Abstract

This dissertation explores the experience of being creative as a spiritual practice. The literature review looks at this experience as it is described in creativity theory, spiritual traditions, as well as in contemporary art history. The research employs a hermeneutic-phenomenological approach, the Experiential Method developed by Sunnie D. and James W. Kidd . ;Ten participants were identified, painters who consider their practice a spiritual one. They were each asked to respond to the question: Describe your experience of being creative as a spiritual practice. Four themes emerged from the participants' descriptions. These were: the interplay of intention/reception, the experience of relationship, the experience of shift in one's sense of self/life/world, and the experience of a journey. ;The interplay of intention/reception includes the experience of intention as well as the experience of allowing. The experience of being in relationship includes an internal/external dialectic or relationship with self, the experience of connection or relationship with the other, as well as the experience of participation in universal creation, or relationship with the Divine. The experience of shift in one's sense of self/life/world includes mental, emotional, physical shifts as well as shifts in seeing, time, space, world, duality, and meaning. The experience of a journey includes the experience of bridging worlds as well as the experience of the ongoing process of life. These themes were found to describe creative experience, as well as the experience of being creative as a spiritual practice. ;In the conclusion these themes are discussed as found reflected in the literature review, the researcher's presuppositions, as well as in the practice of the Experiential Method