I recently met a chap who was asking himself the question- “what is the point?” I often wonder the same thing. This can sound like a negative question, however I see it more as a way of evaluating where my energy goes. On my list of things to do I have had the same 3 or 4 tasks sitting there for months. Update website and social media being among them. To me these are tasks that steal my joy, they are neither relational nor creative. I know they are necessary and see them more as an administrative branch to being an artist. Don’t get me wrong, I fully respect and appreciate people who do this stuff for a living.
Falling out of love with technology and being a slave to the algorithms that stroke or squash my ego, has been in my brain space for a while. Playing the game and promoting an image of success is something that I see all over the place. Is this that “toxic positivity” thing I have heard about? Is “fake it till you make it” still out there? I’m not saying we should be slicing an ear off or burning 4000 canvases. Maybe we don’t have to suffer in order to be a legitimate artist. Maybe we don’t have to make out we are Damian Hirst either.
Taking Instagram, I have started to pick apart what on earth the point is. In the real world, you go to work and someone compensates you with money (often nowhere near enough). On Instagram, you put the effort in- creating art work, taking photograph of art work, editing that photo and thinking of magical and wonderful captions that will grab people’s attention. You are then compensated with a small stroke in the form of a tiny heart. Every now and then someone will bother to use actual words or even wish to buy said piece of art. This is the pay off. This is the goal, to win squillions of adoring fans to give their tiny hearts to you (and whoever else) and sell your work. I appreciate I may be oversimplifying things here however, stick with me.
Something else I have noticed is the abundance of “borrowing”. By no means am I Picasso, but I can see where a likeness of my work pops up somewhere else (this includes images and words and ideas). Sure we are all dipping our toe in the same pool, there is no such thing as an original idea these days, right? Maybe not. However when it is as blatant as what I have witnessed, then it leaves a bitter taste. It makes me want to do the equivalent of putting my arm across my spelling test so no one can see. I put the work in after all?
Something I have noticed is that I feel like I am in a race to paint faster, to paint more. There are times where flow state enables the ol’ paintbrushes to work speedily. There is no better feeling than being completely immersed in what you are doing, for me it is often meditative. I am back on the Isle of Lewis with the biting wind wrapping its arms around my cheeks. I have the shushing of the sea pushing and dragging rocks back and forth. This is how I work best. However there are also times where the pressure to keep up with the momentum weighs heavy. If you don’t produce more pictures of stuff then you will become irrelevant and someone will take your artists badge away (because that is a thing, it says you are valid and your degree wasn’t a complete waste of time). Are there benefits to this kind of pressure? I ‘m sure there are. There are artists who draw or paint every single day. They do this out of a curiosity for the world, out of a need to draw out the tangled lines in their head. I respect this. It’s not how I work, but I respect it. Have there been paintings that I have painted out of feeling like I should? Yes. There, I said it. Do I have the ability or stomach to churn them out, feeding the appetites of social media followers? Nah!
So as the good ship of People Pleasing leaves the dock and sails towards integrity and freedom, let me say this- I value you. You’ve made it this far so that should be a given. I will promise to share what I can with you, this will not happen in predictable segments of thrice weekly. It will be when I can manage and when I actually have something I feel your eyeballs should waft across. I hope it lifts or stirs your soul a wee bit. I hope it connects with you. If it does, use your words as well as your tiny hearts. And to anyone else out there who is jumping through the hoops, fling them into the sky like giant Frisbees. You don’t need them. Not really. Your grit and creativity is enough.
Mic drop.