Tag Archive - Advice to Artists

The Complete Creative Part 1 : How “If-Only Syndrome” Derails Us As Artists

September 12, 2012 in Images, Process with 18 Comments

 

A ballerina by British street artist Banksy (Photo courtesy banksy.co.uk)

 

When Gwarlingo readers give me feedback, I listen. You’ve been telling me that you’d like to see more articles about process and the challenges of being an artist. I’ve appreciated your emails and comments.

Today, I’m excited to launch a new series on Gwarlingo called The Complete Creative, an in-depth series that will examine some of the topics that most concern you and your creative life. During the coming months, I’ll be covering practical topics like money, social media, deadlines, artist retreats, presenting yourself online, and grant writing, as well as a range of deeper, more complex subjects like fear, procrastination, technology, community, time, and limitation. (If you want to read the entire series, be sure to sign up for a free email subscription to Gwarlingo).

Over twenty years of working with artists and arts nonprofits, I’ve noticed an intriguing disconnect. At openings, cocktail parties, and readings, the artist’s life appears glamorous and carefree: fascinating, talented, creative people hobnob with equally “fabulous” collectors, patrons, and members of the public, gawking at bad fashion choices and discussing the weather, real estate, and recent art news. (One of the best gallery conversations was recently overheard at Thomas Beale’s opening at Honey Space when a middle-aged man was spotted walking around completely naked other than his shoes and socks: “Is he part of the art,” a visitor asked, “or just here for the opening?”).

 

Garry Winogrand, Opening, Alexander Calder Exhibition, Museum of Modern Art, New York, 1969. Gelatin silver print, 14 x 17″ (Photo from SFMOMA, Gift of Carla Emil and Rich Silverstein © Garry Winogrand Estate)

 

But what do artists talk about once the collectors, patrons, critics, visitors, and naked men have left the building? What do artists discuss when they’re amongst “their own kind?” Sure, they talk about politics, relationships, and literary agents. But they also discuss their struggles to make a living, to overcome self-doubt and creative blocks, to meet deadlines, to keep distractions like email and social media at bay, and to make time for creative projects, in addition to a fulfilling personal life. In other words, real artists discuss real concerns whenever the opportunity presents itself. (This is the beauty of artist retreats or arts and writers groups or simply spending time with like-minded friends — all of that flashy veneer is stripped away and we can dig deeper into subjects that really matter).

It may not be fashionable or hip to publicly own up to weaknesses or self-doubts; it may not be in keeping with the mainstream’s mythology of the inspired, confident artist, but it’s the reality. Why should there be a sense of shame surrounding these struggles when they’re something every artist experiences? Why in heaven’s name aren’t we discussing these topics with sincerity, openness, and intellectual vigor instead of suffering in isolation?

I blame the self-help industry and the touchy-feely, new age gurus who talk about process in terms of “the muse,” “the creative flame,” “the inner goddess” (no offense, but I personally find such a framework exclusive instead of inclusive, while also devoid of practical advice).

Professional artists understand that the best art emerges from good work habits, not from some elusive muse. As the painter Chuck Close once said:

Inspiration is for amateurs; the rest of us just show up and get to work. If you wait around for the clouds to part and a bolt of lightning to strike you in the brain, you are not going to make an awful lot of work. All the best ideas come out of the process; they come out of the work itself.

 

 

One of the most popular posts in Gwarlingo’s short history is a letter I posted from the artist Sol LeWitt to his friend Eva Hesse (shown above). Hesse was going through a creative crisis at the time of LeWitt’s letter. Here’s an excerpt:

Just stop thinking, worrying, looking over your shoulder wondering, doubting, fearing, hurting, hoping for some easy way out, struggling, grasping, confusing, itching, scratching, mumbling, bumbling, grumbling, humbling, stumbling, numbling, rumbling, gambling, tumbling, scumbling, scrambling, hitching, hatching, bitching, moaning, groaning, honing, boning, horse-shitting, hair-splitting, nit-picking, piss-trickling, nose sticking, ass-gouging, eyeball-poking, finger-pointing, alleyway-sneaking, long waiting, small stepping, evil-eyeing, back-scratching, searching, perching, besmirching, grinding, grinding, grinding away at yourself. Stop it and just DO!

…If you fear, make it work for you – draw & paint your fear and anxiety. And stop worrying about big, deep things such as “to decide on a purpose and way of life, a consistant [sic] approach to even some impossible end or even an imagined end.” You must practice being stupid, dumb, unthinking, empty. Then you will be able to DO!

