Art on the Street

This is always super- busy season for me, with exam marking being squeezed into ever shorter time periods. But it has been extra busy this year. Interviews, which I mentioned before, all requiring prep. But also all successful (I will be starting my doctorate in October!), and also getting ready for Art on the Street, Maidenhead. Which I also managed to do quite successfully. 

It was a lovely sunny day, lots of people and Lots of positive feedback on my work, which was much appreciated! 

Now, back to the marking! 

Even busy busy busier than before!

My academic Pookery is in a state of chaos. And I don't mean the kind of chaos that signals productivity. This is the no time to finish one thing before going on to the next kind of chaos. I am trying to cram work I would have liked a week for into one day, while at the same time fulfilling some professional obligations to other people in a totally different area of work so that they can get on with what they have to do. 

Don't get me wrong, it is good to be busy. But why does everything have to happen at exactly the same time?!?!!!?

Still I thought I would take the time to dash this off since I missed last week. I didn't forget. Or rather I didn't forget the blog. I did forget that I would be in a house with absolutely no way to connect to the Internet. 

Right, must crack on! 

Splattering!

Both my interviews went as well as they possibly could. Hurrah! 

Of course one of them results in some rather urgent work to be done at my busiest time of year - exam season is almost upon us! The other was only one stage in a process that should see me being interviewed again (fingers crossed, touching wood) in a couple of weeks after which I will know whether I have achieved what I set out to achieve. At which point I shall tell you all about it. 

On the creative front I have just acquired two new brushes, specially shaped for creating splatter effects. I've been having great, if messy, fun with these. I bought them because I kept snapping paintbrushes by making them flick the way I wanted them too. I will probably still do that though, because its a different effect again. But hopefully less often. 

I wouldn't have thought I would enjoy splattering paint so much actually, but its very freeing. A real chance to play. When this one is dry I shall add some very straight and structured collage to it, as a contrast. 

Busy busy

I have two interviews week. I don't want to say too much more, don't want to jinx things! Neither of them are for arty-creative things though. They are on the academic side of my interests. They have have had a knock on effect on the art though as I have had lots of prep to do - two quite substantial tasks for one of them and some back-up reading for both.

It's not that I resent the time, it is my chosen subject after all and things I want to do. But I have yet to master that 'grass is greener' kind of feeling, which says that I would rather be painting when I don't have the time and also (of course) that I would rather be studying/writing when the painting is being stubborn. In fact the time I have the least resistance to overcome in either case is when I'm in bed, thinking about what I'm doing tomorrow! Then feels like I can go straight to the desk, or the studio and get right into things without hesitation. But when I'm actually there I find I still need my little rituals to get me going.

Painting

Feeling a touch more positive about life today! Hoorah, I hear you cry.

A couple of pictures are starting to come together, which I was beginning to despair of! The first layer was good, and then everything I added seemed to make them worse and messier and more rubbish...always a problem when you like what's there but you know it's not finished I suppose!

The one with the pelican, 'Wheel of Fortune', which is now finished, wasn't working I think because I had too strong an idea of how I wanted it to come out. Once I let go of that, which I'm afraid happened in a burst of 'oh f**k it!' Frustration rather than a zen-like embracing of the process, it came together really quickly. Although it doesn't look anything like I wanted it too it does say what I wanted it to say, which no doubt says something more profound than my words can manage about the importance of letting go and letting your intuition move the brush.

The other, working title 'Antibodies', was just being a but stubborn. Didn't have any idea what it was going to look like. Still not sure what the finished piece will look like, but I feel that it is moving forward now, at last. Which is all I wanted it to do.

Thinking of possible futures

Where my head is at the moment is the trivial question of what to do with the rest of my life!

When I was 13 I had no idea. I’m not sure that many people do, really. Not least because ‘the rest of your life’ is a long, long time and it’s impossible to imagine how you will change and grow, even over the next few years before you leave school.  But it matters, you’re meant to know, because you have to start making the choices that will take you there. I had to choose my GCSE options, then less than two years later A level subjects, then a degree course…and then you are supposed to be there, wherever it is you are going. You get this job and then that one, climbing ladders, building experiences, but essentially doing that thing which you chose way back when, in one form or another, until you retire.  

And now, at the grand old age of 36, I wish to do something totally different.

I know, I know, people do change course – I too have read all the stuff about people having multiple careers these days.  It’s not easy though, because a job is based on your previous experience, which you got through your educational choices…you can explain stuff at an interview of course, but what if your choices just get your form thrown out at first glance? All my qualifications and experience steer me towards education, within a specific subject-specialism, so even if I see a fabulous job I know I can do if it doesn’t line up with those areas I am likely to fall at the first hurdle.  As for self-employed... well we all know that’s hard, and emotionally stressful as well, even within the areas where you are already expert.

