June 18, 2010

Today,..this week has been a revelation...my brain..firing on cylinders rarely used!!! My eyes..behind my head seeing things in such a different way..Why this week? why now? my confidence in my art had been shakey at best, and my skills torn, broken.my need for approval over the top. My feelings arbitrary, depressed, my mood black and sad. So what has awakened me? Reading the Peter London book (No more second hand art,awakening the artist within)? Maybe, he has written about things in a way I haven't thought but I am only on page 34..much more to read and hopefully understand. I have read many books on creativity and felt mild eureka moments so I am somewhat of a skeptic..I watched an interesting documentary on the 4 yr. old phenom abstaract artist, Marla Olmstead. I was amazed at her paintings..I don't care who did them. I read a book on Joan Mitchell, I revere artist Gaylon Hansen, I am a Helen Frankenthaler fan. Klee, Pollack,Rothko, the guy from Ogden who did a minalmalist abstract on kraft paper and blew me away at the statewide show last summer. I am attracted to abstract art ..it makes me emotional..and I don't understand why. I want to slather color on fields of white, yellow, red and black. I want to put this color next to that color and then draw something in there..WHAT!?!
I have decided to give up my studio space because I was not happy with the quiet, the commute, the lack of camaraderie. I am probably going to dismantle my website, my Red Bubble Account and art presence in other areas. I will return to them when I spend some major time doing new art, investigating where I am going with it and hopefully reaching some level of competency. I am not going to enter shows until I feel I have reached another level. Do you think this is drastic? Well yes it is!And it is meant to be that way. When the path is wrong..do you keep going on it or returning to it hoping it will take you to the place that is not anywhere near that path? Do you step off and stay close and keep it in sight and never really change direction, just fooling yourself into believing you have changed? Or do you make the change, step off the path with an about face and walk into the woods, even if you can't see the clearing, or the goal or the citadel? Walking into the dark in order to find your light..not someone else's light..but your light. Well?
OK it is not really me to force myself into the abnormal. I talk big..but when it comes to a showdown, well I am all about avoidance..but I can't ignore the pain in my head, the lights in my eyes, the crazy desire to paint what I want. so here I go..
I will be here but the art hopefully will be different and better.