From my friend Philip…
Thus when we used to make our constructions, we produced “pure truth” without pretensions, without tricks, without malice. What we did then had never been done before; we did it disinterestedly, and if is worth anything it is because we did it without expecting to profit from it. We sought to express reality with materials we did not know how to handle and which we prized precisely because we know that their help was not indispensable to use, that they were neither the best nor the most adequate. We put enthusiasm into the work, and, this alone, even if that were all that there were in it, would be enough: and much more than is usually put into an effort — for we surrendered ourselves to it completely, body and soul. We departed so far from the modes of expression then known and appreciated that we felt save from any suspicion of mercenary aims.
Pablo Picasso, reported by Jaime Sabartes in, Picasso: An Intimate Portrait, New York 1948
Good food for thought, especially when working hard and fast…
Hi Nancy – thanks for your note and I hope you enjoy the bread pudding – like quiche you can put any old leftover in it for a great transformation. You may not have the soda bread available that we have here – but if you do it makes for a rich alternative to regular loaves.
My twitter name is alanajames and I think I sent on some type of hello to you through that system (still learning).
Thanks for your posts on Picasso – I think young geeks are similar when they pound away at new code, adding it to open source, etc.
Off to invesitgate swarm teams!
Alana
nice quote.
there is some work somewhere (o how I love the net, which tells me things I can’t remember where I learned them) about how introducing money into a social system of favors and mutual goodwill changes how people behave, to the point where people are more cooperative if you don’t pay them anything at all than if you pay them just a little. if you can (or must) work on something without any hope of ever being directly compensated for it, then you can work on it round the clock without tallying up hours or making time sheets or budgets.
not everything is of course done off the clock!