Science is pretty good at explaining the mysteries of nature. Birds know when it is time to migrate by sensing changes in the length of the day. Moths navigate with respect to the moon, so when they see a porch light, they fly towards it and then circle in confusion, thinking “oh my god, I’ve reached the moon, now what?” Even the phenomenon of beached whales has a number of plausible theories related to sickness or navigation by Earth’s magnetic fields.

But science still can’t explain what drives an artist to create.

My wife danced with the National Ballet of Canada and then with a modern dance company in Austria before she retired from professional dance. Now she choreographs – creating dances for others. And every two years, like a moth to a flame, she is drawn to create a big dance production.

So, back in January, Kathleen frantically announces the grant deadline is Feb 1 and we need to have the application completed. Obtaining funding via government-sponsored grants is the first step in putting on a production. No matter how “pure” the art, realities like theatre rental, prop construction and dancer’s salaries require money to give the art life.

Grant writing is a creative art all in itself. Basically, you have to convince a jury that your artistic vision is worthy of their money. Unfortunately, “art” and “money” mix about as well as oil and water. And the funding bodies don’t have a lot of money to throw around. In the recent federal election, arts funding wasn’t exactly a hot-button issue. Curiously, there is even a segment of the population who are offended their tax dollars are given to artists. In light of this, funding bodies desire to maintain some appearance of accountability.

The Arts Council wants to see a solid business plan – budget, timelines, project summary. How will you accomplish your project and what will be the outcome? Squeezing a creative vision into a business plan is difficult at best. For Kathleen, it’s even more difficult. You see, her style of creating is totally in the moment. She arrives in the studio, stands in front of her dancers and via instinct or inspiration or channeling the universe’s energy, concepts and dance steps spontaneously flow out of her. The results are brilliant, but it’s a hard sell to the Arts Council. “Going with the flow” isn’t seen as a solid business model.

In the past, she’s jumped through the hoops and submitted a project description that sounded great, but in the end, bore little resemblance to the finished project. This time, she just laid it out, described the themes and concepts she had in mind and referred to the end result as an “exciting unknown”. As she put it, “I’ve been doing this long enough to know [going with the flow] is what I need to create high quality work.”

As an engineer, I spend my days planning, analyzing and calculating. Despite the impending chaos of putting VIVID4 on stage, “going with the flow” sounds pretty good to me.