Our most-loved artists create alien spaces which help them reframe reality. This alienation resulting from the artist being silenced by existing societal norms defines their creativity and opens up new possibilities beyond the normal, as Professor Rodney Sharkey argues using the examples of David Bowie and Samuel Beckett.
Both Samuel Beckett and David Bowie's creative processes are defined by the effects of alienation, as both felt silenced by normative modes or representation. To express themselves fully, Beckett and Bowie created alternative or alien spaces which helped them reframe their own realities. In doing so, they were able to transgress hitherto normative social values and incite progress in the political and cultural orders of their present day lives. Furthermore, and for contemporary readers and listeners, they leave behind a similarly alien aesthetic; one through which alienated people can see each other beyond the social codes that determine the normal parameters of the current hegemony, while also opening up new alien spaces of potential communion and collective action. Consequently, their aesthetics of alienation create a state of uncertainty for the marginalised other that nonetheless can be used to open up new narratives and new ways of being, individually and collectively.
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