“Where do you get your inspiration?”
Most artists have to field this question with relative frequency, yet very few are able to articulate a comprehensive answer. Indeed, inspiration is a complex concept to wrestle with—it can come from almost any source and, depending on the situation, can lead to a fascinating variety of results. Therefore, we’ve decided to make the September 2012 issue of Synchronized Chaos a study in inspiration. We think you’ll be quite interested to see the many places from which our contributors draw their ideas—and the diverse ways in which they exercise their creativity…
We begin the issue with a very unique form of artwork: digital poetry. Wrapping words, sounds, and images together in a video format, poet Mary Ann Sullivan crafts a distinctive and memorable set of works which take their inspiration from many different sources. Joan of Arc, surely one of history’s most inspirational figures, is the subject of one notable piece; the other spurs for these poems’ creation include such diverse items as religious texts, found objects, and even the notion of language itself.
It’s a real-life event which provides the inspiration for this installment of Leena Prasad’s monthly column Whose Brain Is It?: the hatching of eggs born to a duo of pigeons which had nested on the fire escape of her building. From this springboard, Leena goes on to discuss the phenomenon of nurturing newborns and the biological chemicals which are associated with parental behavior. Both humans and animals come in for discussion, as well as the respective roles of male and female parents.
Lack of inspiration can be quite a dreadful thing, as our columnist Chris Cooper can testify. He was in attendance at a Republican Party fundraiser in Pleasanton, California, and he came back dismayed by the level of enthusiasm (close to nil) at the event. As Chris describes in his article “Snoozefest: The Decline and Fall of the California Republican Party,” the event’s dullness and lack of focus on actual issues mirrors the party’s out-of-touch and distinctly uninspired response to modern problems.
Sometimes it’s the readers of a piece who need a little inspiration in order to reach their goals. In her essay “Create It,” Bramani Spiteri expresses frustration with the cultural trend of sacrificing happiness and satisfaction in favor of staid and unfulfilling lives. She argues that, instead of settling for a dull job and a life of “just getting by,” people should follow their dreams and inject a little more creativity and joy into the modern world—and we predict that many of those who read her thoughts on the matter will feel inspired to do just that!
Sam Burks, one of Synchronized Chaos’ most talented poetic contributors, appears in this issue with “Gravity, An Illusion.” The piece portrays a troubled romantic relationship which has taken more than a few twists and turns and lost much of its former inspiration. It also features a particularly inspired use of poetic language, as traditional metaphors for romance and relationships appear in new and different contexts.
Cristina Deptula, longtime editor and contributor to our magazine, contributes an article on a real-life medical mystery: the outbreak in recent decades of “nodding syndrome,” a debilitating condition which has affected thousands of children in the eastern regions of Africa over the past several decades. Cristina reports on the current efforts to combat the problem: the medical researchers on the scene have a challenging task ahead of them, but they draw considerable inspiration from the resilience of the affected communities.
Readers of our previous issue will recall the first chapter of Peter Lynch’s memorable novel Newman-X. This month, we have the second installment of the story, in which we continue to follow its troubled young narrator on his odyssey through the pitfalls of the modern world. In this segment, he inspires himself to perform a little self-observation, as well as some research into the neuropsychological concepts which are so relevant to his life, but nevertheless his self-destructive behavior continues unabated…
We hope you enjoy this month’s issue of Synchronized Chaos! As always, feel free to leave comments for the contributors; if you’re interested in submitting some of your work to the magazine, please send it over to synchchaos@gmail.com.
