Category Archives: Studio
Pearls from artists* # 720
“Gatecrasher” (in progress), soft pastel on sandpaper, 58” x 38”
*an ongoing series of quotations – mostly from artists, to artists – that offers wisdom, inspiration, and advice for the sometimes lonely road we are on
An artist without a vision is like an individual programmed just to live, breathe fresh air, eat, and then move on. It is that important vision that we see with our mind’s eye and believe in that society cannot live without. The artist with foresight is the one who is responsible for making it possible. Vision encourages us to pursue art and it gives us reasons to live a purposeful life. But without a conscious effort to maintain and focus our vision, some unimportant thing can sway us from our path and persuade the artist to become something else. And without technical skills to clarify what we think is purposeful and meaningful, the artist can be misunderstood.
Samuel Adoquei in Origin of Inspiration: Seven Short Essays for Creative People
Comments are welcome!
Pearls from artists* # 718
Barbara’s Studio
*an ongoing series of quotations – mostly from artists, to artists – that offers wisdom, inspiration, and advice for the sometimes lonely road we are on
Do the work of your earnest heart, with all your body and soul, for as long as you breathe and with as much craft as you can wring from your every filament, and you will have made art. Your art.
Sally Man in Art Work: On the Creative Life
Comments are welcome!
Pearls from artists* # 717
In the studio
*an ongoing series of quotations – mostly from artists, to artists – that offers wisdom, inspiration, and advice for the sometimes lonely road we are on
Go slowly. Success is a kind of energy field. You vibrate in it like a charged particle. There are new demands on your tine and talents, new interview requests and business questions, new possibilities and opportunities. In this context, when you have a free half-hour you may continue spinning like a top. Walk, breathe, stretch, meditate. Do the mundane: scrape a carrot, sweep the patio. Calm down.
Manage your money. You may or may not have paydays like this again. Study a book on money management. Learn your options. Think before you have a full-time personal trainer or buy Adar that corners too tightly at 100 miles an hour. Think before you find yourself in the position of needing to earn half a million a year in order to cover expenses and feed your vast retinue.
Protect your privacy. Begin to calculate how public and accessible you want to be. Learn how not to give yourself away. Be able to say “Thank you” and “I don’t have an answer for that question.” Have an interview persona and a public persona. At the same time be able to access your humanity.
Manage your anxiety. New stresses exist in your life. More is expected of you. The ante on each project rises. Success is not a magic pill that allays anxieties.
Expect setbacks. The next book you write after your bestseller may disappoint you, your publisher, or your readers. The movie you directed after your blockbuster May bomb. But even if your stock is lowered in the eyes of the world, it need not sink in your own eyes. Virtually no artist experiences one success after another. Determine to come back. If doors have closed to you, consult your business adviser. Plan and analyze ways to reopen them. Demonstrate your courage all over again.
Remain human. Guard your privacy and your person; decline to become a stereotype or a frozen icon. Be more than the bad-boy rock singer, the sex goddess, the reclusive dancer, the brilliant violin virtuoso. Remember that you have a heart and mind as well as a reputation.
Eric Maisel in A Life in the Arts: An Expanded Workbook Edition of Staying Sane in the Arts
Comments are welcome!
Pearls from artists* # 716
*an ongoing series of quotations – mostly from artists, to artists – that offers wisdom, inspiration, and advice for the sometimes lonely road we are on
… We are in the early stages of what I hope will be a revolution surrounding the way we view creative labor. I optimistically dream of a new model, crafted by the next generation of artists. Hopefully, they will not have to spend too many years chasing the old, late-stage capitalist one, as we did. We must cultivate a sense of our own value. As audiences, we willingly spend money for the experiences of books, plays, and other performances. It is not unusual to drop forty dollars on a mediocre movie and bad popcorn, or hundreds for a concert. Yet, we have tolerated a system where artists are not paid for putting their time, money, and very souls into the creation of inspiring, thought-provoking works. It is time to collectively channel creativity towards new paradigms, to provide us with a living wage, ensure that art history reflects all of us, and change the very status of art in our culture. Armed with the truth, technology, and ingenuity, we can forge a powerful future.
