The other day over on her blog, Greywaren Art, Maggie posted her thoughts on the potential of a zombie attack and whether the artist side of us carries over into the wee hours of the night. More correctly (I hope, and please correct me if I'm wrong), are you an artist through and through? Regardless of whether you’re awake or not, selling your art or not, beginning artist or seasoned veteran? Are you being true to yourself?
"Enlightened" WIP5x7, coloured pencil on Mi-Teintes
Copyright Rita Woodburne
This was something I’ve been thinking about a lot over the past few months and most especially when I injured my back and was forced to do nothing but lie on my stomach and stare out the window and watch the world go by. I also did a lot of reading on art history and interviews/ articles on contemporary artists as well. Life got in the way of me pushing forward with my art in a gung-ho kinda way and, to be honest... it was probably for the better.
I've pulled an about face and decided to focus a lot less on selling my art and instead have shifted my focus on developing my skills and style. For me to do that I need to set the business side of being an artist aside and I need to just focus on my art and, as I posted in the comment section of Maggie's post, to Hell with the rest of it.
Now, potential collectors don't go tucking your cheque-books away just yet. I'm still selling my art in art fairs and, if the Universe unfolds as it should, by next year it'll also be in galleries but I'm cutting back on commissions drastically. I simply have too many projects of my own that I want to explore and my free time to pursue those projects has become very limited as of late.
So basically what you see here and on my website (which should be updated soon) is what I'm doing and I'm shifting into purely visceral mode with my art. It was what I did when I was younger and didn't have a care for anything else except doing exactly what I want... and when I was doing that I was happy as a clam with legs.
Yes, I'm regressing and taking a child-like approach to my art again and quite franklyI can't wait to see what happens. I'm sure I'll return to an artist/ business person approach to my art eventually but for the forseeable future this is what I need to do... zombie attack or not.
3 comments:
I am looking forward to what evolves as you take a step back. It can be really hard to turn off the voice that tempts toward the popular spotlight instead of being true to your artistic journey.
Your horse is beautiful!
Good for you! I'm looking forward to seeing what unfolds with your explorations.
Thanks Regina & Ann!
I'm pretty excited to see what happens myself and while I'm still really busy at this time of year I suspect that as we get more into Autumn (when I have more free time) I'll be able to really focus on doing my own thing.
We'll have to wait and see... ;)
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