Yeah, it’s been a while since my last entry. I’ve been making art and then not. “Time” has been my biggest antagonist. Not having enough of it, or not being able to spend it where I want to. Last Thanksgiving (2006) I was awarded an extremely large website project for my graphic design business that I accepted long before I even applied to graduate school. The site was supposed to be finished by late August and I figured I’d have one really “hard” month balancing work and school. Well, it’s been more like three “hard” months. The site didn’t launch when it was supposed to. Too many complications to bother explaining, only to say, it just launched this past weekend, and to meet this late deadline it required I spend about 70 hours a week for the last three weeks to deliver it. Yeah. My school work/art has been completely on hold. And such is the ebb and flow of my life. At times my design business will dominate, and at others time spent in the studio will dominate. My life doesn’t seem to be naturally constructed by consistent and equal amounts of time to both – and I’m trying to learn not to stress about that and go with the flow knowing that in the end there is balance, just not in a traditional sequence of time. But, now the website is done (THANK GOD) and I can actually swing the pendulum in the other direction!
Three weeks ago, before this last push on the website, I went to NYC to meet with my artist mentor Sarah Walker. I had a great meeting with her. She really gave me some insightful, intelligent, and very constructive feedback on what I had been doing up to that point and suggestions for moving forward. I can’t say enough about the effect of this meeting. It was completely pivotal for me. It allowed me to view myself as a ‘real’ artist and the particular method/work that I’m pursuing in a whole new and very serious way.
After our meeting I went into Chelsea with a list of artists that she suggested I go check out (noted in my museum and gallery list on the right hand menu of this blog). I had a blast walking through the gallery district and seeing the variety of work, and surprised at what moved me and what didn’t. I’m learning that the best ideas can come from what I would have previously considered unlikely sources. I understand the power of looking at work that is completely different than mine as it provides me with the seed of an idea that then germinates into my own unique flower (oh, but not to confuse you -- I’m not working with flowers anymore!)
After the gallery tour I went to the MoMA to see the Richard Serra exhibit. It was phenomenal to experience his work, not to mention seeing all of the other paintings in the galleries. I was a little surprised (well perhaps not so much any more as I’m better understanding my motivations and inspiration) was work by Rothko, Reinhardt, Jasper Johns and Pollack. I noted (in the paintings I saw) how they were dealing strictly with an “abstraction” of form -- not pulling from nature -- focused only on line, color, etc. Interestingly I’m connecting with their end result and how it relates to my process of achieving a similar affect by using layered images from nature and mixing photography with painting.
When I got back home I went about the task of purchasing a whole new set of materials to do my next round of experimentation with (based on some of Sarah’s suggestions) and went to the studio to do some re-organizing and get set up. Well, that was three weeks ago, and I haven’t been there (for any real length of time) until today. I went back over to drop a series of things off (I participated in two open studio weekends the past two weekends) and brought everything back to my studio and spent time putting things away, cleaning up and re-organizing some more. I guess you could say I continue to “nest” in my studio. It’s actually been an important part of my process -- integrating this whole set of new materials and the need to keep restructuring how things are organized to pursue these new methods. But the nesting needs to stop and now that the big website project is (for the most part) finished, it’s time to get back to working in the studio, which I’ve both REALLY missed and have been dying to get back into. I can now breath again.
No comments:
Post a Comment