Utopia "Statement of Purpose"

Getting all serious here, and long-winded.

Wrote the next few paragrahs in the comments column to Rachel's "Babayaga" blog. I think it says much of why I'm doing all this drawing, and blogging it. Trying to avoid too many "I" statements, because as David Fennario vividly states, art can get too self-involved, and you can disappear up your own navel, or nearby orifice. Still, there's art that's outward-directed, and art that's inward. Both valid at times.

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I think art is a way of saving yourself from lots of grief. I’ve been blessed with a little bit of talent. Drawing and writing’s pulled me out of deep holes. Still working out my relation to it. My Mom was an MFA with depression and anxiety disorders, which I’ve inherited to a lesser degree. I think the art helped her cope. But when she started to sell, it became another drag, and she ended up doing work to order, almost mass-producing. The healing aspect was gone.

A blog is great because they give you different notions of artists’ processes. What they are thinking day to day. It can be a soap box, a teaching aid, or a reflection.

I’m lucky now to have something - the TV writing - that’s paying the bills, and letting me explore without the usual pressures. Still working on different aspects of my life which are wanting. Mostly becoming more socialised, less shy and passive, opening up to people, putting energy out there, cleaning up crap inside.

Lots of different ways of doing this. When I get time, and become more organised, I want to do workshops on watercolour applied to cartooning for some local arts centre, or maybe just something about keeping a sketchbook, and exercising your chops. I’m a little terrified of finished work, or doing something that’s not to a deadline (driving it from within, without external pressures, not because of other people’s approval. Doing it just because it’s valid.)

I think giving yourself license to fail is important. They’re not all going to be beautiful pictures, but doing them helps you grow. Even though the results are often clunky, or not what I meant, I’m pleased at all the little improvements, which never stop happening, no matter how old I get.

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One of my mom's paintings, on my wall. It's a lake in Montana, which she loved, and was painted some time in the mid 1970s: