Digestion

By Darryl Ayo

Your influences will pass through you like roughage. Whether you’re a novice artist or a wizened veteran, you will become absorbed in the work of somebody else and occasionally you may fear that this influence is having too strong an effect on your thinking. There is no need to cut yourself off from it, however. Drink deeply of the well of inspiration and it will pass.

Indulge yourself. Allow yourself to go through phases. They will pass. When the mood leaves you, what is left will be the traces of influence. In this way, you will advance your craft and your understanding of your medium.

Eventually, it all becomes a part of the matrix of ideas and thoughts that comprise you. So you will be able to embrace it all at once: personal identity as well as the building blocks which helped create you.