I want to be creative, and I didn’t qualify to do anything  in that line. In fact the idea that someone with an exam-ready brain might be interested in a creative path, or in ‘the arts’ never crossed the minds of the people who gave me my ‘careers education’. If it crossed my parents’ minds then they hid it well. I was good at school work ergo I would go to university and do something academic, something ‘appropriate’. For one parent creativity was all ‘that’s lovely, but is anyone going to pay you for it?’; for the other it was focussed on the idea that if you were good enough at something you would produce works of genius regardless, and the world would discover you whatever you did about it, while if you weren’t good enough no-one could teach you it.  At any event it all adds up to me not even knowing that some choices existed - wonderful, fascinating , fulfilling jobs that I did not know existed.  In my university prospectuses I didn’t even look at the degree courses that had anything to do with creativity - they were not for me, I would just do wonderful things if it was in me to do them. 

I did not do wonderful things. I studied law, found my academic passion (religion) by accident, became a teacher  of Religious Studies, and taught well for over a decade. I love my subject still, I want to learn more about it, I don’t want to lose touch with it. But I don’t want to be a teacher anymore.  I have realised that the world will not implode if I let my creativity fly, and having wasted years getting to this point I want to do that. I want to let it fly. So, I think to myself if only I could find a way to make my living creatively…which brings me back to my first point – I didn’t qualify for that. I don’t know much about it.  I can make stuff, and I can sell it online – to a point anyway, but I don’t make a living. Do I want to work purely for myself? Maybe, maybe not. Possibly that requires a degree of confidence in myself and fortitude in the face of adversity that I simply do not have!

Either way, whether I want my own business or to work for someone else I need knowledge I haven’t got. I read books of course, but you need to know what you don’t know to find the right books! Also there is no substitute for personal feedback on things, from people who know their stuff.

I keep thinking about this – what do I want to do, and how do I go about doing it? There are practical things I don’t know, as well as conventions and expectations; I have no relevant experience to offer; no portfolio in the sense of something which fits the expectations of the people to whom I’m giving it; no real knowledge even of what jobs exist ‘out there’ or of where to look to find them. And when I do spot something and think not only ‘I could do that’, but also ‘I would enjoy that’, the information about it says, without exception, that I must have this or that qualification - even stuff which fits on my ‘education’ hook wants me to have an arts qualification.

So I suppose I could do the qualification thing - I have two undergraduate degrees already,  and a Masters,  so you might say why not add to the collection. But to do what?  I don’t know, beyond a desire to create beautiful things. Do I consider courses in terms of possible jobs as I did all those years ago, or do I finally think about my interests and enthusiasms? If a course, what sort of course – undergrad, diploma, non-accredited? How do I pay for it while still having the energy to do the work? (some teachers manage to teach and study I know, but I don’t think that works for me as I would do neither thing to the full). What if I choose the wrong thing? And, of course, because I am me, the nagging fear - what if I commit to some course or other, love it and find that I am talentless. Or even worse, just talented enough to know that I will never be able to do what I want to, to create what I see in my head.

Alternatively I could throw myself further into academic work, which I enjoy. Pursue PhD options, carry on creating as a hobby and hope that satisfies. What if this, what if that? Round and round in circles I go, getting nowhere fast...

Ennui

Spent much of this afternoon lying on my bed. This is not because I had nothing to do, as I have something of a list. But I was feeling a touch poorly, and not a little miserable.

Both these things are still true. But I must say it is surprisingly comforting to lie down in semi-darkness and not sleep exactly but drift in a sort of dozy haze. Perhaps I spend too much time doing, and not enough time simply being.

Money money money!

Had a good day yesterday, lots of painting. Finished one, started another, added layers to several more. All good positive stuff with no pauses for agonising and soul searching.

It therefore seems deeply unfair that today I awoke, for no particular reason, full of gloom and apprehension about money.

I know that is a ubiquitous state at the moment, but as I said there is no specific reason for me to be more than averagely concerned at present. Not the best sentence structure there, is it? What I mean is that pretty much everyone would like a bit more in the bank ( or for what is there to be worth more I guess), and while many people have genuine fears of losing their homes or not being able to feed themselves many others just want to feel a bit better off, more able to spend money on lunch out rather than packing sandwiches, or to replace the kettle or something, without the need to calculate to the penny what this purchase will leave them for the week.

Well, I am not in imminent danger of starving, or of being thrown out on the street. Barring disaster of course ( makes sign to avert evil eye! ). So I should be in that latter group I suppose. And much of the time I am. But every so often I get over-anxious about all the possible what-ifs which could diminish or destroy my earning potential, things over which I have no control of course so am wasting my time and energy fretting over. Not that knowing that has ever stopped anyone of course.

