Blog Archives
Q: Why art? (Question from “Arts Illustrated”)
Posted by barbararachkoscoloreddust

A: I love this question! I remember being impressed by Ursula von Rydingsvard’s exhibition at the National Museum of Women in the Arts a few years ago. What stayed with me most was her wall text, “Why Do I Make Art by Ursula von Rydingsvard.” There she listed a few dozen benefits that art-making has brought to her life.
I want to share some of my own personal reasons for art-making here, in no particular order. My list keeps changing, but these are true at least for today.
1. Because I love the entire years-long creative process – from foreign travel whereby I discover new source material, to deciding what I will make, to the months spent in the studio realizing my ideas, to packing up my newest pastel painting and bringing it to my Virginia framer’s shop, to seeing the framed piece hanging on a collector’s wall, to staying in touch with collectors over the years and learning how their relationship to the work changes.
2. Because I love walking into my studio in the morning and seeing all of that color! No matter what mood I am in, my spirit is immediately uplifted.
3. Because my studio is my favorite place to be… in the entire world. I’d say that it is my most precious creation. It’s taken more than twenty-two years to get it this way. I hope I never have to move!
4. Because I get to listen to my favorite music all day.
5. Because when I am working in the studio, if I want, I can tune out the world and all of its urgent problems. The same goes for whatever personal problems I am experiencing.
6. Because I am devoted to my medium. How I use pastel continually evolves. It’s exciting to keep learning about its properties and to see what new techniques will develop.
7. Because I have been given certain gifts and abilities and that entails a sacred obligation to USE them. I could not live with myself were I to do otherwise.
8. Because art-making gives meaning and purpose to my life. I never wake up in the morning wondering, how should I spend the day? I have important work to do and a place to do it. I know this is how I am supposed to be spending my time on earth.
9. Because I have an enviable commute. To get to my studio it’s a thirty-minute walk, often on the High Line early in the morning before throngs of tourists have arrived.
10. Because life as an artist is never easy. It’s a continual challenge to keep forging ahead, but the effort is also never boring.
11. Because each day in the studio is different from all the rest.
12. Because I love the physicality of it. I stand all day. I’m always moving and staying fit.
13. Because I have always been a thinker more than a talker. I enjoy and crave solitude. I am often reminded of the expression, “She who travels the farthest, travels alone.” In my work I travel anywhere.
14. Because spending so much solitary time helps me understand what I think and feel and to reflect on the twists and turns of my unexpected and fascinating life.
15. Because I learn about the world. I read and do research that gets incorporated into the work.
16. Because I get to make all the rules. I set the challenges and the goals, then decide what is succeeding and what isn’t. It is working life at its most free.
17. Because I enjoy figuring things out for myself instead of being told what to do or how to think.
18. Because despite enormous obstacles, I am still able to do it. Art-making has been the focus of my life for thirty-three years – I was a late bloomer – and I intend to continue as long as possible.
19. Because I have been through tremendous tragedy and deserve to spend the rest of my life doing exactly what I love. The art world has not caught up yet, but so be it. This is my passion and my life’s work and nothing will change that.
20. Because thanks to the internet and via social media, my work can be seen in places I have never been to and probably will never go.
21. Because I would like to be remembered. The idea of leaving art behind for future generations to appreciate and enjoy is appealing.
Comments are welcome!
Posted in 2021, Alexandria (VA), Art in general, Inspiration, Studio
Comments Off on Q: Why art? (Question from “Arts Illustrated”)
Tags: "Why Do I Make Art", abilities, anywhere, appealing, appreciate, arrived, art world, art-making, benefits, boring, bringing, certain, challenge, changes, collector, commute, continual, continue, creation, creative process, deciding, deserve, despite, develop, devoted, discover, doing, effort, enjoy, enormous, entails, entire, enviable, evolves, exactly, exciting, exhibition, experiencing, expression, farthest, fascinating, favorite, figuring, foreign, forging, framed, framer, future, generations, High Line, immediately, important, impressed, incorporated, instead, intend, internet, late bloomer, learning, leaving, lifted, listen, material, meaning, medium, morning, moving, myself, National Museum of Women in the Arts”, newest, nothing, obligation, obstacles, otherwise, packing, passion, pastel, pastel painting, personal, physicality, places, possible, precious, problems, properties, purpose, question, realizing, reasons, reflect, relationship, remember, reminded, research, sacred, seeing, social media, solitude, source, spending, staying, Studio, succeeding, supposed, talker, techniques, thinker, throngs, tourists, tragedy, travel, travels, tremendous, understand, unexpected, urgent, Ursula von Rydingsvard, Virgnia, walking, what I love, wondering, working, years-long
Q: Why do you make art?
Posted by barbararachkoscoloreddust
A: Last spring I viewed Ursula von Rydingsvard’s exhibition at the National Museum of Women in the Arts. One thing that stayed with me is her wall text, “Why Do I Make Art by Ursula von Rydingsvard” in which she listed a few dozen benefits that art-making has brought to her life.
I want to share some of my own personal reasons here, in no particular order. My list keeps changing, but these are true at least for today.
1. Because I love the entire years-long creative process – from foreign travel whereby I discover new source material, to deciding what I will make, to the months spent in the studio realizing my ideas, to packing up my newest pastel painting and bringing it to my Virginia framer’s shop, to seeing the framed piece hanging on a collector’s wall, to staying in touch with collectors over the years and learning how their relationship to the work changes.
2. Because I love walking into my studio in the morning and seeing all of that color! No matter what mood I am in, my spirit is immediately uplifted.
3. Because my studio is my favorite place to be… in the entire world. I’d say that it is my most precious creation. It’s taken more than twenty-two years to get it this way. I hope I never have to move!
