> CD #44: What artists wear
Ever since I wrote about what writers wear, I’ve wanted to dig into what artists wear, too, for purely selfish motives. I have identified as a writer since I was a kid, but I am still hesitant most days to call myself an artist. I only came to comics in a serious way about six years ago, when my friend Doug refused to illustrate my graphic memoir, forcing me to do it on my own because “the story is so personal and intimate” and “it would be so much better coming from your hand.” Sigh. He was right. What a jerk, lol.
So that’s how I ended up a cartoonist, or graphic memoirist, or illustrator—or, dare I say, an artist?—without any technical training or actual confidence in my skills. And despite the book’s good reviews, I have always suspected it was well-received despite the art, not because of it. Which makes me super uncomfortable because I assume true artists out there view me as an imposter, undeserving of any title except “hack.” (Of course, I know that true artists think not of me at all—and yet.)
My imposter syndrome makes me especially interested in the idea of enclothed cognition, and whether there’s a way to help me feel like an artist from the outside in. Researchers have found that our perceptions around clothing can not only affect how others treat us and how we feel about ourselves—they can also affect our performance in measurable ways. The article describes three different experiments, all leading to similar conclusions:
In the first, 58 undergraduates were randomly assigned to wear a white lab coat or street clothes. Then they were given a test for selective attention based on their ability to notice incongruities, as when the word “red” appears in the color green. Those who wore the white lab coats made about half as many errors on incongruent trials as those who wore regular clothes.
In the second experiment, 74 students were randomly assigned to one of three options: wearing a doctor’s coat, wearing a painter’s coat or seeing a doctor’s coat. Then they were given a test for sustained attention. They had to look at two very similar pictures side by side on a screen and spot four minor differences, writing them down as quickly as possible.
Those who wore the doctor’s coat, which was identical to the painter’s coat, found more differences. They had acquired heightened attention. Those who wore the painter’s coat or were primed with merely seeing the doctor’s coat found fewer differences between the images.
The third experiment explored this priming effect more thoroughly. Does simply seeing a physical item, like the coat, affect behavior? Students either wore a doctor’s coat or a painter’s coat, or were told to notice a doctor’s lab coat displayed on the desk in front of them for a long period of time. All three groups wrote essays about their thoughts on the coats. Then they were tested for sustained attention.
Again, the group that wore the doctor’s coat showed the greatest improvement in attention. You have to wear the coat, see it on your body and feel it on your skin for it to influence your psychological processes, Dr. Galinsky said.
Clothes invade the body and brain, putting the wearer into a different psychological state, he said.
If that’s the case, I wonder whether dressing like an artist might give me heightened creativity? Or if I wore, say, this blouse featuring a print by the Canadian artist Jessica Bell, would it have a noticeable effect on my work?
Oh, if only! If only it were as easy as slipping on Maira Kalman’s signature hat or copying David Hockney’s pattern play. I’d do it in a minute. But an artist’s style really does seem to come from within—or result from their very specific life circumstances—and is therefore inimitable.
Maybe it’s more about developing an artistic mindset or temperament, then? Maybe it’s about bringing your own peculiar idea of beauty into all aspects of your life, from work to clothes and back again, like an ecosystem?
British sculptor Barbara Hepworth once wrote, about the importance of clothes: “We have to evolve some personal style that is an inspiration to ourselves. Inspiration is a necessity, otherwise one is overcome by tiredness.”
Hmmm, could that be it? If I commit to wearing clothes that keep me visually inspired—that make life a little less dull—perhaps some of that inspiration will spill over into what I’m doing on the page. Or should I just focus on my work and forget what I look like altogether? It may be time for an experiment. Who’s in?
:) Teresa
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