Kate Kretz in Art From Your Core: A Holistic Guide to Visual Voice
Comments are welcome!
Q: Your work has been described as “beautiful but unsettling.” How do you respond to that? (Question from “Pastel, Passion, and Perseverance: An Interview with Barbara Rachko” in .ART Odyssey: Healing)
Barbara’s Studio
A: For me, every painting I make is beautiful. Beauty is vital. I see the figures in my pastel paintings as misunderstood, colorful misfits—archetypes—certainly not terrifying or unsettling. In the studio, what I’m often doing is solving technical challenges: figuring out how to depict feathers in pastel, how to lead the viewer’s eye around the painting in complex ways using detail, contrast, and color. Meanings emerge later, when others look and bring their own perspectives. I never want to dictate interpretation. People should be free to see what speaks to them.
Comments are welcome!
Pearls from artists* # 714
*an ongoing series of quotations – mostly from artists, to artists – that offers wisdom, inspiration, and advice for the sometimes lonely road we are on
A moment comes when we realize that we have fallen in love with our instrument, our sculptor’s tools, our dance floor, our computer. We are in love with music, art, literature, cooking, physics. We feel love of beauty, love of the craft well done, love of the material, of the instruments. We feel the sensuality of playing, and of listening, reading, seeing, learning. The desire to learn and to play, if we have it at all, the motive power of creation, is part of our innate makeup, that craving to reach beyond ourselves.
Stephen Nachmanovitch in Free Play: Improvisation in Life and Art
Comments are welcome!
Q: What’s on the easel today?
Work in progress
A: I continue slowly working on “Metamorph.” 26” x 20,” soft pastel on sandpaper.
Comments are welcome!
Pearls from artists* # 712
Finished: “Magisterial,” soft pastel on sandpaper, 58” x 38”
*an ongoing series of quotations – mostly from artists, to artists – that offers wisdom, inspiration, and advice for the sometimes lonely road we are on
To get to the idea of our relation to the creative impulses that flow through us, we can look at the way we respond to our own finished work. I have two responses. First, I’m done with the image in terms of my attachment to it. Whether the painting has succeeded or failed, I’m pretty much done with it.
But paradoxically, I also have an almost objective fascination with the marks and traces of my work when it is successful. I look at it and am fascinated by it, because I don’t know how I did it. It’s as if I’m looking at someone else’s work. I am more astonished by the result than anyone else might be. I know that I have been in the service of spirit, a channel for the divine.
Ian Robert’s in Creative Authenticity: 16 Principles to Clarify and Deepen Your Artistic Vision
Comments are welcome!
Pearls from artists* # 711
Barbara’s Studio
*an ongoing series of quotations – mostly from artists, to artists – that offers wisdom, inspiration, and advice for the sometimes lonely road we are on
The people considered ‘most accomplished’ in our culture pass through a standardized education conveyor belt to be indoctrinated into a cutthroat hamster wheel success ladder. Yet the production and consumption of those goods are destroying the planet that sustains our very lives. Those who question the absurdity of these choices are considered deviant. Try to carve a different path for yourself that makes sense to you, and every societal force conspires to push you back into that absurd groove that virtually everyone else swerved into long ago.
Artists also deal with vocation specific stress. We confront repeated rejection in a way that most other professionals do not. Our relationships may suffer from family members who fail to understand how art careers ‘work.’ They may resent that we bring in little money. There is often a maddening lack of congruity between artists’ abilities, sustained hard work, and reward. Engineers who excel at their job can make a good living, while highly skilled creatives may never reap financial benefits, even after a lifetime of effort. Frequently, artists must reckon with the success of others who have far less talent, depth, and dedication, while endlessly struggling to keep their own practice afloat. Finally, although many people suffer from early trauma and manage to survive and move on, it is in the nature of sone artists’ work to repeatedly re-expose themselves to pain through their practice.
Kate Kretz in Art From Your Core: A Holistic Guide to Visual Voice
Comments are welcome!
Q: What’s on the easel today?
“Gatecrasher,” signed on the lower right
A: I finally finished “Gatecrasher,” 58” x 38,” soft pastel on sandpaper. This pastel painting is number thirty-three in the “Bolivianos” series.
Comments are welcome!