Make the work. This is the phrase that the poet Walt Whitman posted above his writing desk. It’s so obvious, and yet it can be misery-making to accomplish. Whether we’re an emerging artist, a student, or an established professional, we all hit roadblocks in our creative work.

 

If only I was Banksy… (Photo © Nodge Lives via Flickr)

 

One of the central problems of starting, continuing, or finishing a project is that too many of us suffer from what I call “If-Only Syndrome:” If only____________, then I would ____________.

If only I didn’t have to work this terrible job, then I would have time to finish my documentary.

If only I could write like Nabokov, then I would have the guts to attempt a novel.

If only the carpet weren’t covered in cat hair, then I could concentrate on my play.

If only my health were better, then I would have the energy to go to art school.

If only I had more money, then I could afford to buy the new camera I need to start my next project.

If only my family weren’t so judgmental, then I would have the confidence to screw the status quo.

If only I had my own studio, then I would have the peace and quiet to compose.

If only I knew someone famous in the art world, then I would be featured in ArtForum.

You get the idea. (I’ll let you fill in your own blanks.)

One of the biggest problems with If-Only Syndrome is that it robs us of the present moment and all of the present’s potential. We aren’t thinking of the person or task in front of us. Instead, we’re allowing our mind to live in the future or past. Our mind and body are wasting precious time and energy stewing, time and energy that could be used for a better purpose (perhaps even to start the very project we’re talking ourselves out of tackling). Instead of focusing, we’re waiting: waiting for the perfect moment to act.

I have some bad news: there is no such thing as the perfect moment. The ideal conditions we’re waiting for are never going to happen. If we don’t stop worrying and waiting and start doing the thing that is most important to us today, we’ll never fulfill our full potential as artists.

 

One of Chuck Close’s earliest paintings. Chuck Close, Still Life, c. 1950. Oil on canvas board. (Photo courtesy of Chuck Close via Chuck Close: Life by Christopher Finch)

 

 

Chuck Close, Big Self-Portrait, 1968. Acrylic on canvas, 107 1/2 x 83 1/2″ (Photo courtesy of Pace Wildenstein, New York)

 

Artistic perfection is an illusion, a myth we impose on the successful artists we envy most. Artists don’t arrive into the world like some visionary Adam and Eve, fully formed and at their creative peak. Do you think Chuck Close began his art career by creating large-scale, highly memorable portraits? Was the first story Jane Austen wrote a masterpiece? God no. (Like many writers, Austen kept a few early unfinished novels “in the desk drawer,” including Lady Susan and The Watsons; Chuck Close’s earliest paintings were still lifes and landscapes).

Many artists destroy their early work out of embarrassment, an act that only perpetuates the notion that they were talented geniuses from the get-go. But this is rarely true. (The Mozarts and Picassos of the world are in short supply.)

When the acclaimed painter Agnes Martin first saw the mountains of Taos during a residency in New Mexico from 1946-1951, she was moved to capture the scene in representational paintings like this one…

 

Agnes Martin, Landscape-Taos, c. 1947. Watercolor on paper, 11 x 15 3/16″ (Photo courtesy The Harwood Museum of Art & the Jonson Gallery of the University Art Museum, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque)

 

“I used to paint mountains here in New Mexico and I thought my mountains looked like ant hills,” Martin wrote in “The Untroubled Mind.” Through the process of painting, Martin realized that a representational style couldn’t capture the essence of the New Mexico mountains as she experienced them. Martin was in touch with nature in a way that most people are oblivious to. She realized that what she was trying to convey in her art was not the mountain itself, but the feeling of transcendence she experienced when she saw the mountain. Here is Martin writing about her epiphany in ”The Untroubled Mind”:

I saw the plains driving out of New Mexico and I thought
the plain had it
just the plane
If you draw a diagonal, that’s loose at both ends
I don’t like circles — too expanding
When I draw horizontals
you see this big plane and you have certain feelings like
you’re expanding over the plane
Anything can be painted without representation
I don’t believe in influence
unless it’s you, yourself following your own track

Eventually, Martin would reject her early representational style for a minimalist approach — a unique and original style that would make her one of the most respected and famous artists in North America. Here is a New Mexico mountain as Agnes Martin imagined it in 1960…

 

Agnes Martin. Mountain, 1960. Ink and pencil on paper, 9 3/8 x 11 7/8″ (24 x 30.2 cm). Ruth Vollmer Bequest. © 2012 Estate of Agnes Martin / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York (Click to Enlarge)

 
I have great respect for artists who include their earliest works in presentations and catalogs because it tells the whole story about how their art evolved, not a carefully edited version. To see the entire arc of a career is especially important for students. Young artists need to understand that being a professional artist is a process that unfolds over time and that there is no way to get there without going through the painful phase of producing crap. The awful first drafts, the embarrassing early paintings, the horrible first songs are a fact of life. The gap between good taste and skill can only be closed through the process of making more work, painful or embarrassing as it may be.

