All in due time
This was a mostly good, productive week. I say “mostly” because while things are going pretty well in studio, funds have been hitting a critical level which has had me a little stressed. Nonetheless, I’m working through it, making the most of and being grateful for what I have: the ability to have a place to make my art or just being able to have the luxury of making art and not having to flee floodwaters, war and famine right now. Sadly, there’s always turmoil somewhere in the world and since we have online access to information (and mis- and disinformation) around the clock, it feels like a perpetual loop of grief and atrocities. We need to know about what’s going on in order to form an opinion and perhaps act, if possible, but it’s also important to understand that it’s ok to not engage with online anger, fake “debates” and people who exhibit other troll-like behaviors. Bad acts and actors should be called out, but it’s not always absolutely necessary to allow ourselves to be drawn into these situations that can tax our mental and emotional health. I hope we can keep a place open within to lend support to those that need it without causing ourselves more anguish. My hope is for more peaceful days ahead for all who are suffering now.
In spite of the turmoil, I’ve been able to concentrate on a lot of new work, mostly smaller things right now. Once some new funds come through, I’ll be able to stretch some larger canvases, but in the meantime, I’m generating a lot of new ideas that will probably find their way into the larger pieces I want to make. I’ve been in a great place with exploring new avenues of painting, materials and allowing for less dense spaces in some of the paintings. There’s a couple of different worlds that have been forming in the work for some time and I’m excited about the possibilities opening up.
Earlier this week, I had to do some writing about my work and in doing so, I gained some interesting insight about some of the deeper meanings in my work that I’ve been attempting to articulate for a long while. The questions I had to answer where mostly open-ended, which left room for me to think about my process and creative philosophies in a why that I haven’t in the past. I think that this is happening because I’ve been lucky enough to have the time to engage more deeply with my work since taking the chance of making my work full time three years ago. I can’t think of another time when I’ve been able to let things sit and stew for long periods of time before. Usually, I was in the midst of juggling work, art making and other life necessities consistently. I’m still juggling, but in a different way now.
The more time you have to make art, the more responsibilities you have in maintaining your practice and other aspects of your life. The major difference now is that I get to concentrate almost exclusively on the artwork. It can be a tough road, but there’s nothing else I want nor like to do as intensely as making paintings and other works of art. I gave a talk to a professional practices class at the University of the Arts (Philadelphia) on Wednesday. I stressed to the students how lucky they were to have a class like that. It means that they will be much more prepared to deal with the various issues of being an artist that go beyond just making the work. Unlike some of their peers and older artists who never had such a class as part of their education, hopefully, they’ll be more prepared to deal with the financial and other aspects of maintaining a thriving art practice. It astonishes me that most art schools still don’t have business/professional practices courses as requirements in their curriculums. Almost every other profession has a requirement for such things, but not so for visual/fine art undergrads. I hope that’s changing.
TM