When in this particular worry-cycle I berate myself for buying so much as a new pencil or tube of paint, although I also buy things I have been putting off buying because right now the money is there and it may not be if these what-if scenarios come to pass. Is it perhaps one of the downsides of a creative mind to be constantly sifting through possible futures? Or am I just trying to make myself feel better about being neurotic? Could be either.....

Return!

I have returned!

My holiday, two weeks in Japan, was very enjoyable. We managed to cope with the various train journeys to the different places we were staying, but it showed me how much information you glean, even from a language that you don't understand, when it is written in the Roman script we use in the West. By contrast, while I find Japanese script beautiful, it tells me nothing at all. But we did it, helped by the presence of roman-script signs in most stations and very helpful locals!

Saw some amazing craft-works, beautiful buildings, woodblock printing, snow monkeys bathing in hot springs...many things which I hope will give me some new images to use in my painting. Kept a journal, including sketches, to remind me of stuff, photos too obviously. But in general I take dreadful photos. I'm not sure why. But whatever it is that makes you a good photographer I do not have it!

Still fighting the jet-lag right now. A nine hour difference is not a trivial thing!

Academia

I gave been in the academic half of my Pookery most of the past week. The flat I live in is basically circular, so I have one lovely curvy space, lined with windows, for painting, drawing, sewing - that one is my creative Pookery - and another on the other side of the stairs, where I have my desk, laptop and a reasonable percentage of my books, the intellectual ones anyway! And that is my academic Pookery.

I am trying to write a research proposal for a PhD - absolutely terrifying! You have obviously to write a professional looking thing, like you know what one should look like and while there is guidance available on what to put in it no-one tells you the trivial stuff like what the layout should look like. So I have been trawling through books and the Internet, trying to get of together a draft to looks halfway competent so I can send it to the guy who (I hope) will be my supervisor before I go on holiday next week. Otherwise there won't be time for him to comment and me to improve before before the deadline.

Mind you, if there is a good thing about deadlines it is that the pressure of them can help you get past fear sufficiently to make a start and, as I think I have mentioned before, a blank page/screen/canvas waiting for you to fill it is one of the scariest things!

So there you have it - I'll be away for two weeks and then I'll be back with, hopefully, lots of new inspiring stuff to talk about and create with.

Self-Doubt

I wrote on my Facebook page the other day that I was having one of those days when it feels like everything I do is rubbish....and lots of lovely people posted reassuring comments. Which was great.

But I have yet to find an effective way to combat that feeling. I can tell myself it will go away, and it does. But its persistent while it lasts, and it stops me getting on with things i really want to get on with.

It's hard to describe, if is not a feeling you have ever had - and I wouldn't wish it in you, but
I do hope i'm not the only person who has it- But it is quite debilitating, even though you know its stupid. Even things you were previously proud of are worthless, or seem so, even if there's a part if you that is holding on to all the objective measures of worth you might have, you don't believe they are true. They don't feel true, not like the uselessness does. It's all you can do to stop yourself from throwing things away, or ripping things up, or deleting them or whatever form of destruction works for your medium...even though you know you'll regret it when the mood has passed it still seems like it would be the best thing you could do. I don't know that it makes you feel better exactly, but its something you can actually do as opposed to looking at it berating yourself about a) how rubbish it is, and b) how useless you are to be so incapable of doing anything about either the work or the insecurity....

A Question of Value

I have just been pondering the new course from 'Do What You Love', which will be 

#makeartthatsells with@lillarogershttp://ow.ly/hNVbb

It makes me think about the various attitudes people have to art, and also to money and hence to the value of art.

I used to watch 'The Antiques Roadshow' all the time when I was kid - stay with me, that's not quite the non-sequiteur it may seem! - sometimes you would see things that were hideous, and my mother would be declaring that she would not have it as a gift while the expert was saying that it was worth at least £50,000; other times it would something that I loved, which apparently would only set me back £20. It's interesting to note the differences, but I do realise that not everyone shares my taste and of course the expert had knowledge that I did not, such as how many were made, how often they come up for sale and what is currently 'fashionable' in the world of collectors. What seemed really strange though was those occassions when they would say that this item was a fake, but that that was a good thing because it was worth more than the original would be or when there'd be some incredibly fragile, museum-quality piece of glass which had somehow survived for 4000 years and travelled all the way from Egypt to Chipping Sodbury, and was only worth a couple of hundred pounds while the comparitively mass-produced metal lamp from the 1930s was worth three times as much. So it was clearly not as simple as rarity, skilled manufacture or survival against the odds...thinking about it now it seems a pretty good illustration of how ambiguous a concept 'value' really is. 

