Day 5 Prompt: Music
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tolkienekphrasisweekMandatory Art Form Prompt
Day 5's required ekphrasis theme is music. According to my abridged OED, music is "the art of combining vocal or instrumental sounds in a pleasing way. the sound so produced." According to Wikipedia, fount of all knowledge, it is "the art of arranging sounds in time through the elements of melody, harmony, rhythm, and timbre." Music exists across all cultures and serves a dizzying variety of social practices, from fun to religion to politics to 9-5 jobs. It invites us to think about variation, innovation, improvisation, and orality -- or to just groove.
Optional Writing Method Theme
Day 5’s optional writing prompt is in-universe translation. Following Tolkien’s nested conceits, what fun can you have with the vagaries of translated transmission? (This-universe translation could be fun too, if you find an artistic fic you’d love to translate!)
Optional Art Method Theme
For those making non-writing art, Day 5's suggestion is in the style of one of Tolkien's peoples. Have you always thought the Blacklock Dwarves of Rhûn had a really distinctive musical aesthetic? Do you have deeply felt headcanons about the fingering techniques used by master flautists in Cardolan? Are you itching to share the children’s songs of the Ice Bay of Forochel with an international audience for the first time? Let us hear!
Optional Pain Theme
Today's sadness seasoning is artistic unfreedom. Shostakovich vibes, you dig? What are the forces preventing an artist, not from creating at all, but from creating in the fullness of their artistic independence? In what ways are their artworks shaped, and, later, understood, through the lens of unwelcome powers greater than the artist’s own?
Optional Joy Theme
Day 5's invitation to happiness is positive patronage dynamics. Patronage was, and sometimes still is, simply a mere workaday reality for an artist supporting themself, while at other times it was a constricting force of social reproduction. Sometimes, however, it is a meeting of the minds, a way to support a joint vision, a profound connection. The vibes this time are much more Manet painting an extra spear of asparagus to thank Charles Ephrussi.
A number of examples for your inspiration.
Day 5's required ekphrasis theme is music. According to my abridged OED, music is "the art of combining vocal or instrumental sounds in a pleasing way. the sound so produced." According to Wikipedia, fount of all knowledge, it is "the art of arranging sounds in time through the elements of melody, harmony, rhythm, and timbre." Music exists across all cultures and serves a dizzying variety of social practices, from fun to religion to politics to 9-5 jobs. It invites us to think about variation, innovation, improvisation, and orality -- or to just groove.
Optional Writing Method Theme
Day 5’s optional writing prompt is in-universe translation. Following Tolkien’s nested conceits, what fun can you have with the vagaries of translated transmission? (This-universe translation could be fun too, if you find an artistic fic you’d love to translate!)
Optional Art Method Theme
For those making non-writing art, Day 5's suggestion is in the style of one of Tolkien's peoples. Have you always thought the Blacklock Dwarves of Rhûn had a really distinctive musical aesthetic? Do you have deeply felt headcanons about the fingering techniques used by master flautists in Cardolan? Are you itching to share the children’s songs of the Ice Bay of Forochel with an international audience for the first time? Let us hear!
Optional Pain Theme
Today's sadness seasoning is artistic unfreedom. Shostakovich vibes, you dig? What are the forces preventing an artist, not from creating at all, but from creating in the fullness of their artistic independence? In what ways are their artworks shaped, and, later, understood, through the lens of unwelcome powers greater than the artist’s own?
Optional Joy Theme
Day 5's invitation to happiness is positive patronage dynamics. Patronage was, and sometimes still is, simply a mere workaday reality for an artist supporting themself, while at other times it was a constricting force of social reproduction. Sometimes, however, it is a meeting of the minds, a way to support a joint vision, a profound connection. The vibes this time are much more Manet painting an extra spear of asparagus to thank Charles Ephrussi.
A number of examples for your inspiration.