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Grace Paley: “Write What Will Stop Your Breath If You Don’t Write”

December 11, 2011 in Process, Words with 2 Comments

Hallie Zens, age 9, writes a message on the blackboard at the Thetford Community Center during a letter writing session held in memory of writer Grace Paley on her birthday. Paley lived in Thetford, Vermont, and in New York City. She died in 2007 at age 84 at her home in Thetford. (Photo by Jason Johns courtesy the Valley News)

Today is the birthday of writer Grace Paley.

Although Paley’s writing output was modest during her 84 years — some four dozen stories in three volumes: The Little Disturbances of Man (Doubleday, 1959); Enormous Changes at the Last Minute (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1974); and Later the Same Day (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1985)–she was a finalist for both the Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award, and continues to have a devoted following today.

In a 1992 interview with The Paris Review, the magazine made this observation about her brevity in both her fiction and in her conversation:

Occasionally she will admit that, though it is “not nice” of her to say so, she believes that she can accomplish as much in a few stories as her longer-winded colleagues do in a novel. And she points out that she has had many other important things to do with her time, such as raising children and participating in politics. “Art,” she explains, “is too long, and life is too short.” Paley is noticeably unaffected by the pressures of mortality which drive most writers to publish…

The oft-noted Paley paradox is the contrast between her grandmotherly appearance and her no-schmaltz personality. Paley says only what is necessary. Ask her a yes-or-no question, and she will answer yes or no. Ask her a foolish question, and she will kindly but clearly convey her impatience. Talking with her, one develops the impression that she listens and speaks in two different, sometimes conflicting capacities. As a person she is tolerant and easygoing, as a user of words, merciless.

Grace Goodside grew up speaking Russian and Yiddish at her home in the Bronx–her parents immigrated to New York 17 years before she was born. Writing was only one of Paley’s jobs. As The Paris Review observes, she spent a lot of time in playgrounds when her children were young, was very active in the feminist and peace movements, and taught courses at City College, Columbia University, Syracuse University, and Sarah Lawrence College. She was also a co-founder of the Teachers & Writers Collaborative in New York in 1967.

Grace Paley (Photo Courtesy Dorothy Marder)

“Our idea,” Paley said at 1996 symposium on Educating the Imagination, ”was that children—by writing, by putting down words, by reading, by beginning to love literature, by the inventiveness of listening to one another—could begin to understand the world better and to make a better world for themselves. That always seemed to me such a natural idea that I’ve never understood why it took so much aggressiveness and so much time to get it started!”

Paley’s writing, which appeared in the latter-half of the timorous 50s, was radical for its time. As the New York Times noted in Paley’s obituary, “Ms. Paley was among the earliest American writers to explore the lives of women — mostly Jewish, mostly New Yorkers — in all their dailiness. She focused especially on single mothers, whose days were an exquisite mix of sexual yearning and pulverizing fatigue. In a sense, her work was about what happened to the women that Roth and Bellow and Malamud’s men had loved and left behind.”
 
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Sol LeWitt’s Advice to Eva Hesse: Don’t Worry About Cool, Make Your Own Uncool

November 25, 2011 in Images, Process with 4 Comments

 

Sol LeWitt, “Horizontal Brushstrokes (More or Less),” 2002. Gouache on paper, 22-3⁄8 x 22-3⁄8 inches (Photo courtesy Craig F. Starr Gallery. Art © 2011 The LeWitt Estate /Artists Rights Society, New York)

 

 

“Metronomic Irregularity I” by Eva Hesse, 1966. (Image courtesy the Brooklyn Museum. Art © 2011 The Estate of Eva Hesse)

 
Because I’m surrounded by artists in both my professional and personal life, people often ask me what insights I’ve gained into the creative process.

