The Great Wave off Kanagawa is an iconic piece of art. Literally, it depicts Japanese fishermen lying low in a fishing boat, trying to ride out the enormity and capriciousness of nature, specifically the ocean, which in this case serves up a giant wave that dwarfs even the mighty Mt Fuji in the background and threatens to swallow them whole.
The Great Wave off Kanagawa also depicts a life journey. It is a narrative of an unfolding process in life where to be out in the open waters of life in pursuit of a craft, is to be at the mercy of forces and challenges which can overwhelm us and dwarf our efforts, and drown out our solo voice.
A friend of mine, Daniele Bolelli, wrote a great susbtack post today titled Creativity, Success and The Illusion of Fairness. The post conveys a reflective and critical perspective on the nature of creativity, success, and the perceived fairness in artistic endeavours. Bolelli is the renowned host of a much-loved history podcast History on Fire, and is no stranger to personal successes in creative fields. But in this post he expresses a rare cynicism towards the artistic journey, highlighting the vast disparity between effort, talent, and recognition.
He acknowledges his own fortunate experiences but argues that these are exceptions in an otherwise capricious landscape where quality is only one of many factors influencing success. Bolelli has a delightful way with words, but he throws some hard shade on the realities faced by creatives, including frequent rejection, the impact of external factors like internet algorithms and luck, and the emotional toll of pursuing artistic endeavours. His synopsis is about the irony of talent leading to more frustration and disappointment, suggesting that the pursuit of creative success is fraught with challenges that often overshadow the joy of creation itself.
The below is a slightly darker piece I wrote some years back in a darker, less charitable moment of reflection on the same idea.
BLEEDING Art is not always an act of joy or a creation borne of inspiration, sometimes it bleeds out of us. its passage through us is the letting of pain from a deep well of discomfort, agitated by the unavoidable engagement with the world; the simultaneous entanglement with and estrangement from of our fellow man, whose boorish ignorance clatters and drags at our souls like a soiled and rusty bucket dropped carelessly and drawn clumsily out on its chain of petty biases. -Rocco Jarman
The best context I can provide for that poem is the Lava Cake scene in Jon Favreau’s Chef (2014), wherein his character, the eponymous Chef, whose entire life’s meaning and livelihood ride on the words of critics, confronts a food critic who has been scathing of his work. A cathartic vent of epic proportions ensues.
Stop reading for a moment, follow that link and watch the 2-minute clip.
To create art is a vulnerable process.
To perform art, or even publish it quietly out into the world, is to put the full devotional fruits of one’s labours, not only into the galley of public scorn and opinion, but also onto the sacred altar of that ideal you are devoted to, and thereby have to face how short your arrow can even land from the noble mark of its aim.
The becoming and being of one’s own authentic self is no different.
Devotional craft is so honest. No such offering to Life is ever found lacking in that which matters most in the end: Vulnerability—wherein lies the most incredible of all human beauty.
Many people are busy, and noisy—pumping out photos of their lives, churning out quotes and opinions, inducing us to follow them, endorse them, buy their product, share their work, like their work and validate their shine.
Not all Content is Craft.
Craft takes years of development. Craft takes devotion and vulnerability.
Work just takes time and effort. The kind of output that work yields can be borrowed, copied, infinitely replicated and it can be synthesised —you can get AI to do it.
Craft takes a real relationship with the person you are trying to become and the journey it takes to get there with all its disappointments and challenges, choosing to accept the ways it sometimes takes your promise from you or has to break your heart along the way. To commit yourself to your own growth in this way always also requires much un-becoming.
For “work” or “content”, we simply have to invest time and energy, sometimes even someone else’s, or sometimes they, ours, in the fulfilment of an ambition we don’t really carry deeply in our own hearts.
For craft, we have to risk ourselves. Craft takes Calling.
When you are writing, or dancing, or painting, or even creating a meal or a post on social media, this is your craft, you care about what you are putting out into the world. If you have been devoted for many years to your craft, and you pour your soul into a piece of work, and it is not appreciated, it feels like a child you love that is pushed aside, and that shit hurts.
The comment to Bolelli’s post that irked me the most was the one that said something to the effect of: “Why do you care what other people think! After all the best art was created by people who didn’t give a crap about what other people thought. The joy you get from creating is its own reward!” The simplest response to this is that artists and creatives can’t eat self-esteem and they cannot pay their bills with joy.
Half of all the deep investment in the creation of our art, and the devotion to our crafts is the living with a prayer in our hearts about how we might let our gifts live in the world. We dream of being able to not just make a living from our efforts but to have our devotion witnessed and appreciated to the level of our care and effort.
If you have never felt this anguish, if your work doesn’t feel like a kind of coming home, you should know, there is something out there waiting for you. And there is something inside you that wants to live in the world. It does not have to be how you make your money, it might be an art or an instrument. It could be a way we agree to belong to the great secret of life, a way we agree to listen to the voice of a place or the way we decide to show up for someone.
If you are on a true path to meet your life’s purpose, your work will both break your heart and welcome you home. You must have the sense and the courage to truly face both. It is like a star in the sky only we can see. It does not have to be recognisable to anyone else actually, but if we find it, and we chase it, and we give our heart to it, those who know, will see the light of it shining through us.
We all have halos, and when we shine, they shine. Anything that does not light you up is too small to invest all your energy and attention into. That holds true for work, relationships, identities and beliefs.
Any time spent wondering what this might be, asking the impossible question, even if the answer eludes you, is still not time wasted.
Sometimes I still wonder how I am supposed to bring my gift and magic to the world. Finding the magic is half the battle. Finding the way to let it live in the world can be just as difficult, and it can break us in totally different ways.
I am beginning to suspect this is both essential and completely necessary.
The important thing, I am sure of it, is that we wonder.
WHAT CAN I DO ?
If you want to know what you can do: Subscribe to channels that put out valuable work. Like and Comment on their work. Share their work. Be discerning: recognise that not all content is ‘Craft’—see the art, the vulnerability and love someone pours into their work, and take one step towards meeting them at that window!
Also, please take the time to explore Daniele’s work:
History On Fire Podcast - Whether you like history or not, if you care about bravery, wisdom, passion, larger-than-life characters and some of the most emotionally intense moments in human experience, this is your fix.
Daniele’s Substack - Writings about life, the universe and everything else: anything from cooking to history, from martial arts to philosophy
I discovered your work through a mutual friend of yours and really use your work as nourishing soul food. It is truly some of the most moving and deep work I’ve ever read. I’ll often reread passages repeatedly just from the shear shock and awe of the insight in the words. I’m sure it was a gift and a curse to live the life and learn the lessons that have allowed access to this wisdom, but I am so appreciative of you sharing and being able to receive it. I have passed your work onto others who I feel could deeply appreciate it in the same way. I’m not one to comment much online, but this helped me understand with all the negativity and rejection in social media, how important it is to understand that your words are reaching and validate how valuable and impactful your immersion into your craft really is for people like me. So thank you, truly, for sharing your wisdom and vulnerability.
I never noticed the boat or Mt Fuji. Just thought it was a cool painting of a stormy sea!!
Great work as always, Rocco...with TikTok/ our shorter attention spans and AI ready to rip up the very fabric of society its a tough time for creatives....but your writing is beautiful. Thank you for sharing your wisdom! <3