Thursday, January 15, 2009

Maybe Someday

I am taking my second-ever Water Media Class and the first session met today and I worked on this unfinished piece. I worked hard on it, but blown up like this in this crop, I can see a hundred mistakes. I may yet learn to paint. Am am slowly improving. The teacher (Charlie
Myers) said so and I can see it myself. To see more from this series, visit "Half-formed." For CED.

I did have fun playing with this, so if I set aside my expectations or hopes for good results, and just "play," that could be okay.

(I do wish to be able to paint well, though.)

I spent the whole day at this and the whole day Tuesday (?) writing a poem, and sometimes I feel guilty and wonder if I should be doing something more important. I want to explore this sometime. If I ever have time.

3 comments:

Steve Emery said...

The question you bring up at the end is a tough one - and I think of it sometimes, too. But I've tried other "more important" things and they have either not been all that important to anyone else, anyway, or they were positively not good for me in the long run... So I'm not sure what else I should be doing, and thus I am trying to do a good job of showing up for art as often as I can instead of more frivolous things.

As for painting... It's never something you do as well as you think you want to. You will always be doing it less well than you can imagine doing it - even on the current painting (whatever painting is the current painting). Renoir painted with brushes tied to his wrists in his eighties (he was that arthritic) and said, "I am just now really learning to paint." It's an eternal reach. You never get there - you have to be content with going - forever.

So looked at that way, you are well on your way. Like the rest of us. I like your piece so far - and it won't always take so much time. Welcome to the throng of painters. Membership is easy - just keep painting, keep reaching.

Kathryn Costa said...

I love how you captured the highlights in your painting.

So often I will blow off cleaning my home to engage in creative play. Am I wasting my time? I really don't think so. As long as my place isn't unhealthy, I think having fun is a worthy preoccupation even if in my case I'm cutting and gluing paper.

Mary Stebbins Taitt said...

Thank you so much Steve and Kathryn for your kind, thoughtful and considered comments.

I often think I should consider this question more.

I have various health issues and ADHD and have trouble concentrating and am easily distracted and I often feel that I should be doing something "more important." More valuable, as if somehow art isn't enough.

GREAT art is enough, but I will never be great. SO is adding to the pool of mediocre art enough? Have I got 10,000 hours in me to improve to the point where what I do might please enough other people? Or is pleasing MYSELF enough? I don't know, I get confused about all this.

I started learning to do art becasue 1)I like it and find it intrinsically rewarding--that is, it pleases me to do it. and 2)I wanted to illustrate my stories. But the more I do it, the more I like it for its OWN sake.

But yeah, should I be cleaning and contributing in some way?