Narcotic Abuse and Its Impact on The Creative Process Throughout Art History

Looking at the works of some of the world's most influential artists we see that they were either inspired or informed through the exploration of altered states of consciousness, in search of a language that goes beyond the constraints of everyday reality.

The heightened perception and intensity of experience in which psychoactive intoxicant use, its relationship between the creative act and the exploration of altered states can be traced back to prehistoric times. There is archaeological evidence of the use of such substances dating back at least 10'000 years and historical evidence of cultural use over the past 5'000 years. These narcotics can be classified according to the type of altered states of consciousness which they induce, regrettably, artist have relied on such mind-altering substances to transcend the constraints of rational perception and experience to bring out their creative sides for decades.

My argument is that artist has a reputation for being emotionally vulnerable individuals, with complex characteristics which tend to be associated with narcotic abuse. They explore this by offering important and challenging pieces of works that take the viewer to places where the rational mind could not. This indicates the seriousness with which they approach the subject and the relationship between the freedom from representation in the search of a language that goes beyond the constraints of everyday realities, which lie at the foundations of creativity. Such explorations are not driven by commercial or academic concerns but usually from their faith in capacity of art to expand and alter perceptions of consciousness and to express their art as freely as possible.

Can trance like insight produced by Narcotics be the source of higher creativity? Yes, trance like insight produced by narcotics is attributed to a higher level of creativity. These psychoactive substances are used for several different reasons, both legal and illicit, my argument is that many psychoactive substances have undeniably been used by numerous artists that experiment with such intoxicants too alter their state of consciousness to escape reality and explore uncharted areas of alternative modes of perception and experience. These psychotropic drugs are divided into several categories based on the effect they have on the consciousness, psycholeptic, psychoactive and psychodysleptic drugs, that boost aesthetic appreciation, improve Techniques, enhance creativity, heighten perceptions and stimulate innovation and originality.

Furthermore, artist have experimented with certain Psychoactive drugs to induce states that lend light to the minds altered state of consciousness and allow for raw unmediated experiences, that is based on verbal reports from those that have experienced them. There is however little scientific evidence that supports the notion that drug use increases creativity.

The reason for my argument is because many of the worlds creative geniuses have claimed that using such substances were liberating and provided insight into a world that was otherwise restricted, for this I strongly believe that creativity is attributed to drug use and partly because of the actions many psychoactive substances produce altered states of consciousness. This is because psychoactive drugs act by affecting the chemistry of the brain and cause changes in neural activity by acting as chemical messengers that bind to the receptors on brain cells and its precisely because of this, that these drugs can exert such actions which gives rise to alternate states of drug induced highs.

These are characterized by some if not all the following features: alterations in thinking, where distinctions between cause and effect are blurred and which logical states of incompatibility coexist. Disturbance in time sense, through which the sense of time and occurrence of events become altered, a sense of loss of control, during which the artist becomes less reserved and inhibited. A change in emotional expression influences their use in social settings and enhances social interactions. Body image changes with the detachment of boundaries between artist and the world, resulting in altered states of consciousness and mystical experience. An ertist feels perception distortion, hallucinations and heightened visual acuity. a heightened sense of meaning and significance, ineffable, where experience is too extreme to be expressed in words and finally the feeling of rebirth and rejuvenation.

You only need to look at Walter Benjamin's fascination with the unconscious mind and the reconciliation of dream and reality into absolute reality. Through his attempts to reconcile the two it lead him to develop the idea of profane illumination, that involved experimenting with substances such as, opium, mescaline and hashish. He wrote in his essay Surrealism: The last snapshot of the European intelligentsia (1929) in the world's structure, dream loosens individuality like a bad tooth. This loosening of the self by intoxication is, at the same time, precisely the fruitful, living experience that allowed these people to step outside the charmed space of intoxication.... It is a cardinal error to believe that, of surrealist experiences we know only the religious ecstasies or the ecstasies of drugs.... But the true, creative overcoming of religious illumination certainly does not lie in narcotics. It resides in a profane illumination, a materialistic, anthropological inspiration, to which hashish, opium, or whatever else can give an introductory lesson.