I struggle with pricing things. I should think most artists do. I do not believe that the money you will make for it should be the most important consideration, but if you want it to be more than a hobby then you probably want to sell some of it. And that means, however pure a creative process you engage in, at some point you have to think about money. The objective costs of making something may be relatively easy to work out, but that is only a small part of the equation that places a value on artwork. I'm not sure that you can price your work according to an idea of hourly rate, but there is the undeniable fact that it took you some time and effort to create. With some things you might look at other similar items, and place yourself accordingly, but that is hard to do with art. Not only because every peice is essentially unique, but also because of factors such as how many people have heard of you, whether someone who is regarded as knowing what they are talking about has said something complimentary (or otherwise) about your work, whether you are within a particualr niche, or doing something really innovative that you can't find anyone else selling. And, of course there is the thorny issue of individual tastes. Fundamentally everything is worth what people are, or might be, willing to pay for it - there are factors which can contribute to that such as rarity, but it is hardly cut and dried. Most people, if they are buying as individuals rather than as interior decorators or agents or whatever, are only likely to pay for artwork if they love it, if it speaks to them, if they can see it in their home. And only they know how much they are willing to pay for such a thing. Which means that you can produce a beautiful work of art, which they do love and which would go beautifully in their home but which is over (or under) the price required to meet their personal, internal assessment of its value. 

Of course, one way of pricing things as an artist to to consult your own, personal, interntal assessment of its value. But I am here to tell you that this is an area rife for self-doubt to rear its ugly head. If you are prone to such things anyway. You start to ask yourself whether that's too much, because after all it was you who did it. Not a 'real artist'. Or possibly you worry that you have under-charged and sent a signal out to your potential customers that even you think your work is a bit crap. So why would they pay even that tiny price for it. I suspect it is one of those no-win cases, where whichever way you go and whatever decision you make you will worry about it, if you a person inclined to worry. That being so my theory is that if I spend the time setting the price, for reasons that I have thought through, then I should be able to tell myself in the future when the worry occurs that those reasons were good then, and so they are still good now. 

I do want my work to sell, obviously. But I also do not want that to be my sole motivating factor. Or the reason behinds any choices I make in the course of the creative process...it is a dilemma. Possibly one which the above-cited course will examine. Maybe I should do it, and find out. 

Practicalities...

Today I'm all about practical things. Well, practical to a point anyway.

I like to paint on foamcore board. There are a number of reasons for this, but it also has its problems. Not the least of which is that the stuff is not designed to be painted on. In fact if you buy good quality foamboard you may find a little note on the label, or the website, which tells you it is positively not recommended that you paint on it. It curls up, quite dramatically - definite potential for free-form sculpture!

I suppose one of the advantages of being self-taught is that you may be more likely to try unusual surfaces as substrates for painting. But the corresponding disadvantage is that you have to find out for yourself how to prepare such a surface, if you are daft enough to continue to want to paint on it. For someone like myself that sort of trial-and-error thing is quite daunting.

However I remain attached to foamboard (not physically). It gives a completely smooth surface - no tooth. And I like that as a starting point, maybe because for much of my life drawing on smooth cartridge paper was the only way I felt I could create art...it doesn't bounce like a stretched canvas does when you get into the paint with your hands, as I do have a tendency to do, and I find that give distracting. It has some depth, more than hardboard although not as much as a canvas, so you can hang it without a frame (working out how I wanted to do that is one of the practicalities I mentioned earlier) and its very light. It's also cheaper than artist quality wooden panel, which shouldn't be sneered at when you're experimenting with styles and stuff, and you can get eco and ph neutral stuff...

So I had to work out how to use it without it curling. One plus is that my starting point of covering it with tissue paper means if it curls it does it before there's any painting on it to get damaged, as soon as the medium soaks in. So I had to find out about sealants and polymers and stuff, which curl it a bit as you put them on, but if you can flatten it again afterwards you are go for painting! I think of it as a curing kind of process, you have to treat both sides of it the same so that the curling tendency cancels itself out.

The other practicality I mentioned is hanging the finished piece. This is a matter of personal taste of course, but I wanted a frameless finish, which would kind of float on the wall. So I've gone with a wooden cradle, like the one you would use to stretch a canvas on, made slightly smaller than the foamboard and mounted on the back of it. With eyelets on the inside faces of this the picture hangs flat against the wall, and appears to float. Just as I wanted it too.

