Wade - u and I have had this discussion before - so lets skip past some of this with quick summaries:
Most certainly there are those that create without drugs, and like many people, have a prejuduce against them. Artists like anyone else, are just human and full of prejiduce and perception. We like Dali, and and Moore, but we dont know that they could not have been much better had they used drugs either. Some people are just plain skilled and drugs or not, will do well.
Michaelangelo was a snuff user, dont know about Da Vinci.
Most of what I was speaking about are modern works - mostly because being an artist in the past was much more difficult and limiting than now. Art was not open to the masses a few hundred years ago. Many composers trained their whole llives to become skilled. Times are much different now. If we look at what music has dominated over the last 30 years, you will see a huge percentage of artists that explore music using drugs. The very sounds, instrumentation, composition styles, and knowledge of psyhcoacoustics are utterly beyond the conceptions of the past, and have a great deal more effect on the human organism.
As for drugs hampering the creative process - certainly it can - especially if a person has a weak will. This is common with POT especially. Most of my friends have the common problems of remaing alert and functional when half baked. Fortunately I do not, I will stay up until 3 or 4 in the morning on the stuff. And what about LSD? I am a guitarist, and computer composer. It is through my familiarity with these instruments that keep me functional while tripping. I will compose while my pupils are the size of saucers - I cant really play guitar well - but I can visualize the sounds as notes on the scale, and type in much of the music without playing a thing. This process I find confusing and frustrating when i am sober, but it seems to make sense when I'm on LSD. It does take will power - a lot of it. I think that someone interested but not driven might not be able to perform in such a manner, much less type on the computer
I dont think that drugs will hamper your perception, just your performance. I suppose its really about the payoff and what you are looking for. Ill be more than happy to send anyone a copy of some music composed on LSD alone. Its completely sequenced - and is intended only to have a strong effect on non-sober people.
Bill Roh
Sodom
Wade T.Smith wrote:
> On 1/13/99 14:18, Bob Hartwig said this-
>
> >Do you believe there are individuals who don't need drugs to reach their
> >full creative potential?
>
> More to a point, is, what people have actually _reached_ their 'creative
> potential' using drugs? Just as adamant a claim can be made that drugs
> hamper the creative process.
>
> Two of my favorite artists, both extremely creative, groundbreaking, and
> prolific, are Henry Moore and Salvador Dali, both of whom have stated
> without reservation that no drug was ever used in the creation of their
> art.
>
> Do we have records of Da Vinci using drugs? Michaelangelo?
>
> But first, tell me how one determines a 'creative potential'...?
>
> **************************************
> Wade T. Smith
> morbius@channel1.com
> wade_smith@harvard.edu
> **************************************