@RoakillSpatula is getting married today. I’ve had the pleasure of knowing him here in xangaland for several years now and have watched this love story evolve, the chronicle of his work to unite his life with his love’s. It takes a lot of real work to combine two adult households, not to mention the challenges that are magnified by distance between the two. It makes me think of the way I gave a lot of “myself” away to join my husband in marriage and the creation of a family… the endless compromises that are better left uncounted… And the rewards that come from truly releasing some of those things that seem so unbearably important.
Over the last couple days, I’ve encountered several comments in different places wondering what it’s like to give oneself away in art… How can I sell pieces that are “me” in some way? Or, even better, assumptions about my very private internal life gleaned from images of my work. To do what I do for a living, I have to give myself away to strangers frequently… endless unmentionable compromises… Matters of pricing or convenience or detail… Matters of my self image and blunt encounters with bizarre ideas of my internal life and motives…
But it occurred to me as I spoke with another artist recently that I can no more hold my art close to myself than I can hold all my words inside. Like unspoken words, selfishly hoarded, old pieces of art clog up the pathways of my home and my heart, arresting my progress and miring me in memories and old feelings, no longer useful to me… my own antiquated ideas of self.
So I paint. Full time. Like my life depends on it. A self-replenishing inspiration permeates the majority of my days and I must let the colors out. I was berated for years for painting over art others loved, but they wanted me to store it and keep it safe… I can’t do that. I can’t live with it. I WILL paint over it. So, now I’m pricing stuff low so it can go away more quickly and leave me to paint over something else, less loved or less useful to the people I happen to know at the moment.
Just yesterday, I started a serious revision of an old Water Lily painting much to the horror of my husband.
I didn’t even know he liked the piece…
But that wouldn’t have stopped me.