Yup, that’s me. I’m an artist of no repute. Once I had a kind of reputation when I worked for many years as a graphic artist. People knew me and I got paid for making art, though the art was constrained in size and scope by the written word it was meant to ‘illustrate’. I’ve moved on now that a lot of my financial responsibilities have lessened. I feel so lucky to have had the work life I did—all that freedom! But it’s time to swim in deeper, colder water.
When I started this blog I thought I might use it to promote my work. Mostly I spend my time writing but art is in my blood too, something I’ve done daily since childhood. I never intended to be a ‘fine’ artist. Art has always been simply a means to express myself and to connect with the mystery of being here, to tell stories even. I love doing it and if I’m away from serious efforts for a few months, as I sometimes am, I begin to miss it in a way that causes me to throw other things aside and begin again. The same is true of writing. I must do both, just who I am.
I knew little of the blogosphere when I began here. I don’t read many blogs and so don’t build a lot of readership though I love to find other artists out there. I hope more will begin to discuss their work, to bleat and chat online about their own art journeys because we don’t see those journeys in the work itself. And I’m kind of curious—is it just me? And, well, there are so many different kinds of art. I wonder sometimes what people are thinking. Just curious, you know?
Now I’ve been at this a year I see my wee blog is something that gives me pleasure for the connections it sometimes creates and for the ways it enables me to think on the page. It’s like holding my thoughts up to a mirror. I see them a little more clearly and get to quicken my step a bit.
Here’s what has changed in this last year for me as an artist—
—I began teaching drawing to a wondrous group of women on Saturday mornings. It has made me think about the artistic process in a more conscious way and there is an amazing creative synergy working with other people. We’ve all grown as artists.
—I started painting. Just because I felt inspired to. Small things that are getting larger. Without ambition but for all the reasons I have always made art—for the ongoing exploration of what is possible.
—I continue writing because it calls me like my mother. ‘Get in here!’ I write things that make me laugh. I show up with devotion.
—I see there is a need for a reputation! Yes. Yes, I do. The work is piling up and the next art is the one where I discover the way to bring it into the world again, with the bucks.
So, that is what I’ll explore here now. It’s kind of important to all artists even those of us who aren’t trying to be ‘big show’ artists. But I’m not trying to be small either. I’m just doing what I do and I’m curious what that means.
Last year I wrote a lot here about my art class. This year I’ll fold that into my own art story here. What I do with the art class opens up my own creative path. I’m not really teaching them anything, just sharing how it is with me making art and they are sharing with me—their frustrations, their pleasures, their explorations. We’re expanding together like laughing gas and the results are showing up in my work. The Tao says everything has an ebb and a flow. This is the flow.