The unromantic truth is that being an artist in any field is hard work. Because artists need a lot of time alone in order to create, they wrestle with loneliness and insecurity. They face continual self-doubt, as well as the criticism of others. Many artists work with no financial safety net or healthcare. Those who do have some financial stability often work day jobs that drain precious time and energy from their creative work.

Even for artists who make a living from their art, there is the constant tug-of-war between the need to make new work, which requires quiet and solitude, and the need to promote, sell, and manage the business side of being an artist. And all of this must be done while paying the bills, nurturing friendships, family, and relationships, doing the chores, and getting the kids to school on time.

The challenges vary, but all working artists, regardless of their struggles and their financial or critical success, share one thing in common. They make art. They sit at their desks and write. They draw. They paint. They compose music. They shoot images. They perform. They create.

This is the single most important piece of advice I could give a young artist or anyone who is trying to realize a creative project. Do. Play. Explore. For a short time every day, forget about the chores, your personal goals, your email, your upcoming travel plans, and your career trajectory. Forget about what is appropriate or fashionable–about what your mother, friends, or the public will think of your work.
 

Artist Eva Hesse in her studio

 
In a recent interview with The Atlantic, painter Chuck Close describes how “everything comes out of the work itself—every idea comes out of something you’re already doing.” Doing is a key word here. The act of creating, of showing up at the desk or in the studio each day is critical.

Making space and time to create without interruption is difficult but essential. Our competitive culture rarely rewards stillness and imagination. From childhood, we are programmed to stop day dreaming and told to be constructive and busy instead.

But great art can come only from deep, focused attention–attention combined with the discipline of doing. In order to make our best work, “doing” must take place in a favorable environment–one that allows us to block extraneous interruptions and calm our own mental chatter.

Doing is particularly hard for artists who are in the beginning stages of their creative field. As Ira Glass has explained, there is often a gap between taste and skill when starting out. We aspire to become artists because we love great music, paintings, or books. But there is often a gulf between our aspirations and our skills. Overcome by self-doubt and indecision, many beginners quit at this stage. But artists who have the nerve to push through this awkward, uncomfortable phase evolve and eventually improve. Over time, they find their own unique style, the right medium, and a routine that makes original art possible.

 

Artist Sol LeWitt

 
Artist Sol LeWitt understood fear and the importance of doingbetter than anyone.

In 1960 he met Eva Hesse, and the two artists formed a decade-long friendship. As Stephanie Buhmann details, “despite superficial disparities (LeWitt’s oeuvre is usually thought of as idea-driven while Hesse’s works reflect the opposite: intimacy, personal gesture, and physical sensuality),” the two artists shared a lot in common. “While Hesse drew inspiration from Minimalist aesthetics and the conceptual clarity that characterized LeWitt’s work, LeWitt respected Hesse’s devotion to the trace of the human hand in art.”

 

A detail of LeWitt’s letter to Hesse (Image courtesy the Art21 Blog)

 

The wonderful letters, photographs, and postcards in the Hesse archive demonstrate the depth of the friendship between Hesse and LeWitt. Many of their artworks were dedicated to each other and bear the poignant inscriptions “for Eva,” “for Sol.”

Earlier this year, Veronica Roberts curated an excellent exhibition titled Eva Hesse and Sol LeWitt at the Craig F. Starr Gallery in New York. The show investigated the creative dialogue and camaraderie between these two talented individuals.

As Roberts showed, art was the centerpiece in both of their lives, but for Hesse, self-doubt was a persistent challenge. In 1965, when Hesse found herself in a difficult creative place after a year in Germany, LeWitt wrote his friend a long letter of encouragement:

Just stop thinking, worrying, looking over your shoulder wondering, doubting, fearing, hurting, hoping for some easy way out, struggling, grasping,…Stop it and just DO!…

Don’t worry about cool, make your own uncool. Make your own, your own world. If you fear, make it work for you – draw & paint your fear and anxiety…

You must practice being stupid, dumb, unthinking, empty. Then you will be able to DO!…

Try to do some BAD work – the worst you can think of and see what happens but mainly relax and let everything go to hell – you are not responsible for the world – you are only responsible for your work – so DO IT. And don’t think that your work has to conform to any preconceived form, idea or flavor. It can be anything you want it to be…

I know that you (or anyone) can only work so much and the rest of the time you are left with your thoughts. But when you work or before your work you have to empty you [sic] mind and concentrate on what you are doing. After you do something it is done and that’s that. After a while you can see some are better than others but also you can see what direction you are going. I’m sure you know all that. You also must know that you don’t have to justify your work – not even to yourself.

