It’s Important to Get Help From Your Friends!
I’ve been delaying blog posts for a couple of weeks while waiting on announcements of things that could happen.
One thing did come to be:
Another did not.
I applied for an artist’s grant to help me grow my exposure as an artist by providing financial support to purchase supplies. Somehow panelists who reviewed the grant did not equate creating new work to get in front of new audiences as artist growth. I failed to communicate the importance of audience growth to keep artists financially solvent. It is a given throughout the creative process, that new learning (artistic growth) will happen as each new work is developed. That led me to think more cautiously about how to present myself as an artist to future grant panelists.
Abstraction is a new direction for me as a painter. I did not have a previous following as an artist. I put more effort into writing and promoting books. My artist dabbling was a side hobby. That’s how I thought about it. After 30+ years as a graphic designer, I learned to not take my creative work too seriously. Any client was likely to overlook my best work, favoring some other direction. I wasn’t invested in the projects. It was work I did that I enjoyed. Books were my passion.
But then, in 2021, that all changed. I still love working on books and promoting books and talking about my books, but my artistic practice changed. I began to explore abstraction as a legitimate expression of myself as a visual artist. I fell into the most wonderful creative space that matched my inner view of experience. Interestingly, this work, the work I align with myself only, is the work that is getting attention. Again, I’m new to this and there are few art lovers who know about me as a painter. Because of that, I am not yet, self-sustaining. I need outside financial help to create more work to put in front of more people – art lovers, art collectors, art galleries, art exhibits & shows.
I recently had two thought provoking conversations about my art. As I prepare new grant applications, I have to keep in mind that understanding how the art is received, responded to by others, matters. I have to show how the work not only activates new learning for me as the artist, but also what the art has to offer a larger audience.
Grant application instructions can be confusing. I needed help to work through what my art is, where I think it’s going, and how that fits with the application criteria.
What would a five-year project look like? Hard to say if artistic growth is a factor and the project is more than a one-piece, pre-designed visual.
Do I want to commit to create one vision when I’m full of so many ideas? I don’t know. Maybe.
Is this the time for me to focus on a project (sounds like client work to me) versus letting the creative juices flow and form as they will? Maybe I can do both. Ah!
Wish me luck as I move forward. And please plan to visit my solo exhibit at the Watermark Art Center in Bemidji this spring and summer.
See you next time. Thanks for reading.