Hughes chap 9

If I hear one more thing about Frida Kahlo, I'm moving to Mexico. Just joking. This chapter mainly dealt with examples of different illnesses and creatives/artists who had them. I'm not especially interested with any of it. Hughes makes connections between art work and the artist by attributing their creative abilities to various 'states' of illness/sickness. Maybe they're all just really creative people. Why must we label them? Odd that we [the West] would cite someone's illness as their means to creativity. This chapter does point out several altered states of consciousness (sensory deprivation, insanity, depression) and how despite that, people have managed to create amazing works of art. But, what about people who are insane or depressed who don't create anything artistic? How does this account for randomness? Couldn't these people have been great artists even without their particular illness/sickness? Otherwise, wouldn't every 'madman' or depressed person being incredibly artistic? The end of the chapter deals with alcoholism and creative people and makes reference to the West's acceptance of alcohol for ASOC's which relates to previous material/blogs about our [the West] approval of certain 'drug's and not others. Labels, labels, everywhere..........I'm ending this blog with a quote from Oscar Wilde (who I don't think was mentioned in the chapter)---"work is the curse of the drinking class."