MFA and Professor Commentary

Negative Comments Come Regularly

"Looks like wallpaper"

"Try limiting your pallet"

"What are you trying to say?"

"You need more contemporary colors"

"What do you know about color theory?"

"You may want to think about painting slower."

"Don't do the adult trying to look like a child did it."

While in the end - a few weeks or months later - I found many of these comments helpful, at the time they hurt. They hurt a lot. So, I kept on painting and painting. Searching for the voice inside of me that has something to say. Being a creative is not like other jobs.

What I do to keep the spark alive is simply get to the canvas, or paper and work. In doing the work I see that the work gets better, fills me and on those occasions were I show the work - I hear that the work makes others think differently or see differently or simply enjoy a bit of what I call "Eye Candy." 

When I sell the piece, the work also gives something to the new owner. I have been painting and making cards now for over 25 years. It is amazing to me to hear from my long time customers that they look at the work regularly and "get something from it!"  - Their words, not mine.

I will think about writing sometime on the topic of why humans need art, but for now I hope that anyone out there that has had a stuck kind of day or a negative comment fly at them will just realize we all have them - and then move to the work. It's what I plan to do.

Paint and paint some more and then show it and share it!