This is some of the best advice about overcoming a creative block that I’ve ever encountered.

 

Eva Hesse circa 1959 (Photo by Stephen Korbet)

 

 

 

Eva Hesse, Untitled, 1969. Gouache, watercolor, silver and bronze paint on paper 21-3⁄4 x 17-1⁄4 inches (Image courtesy Craig F. Starr Gallery website. Art © 2011 The Estate of Eva Hesse. Courtesy Hauser & Wirth)

 

The close friendship between Hesse and LeWitt suggests another essential ingredient for a healthy creative life. For an artist, quality community can be just as important as quality solitude. Being a writer, painter, performer, composer, filmmaker, etc. is hard enough without the burden of isolation.

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MacArthur Fellow Anna Schuleit & the Whole Sweep of Trying

May 31, 2011 in Creative Spaces, Images, Process, Spaces with 7 Comments

 

For the public installation "Bloom" Anna Schuleit and a team of volunteers filled the Massachusetts Mental Health Center with 28,000 blooming flowers and 5,600 square feet of lush, green sod, including corridors, stairwells, offices and even a swimming pool. (Photo by Anna Schuleit courtesy This is Colossal)

 

 

Anna Schuleit's studio is located in a renovated mill building in the historic town of Harrisville, New Hampshire. (Photo by Michelle Aldredge)

Welcome to the first installment of “Creative Spaces,” a regular Gwarlingo series that will focus on the creative habits and work spaces of visual artists, writers, musicians, filmmakers, and other talented individuals.

I’m so pleased to kick off the series with an intimate profile of visual artist and MacArthur recipient Anna Schuleit.

Anna graciously agreed to talk with me about her daily work habits, studio space, recent projects, and much more. She also gave me permission to photograph her studio in exceptional detail, granting me access not only to her works in progress, but also to many of her sketches, personal collections, notes, and books.

Such generosity is in keeping with Anna’s personality. She is curious, playful, open-minded, intelligent, and exudes a positive, contagious energy. But forget the stereotypes of flighty creative geniuses (a word that makes most MacArthur fellows squirm). Anna is as deep and introspective as she is energetic and outgoing.

Born in Mainz, Germany, and raised in a family of artists, Anna came to the US at 16 as a high school student. She went on to study painting at RISD and creative writing at Dartmouth.

 

Visual artist Anna Schuleit (Photo by John Solem)

 

 

"Bloom" by Anna Schuleit (Photo courtesy Anna Schuleit)

Anna’s early, large-scale installations included Habeas Corpus (2000), in which she brought the crumbling Northampton State Hospital to life with the music of J.S. Bach, and Bloom (2003), where she filled the Massachusetts Mental Health Center with 28,000 blooming flowers and 5,600 square feet of lush, green sod. In 2007 she created Landlines–a public art project commemorating the centennial anniversary of The MacDowell Colony.

In 2009 Anna’s paintings and drawings were exhibited at the Coleman Burke Gallery in New York City. In 2010 she completed Just a Rumor, a large painting commission at UMass Amherst, as well as a painted set-design for Ivy Baldwin Dance at the Chocolate Factory Theater in New York. Her work has been praised for its “conceptual clarity, compassion, and beauty.”

Anna has been a visiting artist and lecturer at MIT, Brown, Smith, RISD, The New School, Bowdoin, and other institutions. Residency programs have been an important cornerstone to her artistic development. She has been a fellow at The Blue Mountain Center, The MacDowell Colony, Bogliasco, Yaddo, and the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Studies at Harvard, among others. In 2006 Anna was awarded the prestigious MacArthur Fellowship.

(Photo by Michelle Aldredge)

The following interview and photo shoot took place in the early spring of 2011 in the small, rural town of Harrisville, New Hampshire, where Anna’s studio is currently located. On the morning I arrived at the studio, Anna’s dog Finnegan was relaxing on the couch and Steve Reich’s “Music for 18 Musicians” was playing on the stereo. When I commented on this musical choice, Anna explained that she begins every work day in the studio by listening to Steve Reich’s “Drumming“ and “Music for 18 Musicians.”

 

Michelle Aldredge: Anna, what is your typical routine? Do you have any rituals that are important to your creative work?

