Being An Artist Is Not So Pleasurable…. It’s WORK!!!

So, I’ve been working on my Master Thesis in art and spending every waking minute it seems doing something towards it.  My work is digital imaging combined with surface design, combined with fiber art combined with photography combined with I don’t know what.  It is getting out of control and out of focus.  I am not pleasured in a sensual way by the thick lusty quality of paint going on canvas or the soul filling delight of clay (hate it/love it).  Instead I am obsessed with stitching, cutting, dying and making objects that don’t sometimes even resemble art.  There is so much to do, to do, to do….process, process obsessive process that I feel I will go CRAZY!!!  Why am I doing this?  What am I learning.  Art is about overcoming fear and communicating and expressing.  I am not even sure anymore what is being expressed.  What is the point… ranting.

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Winter Blues

February has flown and taken winter with it… no not really. We are mired in snow, blizzardy and fierce. The warm gentle breezes of Italia caressing the petals of the golden girasole……….that is the mental picture I keep in my head these blustery March days now as I wait for spring. The first sunny daffodil is buried deep in the frozen earth that seems like it will never thaw………oh the winter blahs. To be in Italia, glass of vino bianco, mellow warmth of olive oil on my tongue…………..dream.

It is days like these when stimulating the mind seems to soothe the restless fatigue that has set into the soul. It was a cold day when I recently visited the Woodland Pattern Book Center on Locust St. in Milwaukee. http://www.woodlandpattern.org/The Center features an independent book store with new books that are listed on many of the UWM syllabi for undergrads. The Center also hosts workshops and exhibits related to books and the art of writing and book making. The exhibit Repetition and Discipline, there through March 15th, gets at the idea of repetitive tasks and the slow meticulous (almost obsessive) work of beading. The life long artist, Anne Kingsbury, has been the Executive Director of Woodland Pattern Book Center since 1970. She has created journals since the 1970’s in list format detailing daily endeavors. Most are ordinary and the lists are not so much about getting the tasks completed, but rather the repetitive act of doing and the repetion of our lives. It was an eye-opening exhibit not only in concept but also in the techniques. The most fascinating pieces to me were those which combined embroidered, beaded leather with small clay objects sewn into the wall hangings. The level of detail and the way of using clay (dreaded material in my eyes!) intrigued me.

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