…how to rectify our training with our wild-card penchant for creativity? Artists anywhere will instantly recognize the theme of craft resting on the precipice of abandon, of the intellect versus emotion.

A central problem here is that our education tends to be built upon teaching the craft and the skill. This suggests that artistry itself is not teachable — otherwise, why wouldn’t we just be taught the “art” side of things? Instead, musicians are taught their scales, dictation theory, etc.

That next leap to artistry is a challenge to teach, and this is an interesting element of Black Swan. Natalie Portman’s character is repeatedly admonished to let herself go, to dance with abandon, to seduce, and to not be so (for lack of a better word) perfect. In short, she needs to inject her intellectual side with some passion.

But what’s so wrong with perfect? I found myself thinking of a Beethoven symphony — take the slow movement of his Seventh. There is not a wrong note to be found, it is architecturally sound, it is superbly crafted from the simplest of rhythmic motifs. Much the same can be said for almost all of Beethoven’s music. Where exactly is the Dionysian abandon? If it is there, it’s not something we can exactly pinpoint and then teach to another generation of composers.

So then, what does a teacher say? What does a practitioner of art do? Essentially, how is this done? Natalie Portman spends half of the movie flailing in an attempt to find an answer and cross that line. We, the audience, watch her crack under this pressure. The nearest advice she is given is to go home and touch herself, a salacious suggestion, but one that has a larger metaphorical meaning, too. Getting in touch with yourself is a crucial aspect of artistry, and if you think about it, all the very best artists are representations of a self-aware individual. It’s personality that is expressed; the craft is only a medium to do so.

But there’s an important corollary. Over the last year I have begun to sense that the very best art is that perfect blend of intellect and emotion. The intellectual structure is needed, or it is all just a mess. But without the emotional element, we have only robotic perfection. There’s a “just-so” balance to be found which touches our hearts and our minds equally.

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But there are so many very rich themes in this movie. Alastair Macaulay, the chief dance critic of the New York Times, wrote the following thematic summary in the February 9, 2011 NYTimes: (I think this is all non-spoiler, but read on at your discretion)

It’s a backstager: Will poor hard-working Nina…get the white-black double lead role of Swan Lake, pull off its taxing demands, survive till the first night and vanquish her rival, not to mention her terrors? It’s horror: Nina’s life spirals out of control for alarming reasons apparently beyond her control and indeed her comprehension. It’s psychosexual drama: Those forces come from her confused perceptions of her mother, her sexual inhibitions, her ambitions and her increasingly schizoid fantasies. It’s a Tchaikovsky-soundtrack movie: Nothing about it is neater than the way Clint Mansell’s score is almost all taken from Swan Lake’s material, with a marvelous use of the slow chords prefacing the ballet’s most famous pas de deux for an offstage effect of psychological suspense. Most powerfully it’s a modern example of that old genre, the woman’s movie. Nina’s loves are seen as repressed and illicit, her successes are shown as triumphs in an unnatural and injurious art form, and she is duly punished for these transgressions.

It should be noted that Macaulay’s review is largely negative, and largely based on the view of a dancer. And I think he misses a very significant larger theme of the movie. He sees the movie in the tradition of classic dance movies, such as The Red Shoes.

I saw the movie through a different, personal lens. I am not a dancer, and don’t dare attempt to say that I am the least bit knowledgeable about the discipline. Instead, I am a creator: specifically, a composer. Several responses to Macaulay come to mind. First, I must disagree with his musical assessment; unless it was the raw Tchaikovsky score itself, I rather disliked the music’s borrowings of Swan Lake. But I do agree, secondly, that all of these themes are prevalent and significant to the achievement of the film. Yet they are subsidiary to the most significant theme.

And that theme (thirdly) is, most importantly, a theme Macaulay misses (or only hints) at: the film’s true theme. He off-handedly mentions the “white-black” duality required of the lead role. Natalie Portman’s character is perfect as the “white” swan–one who knows craft, technique, and seeks perfection in formalized terms. She is repeatedly admonished to let herself go, to be free and wild, to become (in short) the “black swan” (or to at least give in to his/her seductive qualities). Her character is asked to become a seducer. (What composer doesn’t want to seduce?) She is asked to use her craft in service to something that transcends craft. To me, as a creative person — as a composer — this is the most significant theme in the film.

For one thing, I thought of the famous split Schumann established for his artistic personalities. I thought that one can hardly count the significant examples in the popular consciousness of this kind of duality, certainly not in film. How does one represent the struggle of an artist to be both intelligent and emotional? In the film “Amadeus” (1984) we witness the polite formalism of Salieri pitted against the wild-child genius of Mozart. But for composers (and creators) everywhere, we recognize the common issue: how to rectify our training with our wild-card penchant for creativity?

Artists anywhere will instantly recognize the theme of craft resting on the precipice of abandon, of the intellect versus emotion. To me, this is the most fascinating aspect of the movie Black Swan, and I dare say that most artists of any stripe — composers, painters, what-have-you — will respond to this.

I’ll have more to say about this in Part 2. For now, I encourage you to see the movie and think over how your own personal artistry is represented on celluloid.

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