Scrumbling

I wouldn't have expected to 'take' to freeform crochet. One of the biggest paralysers for me, when it comes to creating things, is the fear that it won't turn out like I see it in my head and I suppose I was hooked (unintended pun!) on the thought that following a pattern meant that it would look like it was supposed to, and also that it would not be my fault if it didn't. Makes perfect sense, except that following patterns bores me. It took me a while to realise this, because I would see patterns and get excited about the finished item, and I can follow a pattern from start to finish. But I noticed that there were periods when I wasn't crocheting anything - I had beautiful yarn stashed away, books of patterns that I liked and, crucially, the desire to be making something using some of my beautiful yarn. It seems however that after a while of following a pattern, maybe one finished item and halfway through the next, I just lose interest. Not in the making, in the idea of patterns and I put my hooks away for weeks if not months.

This confused me for ages - I wanted to be crocheting but I didn't want to finish the thing I had started. I know this happens to everyone from time to time, so I tried starting something else but the same thing. I had to be fallow with the crochet for however long it took my enthusiasm to re-emerge and then go round the same loop again. I did think about making my own patterns - I'd still like too, I guess. But it seems to be a process with so much conscious trial-and-error, and with the risk that at the end of it you still won't have what it was you saw in your head...that I just ended up as paralysed as I am if I plan a picture too clearly and carefully. In short it was too terrifying. I wonder if there is anyone out there teaching people how to design their own patterns? That might help me break through the terror barrier....

Anyway, a friend of mine, perhaps seeing something that I had failed to see, bought me a book on freeform crochet for my birthday a couple of years back - this book if you're interested:

The pictures blew me away - the peices shown are amazing works of art, as well as usable items and yes, the picture on the front is all made from crochet! - but it still didn't quite click for me. I suppose I looked at the incredible work that could be done and thought to myself that there was no way I would be able to produce anything like that, especially without a pattern of any kind to follow, so what was the point in trying. I should add that the book doesn't say anything like that - it says anyone can do it, go on, have a go, you'll surprise yourself - and I would recommend it to people who are genuinely interested in freeform crochet, but it is possibly not for the low-self-confidenced among us, who tend to be intimidated rather than inspired. 

I think I had probably had the book for about a year before it hit me - the thing that I guess my friend had realised. My artwork is abstract, that is how I am able to do it. From a young age I was taught (and I use that word deliberately) that I could not draw, ergo I could not be an artist. But I had the urge to draw, as many kids do, and so I developed a style which was a totally abstract exploration of lines and tesselations.  I did these for years, still do actually, although I have developed other styles .

Jolly Green Jungle - Pen and Ink on Paper 

Random Blue, Pen and Ink on Paper 

Atlantis, Pen and Ink on Paper

This technique is about putting the pen on the paper, and letting it move. Creating random shapes around which I can fit other shapes. There is no plan. Nowadays I would say that this work explores colours, shape and tessellation rather than image. But the point is that I have always been able to do this, with a pen on paper - however insecure, however afraid that my artistic talent was zero. It look me years to be able to call this art, even, but I could always do it. I could paper my house in these probably, I have so many of them (some going into my Etsy shop soon btw) because whatever other urges to creativity I felt and stifled this outlet was always there - you do not need to believe yourself an artist in order to pick up a pen and move it around.

I have developed my ability to paint by discovering ways to translate this process into that more intimdating medium - embracing the nature of abstraction and consciously avoiding too strong an idea of the finished peice until in the last few stages i refine and simplfy. Even though recognisable imagery features more strongly in my work now it still gets there through of packing in everything that falls out of the brush, and then painting most of it out again rather than by thinking 'I want X in this picture'. My discovery was that freeform crochet (also true of knitting if that's what you prefer to do) offers a way of doing exactly this with yarn and a hook. You simply take up the hook and you go where it wants to take you - don't think about it too hard, and don't spend too much time looking at the results until you are ready to start peicinng things together - and I would start with small peices (scrumbles) rather than going for a big single peice which is much scarier. You don't even need to know many different stitches, although its a great opportunity to learn new ones with no pressure, and you can incorporate all the lovely buttons and beads and bits of ribbon you have squirrelled away as finishing touches, and use up all the tiny short peices of yarn left over from other things that you couldn't bear to throw away...I collect haberdashery as treasure, and I very rarely have a use in mind for it when I buy it. Means a lot of it has been sitting in jars and boxes for years and now I canb pull it out and play with it!

So, I thought that freeform would be the scariest thing of all but it turned out to be the most liberating. If you scrumble you don't even have to think 'it's going to be a hat' or whatever before you start, if you don't want too. Wait until you have a selection of peices and then fit them together in various ways and see what it suggests to you. Or crochet (or sew) a 'blank' from a pattern, a waistcoat for example, and then cover it with your scrumbles. So here is something I scrumbled earlier: 

I just decided 'black, white and grey' and went for it. 