Anna Schuleit: When I wake up in the morning I first go outside with my dog to check on the weather and the overall feel of the day. That’s the very first thing, going outside. Then a walk or run in the woods, then breakfast. And then off to the studio for the rest of the day.

Once there, I usually continue working on what I was doing the night before–a series of works, never just a single piece. If I stay long enough in the studio, just stay with the work even if it doesn’t feel great or seem satisfying or directional or conclusive, if I just stay to tend and garden, then my mind gradually yields control to the more automatic labor of painting, and with that comes a sweet spot in the process further down, a worn groove, a sense of ease.

"If I stay long enough in the studio, just stay with the work even if it doesn't feel great or seem satisfying or directional or conclusive, if I just stay to tend and garden, then my mind gradually yields control to the more automatic labor of painting, and with that comes a sweet spot in the process further down, a worn groove, a sense of ease." (Photo by Michelle Aldredge)

That’s a bit elusive and hard to describe, and it doesn’t really depend on any rituals other than, well…presence. Just staying with it allows it to open up. The same is true for any creative task, no?

I listen to music while I work, usually abstract things. But I also enjoy the quiet, sounds from elsewhere–birds. I eat simple meals, more lunch than dinner, and I read the news when I can, or make phone calls, or run quick errands, but usually I’m in the studio for long stretches of sameness: mixing paint, looking at paintings, drawing, looking more, painting, mixing more paint, drinking some tea, looking more. And so on. Just maintaining a presence. And I do enjoy this more than I can adequately express.

By the time I leave the studio at night I often feel deeply connected to my work, and I have to tear myself away like a kid from a playground. The process feeds itself, somehow, and I get to be a part of it, which is the best and simplest, and most tumbling and humbling feeling I know.

"By the time I leave the studio at night I often feel deeply connected to my work, and I have to tear myself away like a kid from a playground." (Photo by Michelle Aldredge)

What do you do when you hit a roadblock or get stuck on a certain piece?

For the past six years I’ve been working in series: multiple panels of drawings and paintings that help prevent the formation of serious roadblocks by creating a multitude of views of the same thing. That means there are multiple options spread out across more than a single pictorial plane, side-by-side, which means repetition, which in turn, means a built-in possibility for continuation.

I try to keep going at the speed each particular piece seems to require naturally, some slow, some fast. Slow for me means more than a month, and I actually have several works in that category right now, large paintings on linen. They just seem to need more time to remain “open” while I keep them around, keep looking without specific expectations other than to stay engaged.

"Ultimately, this is what I repeat most often to myself: avoid tip-toeing around, Anna. Stay. Go deeper. DON'T LEAVE." (Photo by Michelle Aldredge)

When I do get stuck and nothing moves forward for several days I will take a snapshot of the painting and enlarge it at a copy shop onto a large piece of paper, which I bring back to the studio with me. I cut the copy apart, paint on top of it, and use it as an impermanent collage. It gets me back into the work through a back-door and lets me see the colors and the composition differently, which can be crucial to getting unstuck again. But that kind of roadblock is ultimately part of the piece like all the rest, a sort of necessary detour.

"The different parts of the studio help me to keep moving, like stations along a road." (Photo by Michelle Aldredge)

I love the combination of intense creative energy and controlled order in your studio. Can you explain how your studio is organized?

My studio is one large space subdivided into several parts: paintings on the walls, drawings and prints on tables in the middle, paints and inks and dry media and other tools in-between, and books and papers on the fringes. The different parts of the studio help me to keep moving, like stations along a road.

"Good advice is really anything that keeps you afloat via a sense of shared struggle. Good advice is the kind that tugs at your heart a little, since it addresses something you know you need help with, be it focus, authenticity, endurance, fearlessness, etc." (Photo by Michelle Aldredge)

Things are in flux though; it’s definitely not overly neat, nor is it too tidy. But it’s not chaos either. It’s a good, medium kind of state with room for dried paint and dust and empty bottles and clothes and traces of use. And there are large, handsome industrial windows overlooking a row of trees. Oh, and lots of lamps and spotlights, since I work at night, too. Working at night makes all the other things that aren’t part of the paintings fall away, adding contrast and saturation and a kind of temporary authority in the composition that the next day supersedes again.

"Now I'm switching over to found shoes and old wheels and pulleys--just ordinary things that are lovely and precious in small, unexpected ways when held and handled." (Photo by Michelle Aldredge)

Are there any objects in your studio that have special meaning to you?

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