It's a new year and I was honored to be invited to join the Daily Painters of Texas and Contemporary Fine Art International organizations. This is my first blog here, though I have done a bit of blogging in the past. I hope you enjoy my thoughts. I'm aiming for transparency...honesty.
I've recently started doing something I haven't done before...posting images of works in progress. This means showing not only the good, but potentially the bad and the ugly. This is something I wouldn't have even considered doing in the past. I know from my background in advertising how potent a carefully crafted image can be and how little it takes to nick and deflate it. I was also raised in an environment where every little mistake, perceived or actual, was ridiculed. Early on, I worked in secrecy. No one would see ANYTHING until it was as perfect as I could make it. Comments didn't roll off my back, but instead seeped slowly into the deepest parts of my brain chipping away at the facade of self-confidence I tried to project. It was a defense mechanism-learned self-preservation.
Like many people, it took a traumatic shake up in my life for me to reevaluate my actions. Walling myself off didn't just pertain to my art, but to most aspects of my life where I feared being hurt. I was in the hospital for several weeks due to a undiagnosed illness before I let my husband tell any friends or family I was there. It wasn't their business, I said. I didn't want to be the subject of gossip and I didn't want anyone to see me this way; unable to walk across the floor without falling, to even sit up by myself, hair falling out, body blown up like a balloon. I think it was more that I thought they wouldn't care. Wouldn't come. Even worse, they might pity me. I couldn't show anyone I was this weak. That I needed help. That would just prove everything I had drilled into me throughout much of my life. It wasn't until the doctors said, "You will die without surgery. Even with surgery, you will likely suffer major complications or still die," that I said okay. Even then, I didn't expect or ask anything of anyone.
So showing my errors, my mistakes, my flaws is particularly hard for me...on me. I'm working to be more open. I also believe that less experienced artists and non-artists need to know that art isn't always this effortless, romantic thing that just flows from the brush to the canvas...it's actually work. If it is always effortless, I'd say that the artist isn't challenging themselves, isn't objectively critiquing their art, isn't growing. There is always more to learn. You'll find a hunger for learning in a serious artist.
"Sparrow's Garden" is specifically for an art show to run concurrent with a Master Gardener's convention in my town this coming Spring. The painting and photography will all feature local gardens. Since I'm also a gardener, this is of my own garden and one of my cats, Sparrow. I typically work from photos and shot several of her on the sandstone boulder. I really liked her position in the picture at the left in the photo, but when I began painting, it became apparent that she wasn't integrating into the garden scene. After much debate with myself and friends online, I was asked to keep the cat in. I had considered painting her out completely. I looked for alternate positions. It is not easy to paint out something that you have put a lot of time into. It's hard to separate from the emotional attachment and be truly objective. A lot of artists can't bring themselves to do it, or have to put the painting away for a while and come back to it, but after looking at the 2 images side by side, the second position of the cat looks much better. One person said that it even looks like 2 completely different paintings.
So here I am. Still learning. Growing...and even Sharing.
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