Incidentally, I also find scrumbling a gloriously satisfying word - 'What are you making?' 'Scrumbles'. Its delicious. Or maybe thats just me. 

Joy of creation

So I love to make art, and I'm afraid of making art. Nothing new there, I hear you cry. But what I want to say today is this - it is worth the fear, the doubt, the anxiety for the thrill that comes when you are actually creating. To stand in the studio and look at the paint, the canvas and the materials for putting them together ( these range from brushes to cling-film and old credit cards!) remains terrifying, but once I start and I'm in the flow it is worth it. That experience is one pure creation - there was nothing and you are making something new, something that could not exist without you. It is wonderful. And then of course the fear comes back, because I look at this creation, and I know it isn't finished and I'm afraid that when I come back to it, tomorrow or the day after, I will spoil what I have achieved. That the magic will not happen again, and I'll just be splashing paint around.

But when I'm actually splashing the paint around - there's a freedom there!

So, here is a work in progress - let's see if I spoil it!

The Power of Expectation

Low self-esteem, self doubt, fear of failure...whatever you call it. The more I talk about it the more I discover how many people feel it; are, if not crippled by it then tormented at least. We cover it well in general, laugh at ourselves, shrug it off. But where does it come from? You can feel bad about failing to meet your own expectations of course, but that's not quite what I'm talking about. I'm talking about the kind of self-doubt that stops you doing things, or trying to do them. Not the tried-and-failed kind of upset, but the there's-no-point-in-even-trying-however-much-I-want-to kind. It says something about the world we live in.

Not the natural world but the world we have created. A world, a society, with expectations that are perhaps never spelled out but of which we are all aware and which grip us and pull at us and press us into particular shapes or hustle us in particular directions. Some of them are social or cultural expectations - you must want to have a career, to be promoted, you must want to own your own house, and so on. Others are more personal. I once knew a very talented musician/composer. She wasn't only good, she loved it too. And I remember a conversation with her mother, about how it would be foolish for her to study music beyond GCSE because it wouldn't be of any use in future life and it might make her want things that she couldn't have. The principles underlying this seem to me to have been that education's sole purpose is to equip you to earn your living, that only a few privileged people can earn their living. Also that it is bad to long for things you can't have and that if you can protect someone from that you should...

I question all of those assumptions - to me education is about far more than employability; 'use' is a highly subjective term at best, certainly whether something has practical purpose and/or brings a financial reward is not a full and complete summary of its value; and, of course, if you begin with the assumption you can't then you do not try, and then obviously you can't! A trite statement perhaps, but true nonetheless.

I'm not saying that she would have been world famous had her family supported her. But in the light of that framework of expectations, assumptions and definitions how was she supposed to find out? I also grew up with a mental list of things marked 'not for you' - I suspect everyone does to a degree. No-one deliberately intended to limit and restrict me, to reduce my potential but that was the effect of it. For me the list included not only things I was not supposed to be able to do at all, which included all forms of visual art, but also things that I might be able to do but which depended on fate (on which one cannot rely) in order to make any money (of course the only reason one would do anything!). There was also the strong sense that if I pursued the things I might be able to do, and succeeded at them, then I would be hurting others who had not been so lucky. I chose my degree course on the basis of these assumptions - my academic interests were, and remain wide but I based my choice on other peoples beliefs about what was 'worthwhile' and I didn't choose with my interests, or my desires. What I did choose was law, which was interesting but which I realised pretty soon was never going to be my life's work. But still there is that persistent belief, 'only a very few people can do X', 'you have to know the right people to make X work out'...

Anyway my point is that I have had to spend a lot of time and effort finding out about these underlying 'shoulds' before I was able to make the art that I make now. I finished a painting this week, and I am pretty pleased with it - it's not bad for someone who can't do art!

This quote by Einstein was printed in 'The Week' magazine. I hadn't come across this one before but it spoke to me
"If you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree it will live its whole life believing it is stupid."

Getting on with things

I believe that sharing something you have put time and effort and emotion into creating always carries an emotional risk, however well-rounded and confident a person you might be - will they like it? Will they laugh at me? Will they think/say/tweet that they could have done better with their eyes closed and the paintbrush up their nose? Am I being unpleasantly arrogant thinking its good enough to share? or, if selling, is this a ridiculous price to ask regardless of the time/effort/love that went into it? Who will ever take me seriously enough to pay money for this stuff?...All that kind of thing.

I do hope its not just me anyway!

