ABSTRACT
The creative process is somewhat of a labyrinth and unfathomable. There is no recipe for producing a work of art. If one existed, we could all be artists. Even though there is no recipe for producing a work of art, artists do nevertheless resort to means or strategies to ward off panic when faced with the blank sheet or canvas, or a block of stone, wood or metal, in order to achieve the completion of a work of art. Since the process tends to be instinctive and not rational or entirely rational, artists resort to creative methods or strategies to circumvent its difficulties. Thus, mastering technical processes, experimentation, constant breakaway and non-conformity, help overcome the stagnation and the barrier of the conventional and the exploration of error and chance through which it is possible to obtain results that would never have otherwise been obtained. We will approach all this through the examples of the artists Marcel Duchamp, Alberto Giacometti, Philip Guston, Sally Mann, Marlene Dumas, and Anish Kapoor. These are rational ways of acting and which, in short, partially help artists to overcome the challenges they face during the execution of a work of art.
