Being an artist sometimes means following ideas that can be considered absurd or foolish. And Lia Chavez is no stranger to following artistic intuition, no matter how foolish an idea seemed.
When she was young, Chavez took some words from Wolfgang Tillmans to heart:
“You will only succeed if you fail!”
She admitted that, at first, she didn’t understand what he meant. But as her career progressed, she realized what he was trying to tell her; that failing is the force behind creative innovation. Chavez recalls a time where one specific failure, dropping her camera in a puddle, really spurred her toward reaching her goal:
“Freakishly, the camera was salvaged to reveal an image of light gracefully spilt like mercury across a plane of kaleidoscopic geometric space. This moment of haphazardly scribbled light divulged a complex harmony of physical laws which roused my creative intuition from a deep sleep. That silly little moment marked the beginning of my creative life as I now know it.”
Creation comes from failing numerous times before you finally form your idea into a finished product. Sometimes, it is necessary to fail so you can create success!
Thanks to reader Erin Albert for this post idea!