Of course all that should really matter is that you like it, and believe in it. Certainly there are people who do operate like that, (or who seem to anyway). But I am not one of them. I can like it and believe in it for a while, but there is always doubt and concern and even despair (of the 'who-are-you-kidding-you-know-you-are-rubbish-at-this-and-at-everything-else-too' variety). Nothing brings low self-esteem to the fore in me like creativity does, which is a shame since I really want to be more creative and more seriously creative as well. I have got better at handling it though - this blog is evidence, if you need any. It used to be that I could like things myself, and look at them and go back to them and admire them for days, but entirely in private. Then I started showing things to a restricted list of individuals, which grew gradually and organically without me actively seeking to extend it and these days I can keep up the positivity until it is too late to do anything about it (the pictures have been posted, or 'look what I made' said, or a peice is out on the table when guests arrive). This is a very new thing. I think that the trick for me is not to think about it beforehand, just show or not as feels right at the time and save the anxiety for afterwards - and believe me it does still come (nasty comments? complete blank nothing happened kind of response? faint praise only? Compliments are always a delightful surprise). I have a little mantra (more on mantra below) that I use when I find myself agonising - every time, even if it is the five thousandth time in a minute, I tell mself  'you've done it now, let it be'. Not the most exciting or poetic phrase, but it does actually help me stop worrying myself into an early grave. Which I could do very easily if I let my natural inclination take its course.

I think perhaps that I find it difficult to separate opinions about my work from opinions about me-as-a-whole. If my work is useless then I am useless, you know the kind of thing. It seems possible that this is a measure of how much of myself I do put into my work. But if the work is done then it seems a shame not to share it. The time and effort has been spent after all, and I have to believe that I wouldn't want to show people if I really and truly thought it was terrible myself, as opposed to simply being afraid other people will think it is. Anyway, who knows, it could be rapturously received and praised to the skies! This is not my default mental state, but I would like it to be.

I  made a sampler once, when I was about 15, which read

'Of all sad words of tongue or pen, the saddest are these - it might have been'. 

I believed that then. And I thought it meant that I was probably going to be the saddest person who ever lived, letting all those might-have-beens slide past me because I was too scared to go out and grab them. It may well have taken me the better part of 20 years to internalise those words and recognise them as an encouragement rather than a prophecy, but I do still believe them now. The phrase can function as a mantra, and its one I use when I get wobbly about putting myself out here like this - if I don't do this, and the other things I want to do like my Etsy shop (in the works), joining art groups, seeking exhibition opportunities etc then I will never know if I could have done them. I don't like not to know things.

Mantra are extremely useful things. Or I find them so. It is not an intrinsically religious thing, or even a spiritual one although it can be. It is about packing a whole lot of thinking and decision-making into a short phrase. I write the phrase down usually, in order to make it real and active as opposed to just things in my head which can get lost or forgotten. Then when I say or read the phrase it reminds me of the things that I packed into it when I chose it. My first self-conscious, deliberately chosen mantra was from Rudyard Kipling's poem 'If''. I took the lines:

"If you can forces your heart and nerve and sinew

to serve your turn long after they are gone

And so hold on when there is nothing in you

Except the will which says to them 'hold on' " 

because at the time I was deeply stressed and also depressed - you know the things on the most-stressful-thing-that-can-happen-to-you lists? They had all happened at once, and I had to keep it together because other people were depending on me to do so. To me those words meant that even when  struggling as long as I could hang on to the will to carry on, as opposed to curling up in a corner and waiting for the world to go away, then the rest of me would fall into line - I had the emotional strength to hang onto these lines, if nothing else. So I would repeat them to myself over and over when I need to and it was like telling myself 'hold on, hold on, hold on'. I had them in a locket for a while, then I put them in a little bottle instead so that I could see them as well as hold them.

Having them physically with me was a good thing, as if I was in a situation where I couldn't just stop and recite poetry I could just hold them and think 'holding on'. Writing the words down was important, I know the whole poem by heart so I could have just recited it to myself but by choosing the words and writing them down I was investing them with the meaning I needed them to have.

There are other things I should have done then (Doctors, counsellors, whatever), but I didn't. The mantra didn't make everything better, but it did help me to cope with things and it is a technique I still use, and am finding new uses for. Mantra can influence feelings and help you through doing things you find tough. My current favourite, which is a good one for trying new things that you don't know will work out, is also from a poem - Sheenagh Pugh's 'Sometimes' -

"Sometimes our best efforts do not go amiss, sometimes we do as we meant to"

which reminds me that failure is not foreordained or inevitable, even for me. I wrote this one on coloured paper to signal positivity, and I put a feather in with it because birds are the most supremely self-confident creatures. I can hang it in the window when I'm working or have it in my pocket if I am going somewhere intimidating.

