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Mona Lisa - Deep Work
Your weekly art takeaway
Mona L
September 01, 2024
Sep 01 | Issue 06
ML - Welcome to Mona Lisa. A weekly newsletter for artists with timeless quotes, ideas and light bites for curious & wandering minds.
Black Swans are the wild cards. They are the rare and unpredictable events that defy our expectations, profoundly altering our world. They are the unforeseen twists that change the game entirely, reshaping the boundaries of what we once thought possible.
Little thoughts
☀️ The summer group show - a defence
📖 “The most powerful person in the world is the storyteller. The storyteller sets the vision, values and agenda of an entire generation that is to come.” — Steve Jobs
📍 Google street views of famous artist’s studios.
🔗 p.s. Images in the newsletter are always linked…click them & explore...🤓
Mona’s notes
My artistic practice consumes my focus like little else. It’s the elevator music of my mind - twinkling away when I wake up, whilst on my commute to the studio, when I’m listening to music, walking, running, scrolling. For me, the reward is in its eventual physicality - tangible manifestations of my inner workings. And yet, although it consumes the mechanics of my mind, reaching a state of flow is a very different dimension of focus.
To build your working life around the experience of flow produced by deep work is a proven path to deep satisfaction.
I discovered the concept of “Deep Work” in a book by Cal Newport of the same name. I read it during the pandemic (an excellent example of a Black Swan event btw). During this time I overcompensated for the world-shifting change by wholly submerging myself into virtual worlds for entire days. It practically re-wired my brain. I was so overstimulated and ‘networked’, and I hadn’t left my house. I picked up “Deep Work” because something had to change, but the irony was that I couldn’t even finish 2 pages of the book without checking my phone. 🙉
Deep Work: Professional activities performed in a state of distraction-free concentration that push your cognitive capabilities to their limit. These efforts create new value, improve your skill, and are hard to replicate.
Books like this are often marketed and written for those termed as “knowledge workers“, but poignantly the book draws upon the craftspersons’ ability to engage in deep work:
“Ric Furrer is a master craftsman whose work requires him to spend most of his day in a state of depth—even a small slip in concentration can ruin dozens of hours of effort. He’s also someone who clearly finds great meaning in his profession. This connection between deep work and a good life is familiar and widely accepted when considering the world of craftsmen. “The satisfactions of manifesting oneself concretely in the world through manual competence have been known to make a man quiet and easy,” explains Matthew Crawford. And we believe him […] Craftsmen like Furrer tackle professional challenges that are simple to define but difficult to execute—a useful imbalance when seeking purpose.
Deep working has been on my mind again. Recently, the craftsperson that I share a studio with commented that finding her focus, in an environment replete with distractions, has been one of her key achievements this year. I rate this — a lot. I feel like the ability to override distractions isn’t necessarily about changing environment, but changing myself. It’s never going to be quiet enough, bright enough, equipped enough, big enough — but if I can manifest myself “concretely in the world though manual competence”, and just get on with it, I’ll get my “quiet & easy” too.
With love -
Mona x
“Cold water doesn't get warmer if you jump late.” - Unknown
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