppress our creative energy. Though tools for personal discovery are offered, this is less a practical program than a moving work of archetypal storytelling and seminal insights. With the author's personal engagement evident in every word, the storytelling is deftly paced, dramatic without seeming so, and powerfully magical. A memorable listening experience and an essential part of the audio library of any creative person.
 

2.   Heart Steps: Prayers and Declarations for a Creative Life

   by Julia Cameron

    (Audio Cassettes - September 1997)

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From Amazon.com: The best-selling author of The Artist's Way narrates a gift collection of prayers and affirmations designed to awaken the creative and artistic child within any listener, accompanied by healing music by noted composer Tim Wheater.

3.   A Creative Companion: How to Free Your Creative Spirit [ABRIDGED]

    by SARK

    (Audio Cassette - September 1992)

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From Amazon.com: Writer, artist, free spirit, and self-described "dangerous woman," SARK reads from her lovely, lighthearted book on becoming an artist. Guaranteed to bring a little magic into even the most sensible life.

  Movies

1.   Frida

     Starring: Salma Hayek

     (2003) ~ DVD

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A zena moon Essential Movie

From Amazon.com: Salma Hayek makes up for many bad movies with her fierce performance in this sumptuous film. Hayek plays the Mexican surrealist painter Frida Kahlo, whose tempestuous life with her unfaithful husband, muralist Diego Rivera (Alfred Molina), drives the story of Frida. Maverick director Julie Taymor (Titus, the Broadway stage production of The Lion King) pulls out a wealth of gorgeous visuals to capture everything from the horrific bus accident that damaged Kahlo's spine to her and Rivera's trip to New York City, where Rivera's political leanings ruptured a commission from the Rockefeller family. Though the script spends too much time telling us how great Frida's painting is (rather than trusting in the power of the images themselves), Taymor's dynamic energy and Kahlo's forceful personality give Frida genuine emotional impact. The superb cast includes Roger Rees, Valeria Golino, Ashley Judd, Geoffrey Rush, Antonio Banderas, and Edward Norton.

2.   Amadeus - Director's Cut (Two-Disc Special Edition)

     Starring: Tom Hulce, F. Murray Abraham

     (1984) ~ DVD

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A zena moon Essential Movie

From Amazon.com: A note-perfect cinematic event whose immortality was assured from its opening night, Amadeus is an unlikely candidate for the director's-cut treatment. Like one of Mozart's operas, the multiple Oscar-winning theatrical version seemed perfectly formed from the outset--ideal casting, costumes, sets, cinematography, lighting, screenplay, music, music, music--so the reinstatement of an extra 20 minutes simply risks adding "too many notes." Yet though this extended cut can hardly be said to improve a picture that needed no improvement, it does at least flesh out a couple of small subplots and shed new light on certain key scenes. Here we learn why Constanze Mozart bears such ill will towards Salieri when she discovers him at her husband's deathbed, and we see deeper into the reasons why Mozart has no students. The structure of the picture is otherwise unaltered.

The director's cut of Amadeus finally accords this masterful work the DVD treatment it deserves. The handsome anamorphic widescreen picture is accompanied by a choice of Dolby 5.1 or Dolby stereo sound options, and it's all contained on one side of the disc. Director Milos Forman and writer Peter Shaffer provide a chatty though sporadic commentary, but they're obviously still too mesmerized by the movie to do much more than offer the odd anecdote. The second disc contains an excellent new hour-long "making of" documentary, with contributions from Forman, Shaffer, Sir Neville Marriner, and all the main actors, taking in the scriptwriting, choice of music, casting, and problems involved in filming in Communist Czechoslovakia with half the crew and extras working for the Secret Police.

3.   Pollock

    Starring: Ed Harris, Marcia Gay Harden

    (2000) ~ DVD

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From Amazon.com: The long road to Pollock began when actor Ed Harris received a biography of Jackson Pollock from his father, who noticed that his son bore an uncanny resemblance to the artist. Harris's fascination with Pollock matched his physical similarity; the actor chose to direct and star in this impressive film biography. And his devotion assured a work of singular integrity, honoring the artist's achievement in abstract expressionism while acknowledging that Pollock was a tormented, manic-depressive alcoholic whose death at 44 (in a possibly suicidal car crash) also claimed the life of an innocent woman. The film also suggests that Pollock's success was largely attributable to the devotion of his wife, artist Lee Krasner, played with matching ferocity by Marcia Gay Harden in an Oscar-winning performance.

In many respects a traditional biopic, Pollock begins in 1941 when Pollock meets Krasner, who encourages him and attracts the attention of supportive critic Clement Greenberg (Jeffrey Tambor) and benefactor Peggy Guggenheim (Amy Madigan). As Pollock rises from obscurity to international acclaim, Harris brings careful balance to his portrayal of a driven creator who found peace during those brief, sober periods when art brought release from his tenacious inner demons. The film offers sympathy without sentiment, appreciation without misguided hagiography. As an acting showcase it's utterly captivating. As a compassionate but unflinching exploration of Jackson Pollock's intimate world, there's no doubt that Harris captured the essence of a man whose life was as torturous as his art was redeeming.