The other evening at dinner, I remarked to Tom, “Well, today I really felt like an artist.” He gave me his “I-don’t-know-where-this-is-going-but-I’m-willing-to-follow-you-there” look & waited for me to continue.
Here’s what I explained: During my studio session that afternoon, I had experimented, observed, documented, jettisoned, recommenced & practiced, all the while enjoying the thrill of discovery & a blissful freedom from expectations. I had entered the studio at 1 PM with an idea, a willingness to explore it & a bit of trepidation; at 5 PM I departed with a pleasing sense of accomplishment, a clear trajectory for my project & happy anticipation for my next painting session. In short, I had engaged in typical, felicitous, art-making behaviors.
This was all noteworthy because lately I’ve been feeling rather too workmanlike – or whatever the female equivalent is – behind my easel. Maybe this is because I’ve been mostly using the same medium for the last decade. Over time, as skills increase, the proficiency bar gets raised higher & higher. Eventually, a quest for breathtaking technique can inadvertently supersede a project’s raison d’être & become an end in itself, an implacable goal to be achieved at any cost. Life in the studio then becomes much less felicitous & rather all too tedious, or at least it did in my case.
Fortunately I found a remedy: It was to become a sort of flâneur – or whatever the female equivalent is – in my own studio. Flâneurs are, most popularly, figures in 19thC. French literature who spend their time strolling the streets of Paris. More than mere idlers, though, they observe closely, delighting in & analyzing all they see & it’s specifically this quality of “detached engagement” that served me so well the other day: Instead of holding on to preconceived, joy-sapping goals, I was able to freely move about, so to speak, riding the wave of new-found creative energy, regardless of where it took me. And where it took me, plain & simple, was straight back to my passion for making art.
If life behind the brush or in front of the easel ever becomes plodding & dull again, I will summon up the metaphor of the 19th C. flâneur & roam freely along the streets of my creativity once more.
(This blog is dedicated to Charles Baudelaire.)