> Granted, you can say "you still can play musical instruments/paint pictures/etc for yourself", but I don't think there was ever a period of time where creative works were just created for sake of itself rather for sharing it with others at masse.
There's a whole host of "art" that has been created by people - sometimes for themselves, sometimes for a select few friends - which had little purpose beyond that creation[1]. Some people create art because they simply have to create art - for pleasure, for therapy, for whatever[2]. For many, the act of creation was far more important than the act of distribution[3].
For me, my obsession is constructing worlds, maps, societies and languages that will almost certainly die with me. And that's fine. When I feel the compulsion, I'll work on my constructions for a while, until the compulsion passes - just as I have done (on and off) for the past 50 years. If the world really needs to know about me, then it can learn more than it probably wants to know through my poetry.
There's a whole host of "art" that has been created by people - sometimes for themselves, sometimes for a select few friends - which had little purpose beyond that creation[1]. Some people create art because they simply have to create art - for pleasure, for therapy, for whatever[2]. For many, the act of creation was far more important than the act of distribution[3].
For me, my obsession is constructing worlds, maps, societies and languages that will almost certainly die with me. And that's fine. When I feel the compulsion, I'll work on my constructions for a while, until the compulsion passes - just as I have done (on and off) for the past 50 years. If the world really needs to know about me, then it can learn more than it probably wants to know through my poetry.
[1] - Emily Dickinson is an obvious example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emily_Dickinson
[2] - Coral Castle, Florida: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coral_Castle
[3] - Federico Garcia Lorca almost certainly didn't write his Sonetos del amor oscuro for publication - he just needed to write them: https://es.wikisource.org/wiki/Sonetos_del_amor_oscuro