Monday Musings~Starting Somewhere

 

For a long time I felt an urge, a need, to put paint down on something, anything. I painted walls in the new houses we moved in to over the years. But then, this wasn’t enough, and I stopped moving around to different places too. A day of feeling cofident, I strode in to an art supply store like I owned the place, and bought a package of different sizes of artist’s paint brushes. And canvases. Small ones, because maybe I wasn’t so confident after all. Little 4×4 ones; after all, the art police wouldn’t find me out so quickly this way, and if I was lucky they’d have bad eyesight and wouldn’t see what I was doing at all.

I had always lusted after friend’s art studios in a room of their home. I always seemed to have a friend or two that were artists. And then I found my way. Abstract art I called what I do, then no one could critique too much if it was abstract…how the heck would they know what I had painted anyway? They’d just see the color. Perfect. I began to put down paint on paper, canvas, wood. I soon realized the extreme soul satisfaction of this activity. I then didn’t care what anyone thought if they should happen to see it.

I read more and more about just starting, even if it’s ugly and bad, and that’s the truth. Once I started, I was off and running. I’ve taken one art class that was in oils, and very structured, a replica of some other artist’s work; this nearly broke my soul. I just couldn’t do it that way. I quit. I stopped completely. Time had a funny way of insisting I get back to it. I did, and on days when I struggle with some sad memory or difficulty in my life, or when I’m just feeling creative, I sit down at a tiny art table I made by placing a 12×35 inch board across two plastic three drawer file cabinets from Target, and I just start.

The hook in really getting me started is the piece below. A cherished plate from Hawaii that broke in my last move. The pieces sat in a corner of my kitchen counter for a year, until my muse told me to take care of it in a better way; to get over the break, and just get started.