This made me think of part of RG Collingwood's Autobiography, when he spoke of growing up while many around him were artists of one kind or another.
"During the same years I was constantly watching the work of my father and mother, and the other professional painters who frequented their house, and constantly trying to imitate them ; so that I learned to think of a picture not as a finished product exposed for the admiration of virtuosi, but as the visible record, lying about the house, of an attempt to solve a definite problem in painting, so far as the attempt has gone.
I learned what some critics and aestheticians never know to the end of their lives, that no ‘work of art’ is ever finished, so that in that sense of the phrase there is no such thing as a ‘work of art’ at all. Work ceases upon the picture or manuscript, not because it is finished, but because sending-in day is at hand, or because the printer is clamorous for copy, or because ‘I am sick of working at this thing’ or ‘I can’t see what more I can do to it’."
Reminds me of what they say about composer Johann Sebastian Mastropiero:
« Whenever -due to economic necessity- Mastropiero was forced to compose music by request or commission, produced mediocre and inexpressive works. On the contrary, when he only obeyed his inspiration, he never wrote a note. »
“I work best under pressure. In fact, I work only under pressure…”