How My Art Practice Is Connecting Me Deeper To Self
Take-Aways From My Recent Abstract Mixed Media Collage Explorations
JULY 07, 2020
I’ve been painting more as of late. And it's been magical. I’m leaning in to this medium and trying to find a rhythm. It’s been challenging as my analytical brain (per usual) loves structure, planning, perfectionism. But this practice is teaching me to let go - to really lean in and discover flow based on more intuition and impulse. It scared me at first. You can get a sense of that fear from my first project with the top image — the catalyst for my paint journey — a series of home works for my bedroom gallery back in April. While I’m (so) in love with the turnout, you could see this initiative did not go without logic and structure: careful layerings of tape, confining a “semi”-disorderly collective of paint strokes, within a perfectly-sharp-pentagonal-perimeter (sans one outlying edge). Reflecting back on this series now, I realize the process behind it is so innately me - analytical with a touch of disorder here and there (depending on the day). Aside from aesthetics, I think these pieces hit home (pun intended) for me because they truly are me. Funny how art can do this — become a physical extension of self, but made manifest in different colors, textures, materials. It’s something I’ve never really considered up until now — how different works can not only embody the ideas, feelings, and moods of the artist but also maybe the artist themself — the canvas as a mirror. Which led me down a tangent to stop and consider some of the greats:
Was Jackson Pollock innately disorderly and chaotic? Loud and messy? Definitely rebellious. Probably also impatient and restless. (A wiki search reveals he had a “reclusive and volatile personality” and dealt with alcoholism for most of his life, eventually leading to his death in a drunk-driving accident at 44 — wowzers.)
Ok, Piet Mondrian: Similar to yours truly, he surely must have been a bit of a perfectionist. Maybe slightly obsessive-compulsive. Patient. A minimalist, perhaps who lived off of only the basics in life. (Wiki reveals a steadfast and unyielding approach to his work: “He spent many long hours painting on his own until his hands blistered, and he sometimes cried or made himself sick.” (If that’s not obsessive or committed, I don’t know what is). (He makes my work-ethic look and feel like a weenie).
Last one: Marcel Duchamp - A troublemaker, party guy. Rebel. Great conversationalist. Bold and brash. (NYT: "Duchamp is an artist whose gestures and writings count for as much as his actual work; the things he did and said become inseparable from the things he made, an artist who ultimately built a career out of self-effacement and ambiguity.")
To my rational brain (again) these observations and connections make total sense. They also provide me with a newfound sense of inquisition and intrigue for art that I haven’t really considered in the past — taking into account the nature and humanness of the artist when viewing their works.
But there’s a plot twist — while doing this quick artist research, I considered Monet. Looking at his works and knowing a bit of background behind his process, I innately thought: dreamer or romantic, diligent and determined, sensitive, maybe soft-spoken or kind-hearted. But to my surprise (and rational-brain dismay) the internet told me a completely different story:
Claude Monet is well known for his paintings, his water lilies, his big beard, and his Japanese garden in Giverny, but also for his vile temper… As a matter of fact, he wasn’t particularly liked in Giverny, lived only for painting, and surrounded himself with friends who were as difficult to be around as he was, such as Georges Clemenceau and Auguste Rodin. He was known to be extremely selfish! Source
Who would have thought (?!)
This threw me for a loop, and now had me reconsidering my earlier observations. It also stirred up new questions and fueled some new thinking —
Subjectivity truly is innate to art.
Art holds secrets - sometimes meant for viewers to understand, and sometimes meant to never be understood.
And also this question: is art a lie? Or is it the truest, most honest expression of the nature of the artist? That expression applied to his/her medium without any external influence but their own (devoid of any and all societal programming, norms, opinions, beliefs, judgement).
Was Monet’s style really soft and subdued because he innately was that person - but his upbringing, experiences, and peers somehow influenced him to project anger and bitterness? Maybe his paintings were his escape to truly get back to and reconnect with his authentic self. Maybe that’s what he wanted to tell the world with his work - "Look at me, I see the world in such a thoughtful, beautiful way and I am that person, but also, sometimes, cannot be that person". If not this, then what? Why would Monet be such a meanie IRL but paint such beautiful, serene Impressionist works? Further googling reveals some insight from his peers and critics:
Monet’s paintings, Mauclair wrote, were “made from a dream and a magical breath ... leaving for the eyes only a mad enchantment that convulses vision, reveals an unsuspected nature, lifts it up unto the symbol by way of this unreal and vertiginous execution.” Source
Monet was “a tormented genius who possessed both and intellectual bedrock and a spiritual essence: someone whose paintings plumbed the ineffable mysteries of life rather than merely catching superficial glints.” Source
So many more thoughts! Questions! Unknowns!
But back to the original thought and intention behind this post — my paintings. Clearly, my interest as of late has left me thinking DEEP and reflecting a lot. But in an effort to consolidate all my thoughts (and finally wrap up this post), my recent findings and take-aways are this:
Continue my initial explorations with my orderly-taped-home series. Push color, scale, technique. Consider more variables.
But also: Challenge myself to let go of order. Be more impulsive. Let go of restrictions, rules, cleanliness. Get messy. Consider integrating new materials and textures.
The latter is what I’ve attempted to do this past week. I sat down over the weekend and told myself to try something different. To get a little uncomfortable. (I was pretty uncomfortable). But I leaned into the process. I painted, finished a work, set it to dry, then went over to look at it and painted again - sometimes starting from scratch, other times adding on to the original in various layers. Here are those preliminary “uncomfortable” pieces.
//e
Some I love more than others, but overall I am indebted to the process and am becoming a little excited to continue seeing it through.
I plan to dive more into a few of these pieces and offer more insight into my thinking (or lack thereof!) and process behind each one in future journal posts. For now, I’ll leave these here for accountability that I am in fact venturing on this path to more “intuitive artistry”. My analytical self hates me rn, but she’s been spoiled and given way too much attention for too long. It’s time to break some rules 🤘🏼