4. Because I get to listen to my favorite music all day or to Public Radio stations.
5. Because when I am working in the studio, if I want, I can tune out the world and all of it’s urgent problems. The same goes for whatever personal problems I am experiencing.
6. Because I am devoted to my medium. How I use pastel continually evolves. It’s exciting to keep learning about its properties and to see what new techniques will develop.
7. Because I have been given certain gifts and abilities and that entails a sacred obligation to USE them. I could not live with myself were I to do otherwise.
8. Because art-making gives meaning and purpose to my life. I never wake up in the morning wondering, how should I spend the day? I have important work to do and a place to do it. I know this is how I am supposed to be spending my time on earth.
9. Because I have an enviable commute. To get to my studio it’s a thirty-minute walk, often on the High Line early in the morning before throngs of tourists have arrived.
10. Because life as an artist is never easy. It’s a continual challenge to keep forging ahead, but the effort is also never boring.
11. Because each day in the studio is different from all the rest.
12. Because I love the physicality of it. I stand all day. I’m always moving and staying fit.
13. Because I have always been a thinker more than a talker. I enjoy and crave solitude. I am often reminded of the expression, “She who travels the farthest, travels alone.” In my work I travel anywhere.
14. Because spending so much solitary time helps me understand what I think and feel and to reflect on the twists and turns of my unexpected and fascinating life.
15. Because I learn about the world. I read and do research that gets incorporated into the work.
16. Because I get to make all the rules. I set the challenges and the goals, then decide what is succeeding and what isn’t. It is working life at its most free.
17. Because I enjoy figuring things out for myself instead of being told what to do or how to think.
18. Because despite enormous obstacles, I am still able to do it. Art-making has been the focus of my life for thirty-three years – I was a late bloomer – and I intend to continue as long as possible.
19. Because I have been through tremendous tragedy and deserve to spend the rest of my life doing exactly what I love. The art world has not caught up yet, but so be it. This is my passion and my life’s work and nothing will change that.
20. Because thanks to the internet and via social media, my work can be seen in places I have never been to and probably will never go.
21. Because I would like to be remembered. The idea of leaving art behind for future generations to appreciate and enjoy is appealing.
Comments are welcome!
Posted in 2019, An Artist's Life, Creative Process, Inspiration, Working methods
Comments Off on Q: Why do you make art?
Tags: "the work", abilities, anywhere, appealing, appreciate, arrived, art world, art-making, artist, ”Why Do I Make Art by Ursula von Rydingsvard”, behind, benefits, bringing, challenge, change, collector, color, commute, continual, creation, creative process, decide, deserve, despite, develop, devoted, different, discover, enormous, entails, entire, enviable, evolved, exciting, experiencing, fascinating, favorite, figuring out, foreign, framed, framer, future generations, hanging, High Line, how to think, immediately, important, incorporated, instead, intend, internet, late bloomer, learning, leaving, life's work, listed, make all the rules, make art, meaning, medium, months, morning, moving, my time on earth, myself, National Museum of Women in the Arts”, obligation, obstacles, otherwise, packing, particular, passion, pastel painting, personal, physicality, places, possible, precious, properties, Public Radio, purpose, realizing, reasons, reflect, relationship, remembered, research, sacred, seeing, social media, solitary, solitude, Source Material, spend the day, spirit, stations, staying fit, staying in touch, Studio, succeeding, talker, techniques, the world, thinker, told what to do, tourists, tragedy, travel, tremendous, tune out, twists and turns, understand, unexpected, uplifted, urgent problems, Ursula von Rydingsvard, Virginia, walking, wall text, wondering, working, years-long
Q: At the end of last Saturday’s (September 28th) post you mentioned something called, “Esala Perahera.” What is that?
Posted by barbararachkoscoloreddust
A: My trip to Sri Lanka was timed so that I could observe it first hand. Here is a description from the “Insight Guide to Sri Lanka:”
The lunar month of Esala is a month for festivals and peraheras all around the island. Easily the finest and the most famous is the Esala Perahera held at Kandy over the ten days leading up to the Esala Poya (full moon) day (late July or early August). The festival dates back to ancient Anuradhapura, when the Tooth Relic (of the Buddha) was taken through the city in procession, and the pattern continues to this day, with the relic carried at the head of an enormous procession which winds its way round and round the city by night. The perahera becomes gradually longer and more lavish over the 10 days of the festival, until by the final night it has swollen to include a cast of hundreds of elephants and thousands of dancers, drummers, fire-eaters, acrobats, and many others – an extraordinary sight without parallel anywhere else in Sri Lanka, if not the whole of Asia.
I would go further and add that the Esala Perahera is one of the world’s great festivals. Who could ever imagine such a spectacle? It may be a cliché to say it, but travel is ultimately the best education.
Comments are welcome!
Posted in 2013, An Artist's Life, Inspiration, Photography, Quotes, Sri Lanka, Travel
Tags: "Insight Guide to Sri Lanka", ancient, Anuradhapura, anywhere, around, Asia, August, balancing, become, Buddha, carry, case, cast, charge, city, cliche, cntinue, dancer, date, day, description, drummer, early, easily, education, elephant, end, enormous, Esala Perahera, exist, extraordinary, famous, festival, final, finest, fire-eater-acrobat, first hand, flame thrower, full moon, further, gradually, great, head, headdress, held, home, hundreds, imagine, include, July, Kandy, lavish, leading, leave, longer, love, lunar, man, mending, month, night, observe, parallel, pattern, perahera, planning, post, Poya, preparation, procession, read, reason, round, Saturday, say, sight, single, spectacle, Sri Lanka, start, stilt, swollen, taken, thousands, timed, Tooth Relic, travel, trip, tusker, ultimately, until, waiting, watching, whole, wind, world