 

It is also important to me, as I think I mentioned, to notice when I am feeling negative. This is because you can get so used to feeling that way that you forget other things are possible. I try to recognise it and then move on - pretty much with that phrasing. 'I think I'm stupid. Noted. Now I'm getting on with this'.  If you try to ignore thoughts and feelings they grow - like telling someone not to think about the pink elephant - so, in theory, noting them should keep them small. I can accept that, just at this moment, I think I am stupid without letting that stop me doing what I have decided to do. I've just made another bottle charm today actually, although not a mantra. More of a symbol, reflecting the fact that fear can be a barrier but it can also be spur. I find it very easy to get down on myself about being down on myself, about being shy, about finding the creative act frightening but it is also true that I need the fear, I need to be aware of the risk that I take when I make art in order to be sure that I am producing something real and true. It is a stylised molecule of adrenalin, made out of paper and beads. I have been using this image in a painting, and I find it strangely pleasing. Hence my little charm. 

Achievement!

I have sold a picture! This is very exciting, obviously I suppose. Someone other than me likes my work and, not only that, is prepared to spend their hard earned money to have possession of it. It's tremendously validating. It is scary to show it to people, not knowing what they will say when they see it. You put a lot into the things you create after all, and to show them to other people means exposing that, risking criticism...but that's a good thing too. I think. If you are prepared to risk criticism, or rejection or even insult then you are committing to your own work - you can't take a risk like that if there isn't some part of you that believes your work is worth that risk. That is prepared to stand by the work regardless of what others might say. I think that when the work is good enough it wants to be shown to people. Or the part of you that you have invested in the work wants you to show it to people. Which, maybe, makes criticism easier to handle - you know that this was the best it could be.

But it's still nice not to have to deal with criticism and to have positive things said instead!

Overcoming the blank white canvas

I can plan to do creative things. I can plan it like anything! I work out what it is I want to do and how it should be done, and what I'll need and what the finished thing will look like - I do a lot of different creative things, from crochet through to chain-mail but this is true of pretty much all of 'em. I spend so much time and energy thinking about it, and seeing what it should be like when I have done that I don't actually start it. Or if I do I decide it has failed at the first point at which the plan does not run smoothly.  The problem with planning creative acts is not just the action part; I know this because I can work through a pattern from beginning to end, and I can make mistakes on it and undo those mistakes and end up with the finished item without any blows to my self-esteem or bouts of over-whelming anxiety that I am useless at whatever I turn my hand too. But ultimately following a pre-made pattern is just less satisfying. I like it for those  occasions when I want something to do with my hands that I don't have to think about too much but my urge is really to create original things, things that are wholly my own. This urge has only grown as I have added new skills to the lists of things I know how to do, and it has grown as I have become more successful at battling the various fears that come with the creative urge. So I need to find ways around the blocks that parts of my brain set up.

I have concluded that if I spend too much time thinking about it beforehand then I do nothing, at least partly because I'm afraid that I won't (or can't) live up to what it is that I see in my head. So I have to just do things, play around and see what happens. As it happens this is something else I find difficult - I suspect part of me believes that 'real' artists, writers etc are able to produce a masterpiece just like that, no errors and if I can't do that too then I must be wasting my time, hence the first deviation from the plan feeling like total failure. I do know this is rubbish, but as anyone with any interest in psychology or philosophy will tell you knowing something to be the case and engaging emotionally with that as true-for-you are not the same thing. So I have decided that inventing and working with methods that render 'perfection' (as defined by my unconscious mind) an impossibility from the start and therefore enable me to believe that nothing which I do during the process matters any more than any other thing will encourage me to believe the 'there are no mistakes' mantra.

So when painting I begin by creating a surface that has already been 'spoiled'. I take my canvas or my board and I cover it with pieces of tissue paper, painted over with medium. However hard you try tissue paper resists being stuck smoothly, and is wonderfully easy to make less smooth, so my surface is covered in all sorts of interesting crinkles and wrinkles, and sometimes rip, thus removing the pressure to do justice to the smooth perfection of the original surface. It may not sound logical, but believe me if you are scared of the blank canvas ensuring it is not blank before you start actually doing your thing really helps. It isn't blank anymore, or, to put it in the way I suspect my unconscious does, I have spoiled it already so what does it matter what I do to it now? This frees me to actually make some marks on the thing, with no idea what result I am aiming for and consequently without worrying about what they look like.

Of course then, eventually, I find myself looking at a canvas that I am quite pleased with but which I am sure is not finished. Then I need another strategy to get past the fear of irrevocably spoiling what I am currently pleased with. I don't have a cast-iron solution to this one yet, but I'm working on it!