Creation is interactive, and all of the players are instrumentalities of soul's instinctual process of ministering to itself. It is through others that we discover who we are. In order to operate within this context, the artist has to relax ego and see it as only one of many players within expression's pantheon. Curiosity and attentiveness become active participants in the creative process as we learn how to watch what we do while we are doing it. This is not easy, because our ego 'judges' are thoroughly ingrained in us, but struggles abate as commitment and familiarity increase.
Art becomes part of the tradition of meditation where watchfulness is essential.
Whatever a person paints, dances, or sings has significance when we restrain ego's value judgments. These discoveries are similar to the meditator's experience of wonder in something that was once boring and insignificant. Judgment yields to awareness. Criticism is essential to art. Through immersion in it.