march2009

John Smith

Thoughts From My Studio
March 2009

Words and Affirmations

I tend to think that one can walk around saying positive things and making affirmations till the cows come home without anything happening, but believe that you can talk yourself ‘up’ or ‘down’ without really being aware of it, if you are passionate about what you are saying.
This is nothing new and I would be the last person to claim this concept as my own; and yet I see it happening all the time and must confess to a personal weakness in this area too.

An all too common occurrence in my art classes is of students admonishing themselves for being ‘stupid’, ‘non creative’, ‘out of it’, ‘only a hobby’ and yet are passionate about ‘making masterpieces’ without practicing, and the only passion is ‘desperate to sell’ but then showing little enthusiasm when it comes to being competitive and going that extra mile.
I personally do not have a problem with studying and practicing, and I love reading and finding out, and learning ways to give myself a competitive edge, but do confess to falling into that negative affirmation trap. Typical is, “Darn this is a lot of junk!”, “I just can’t paint today” or “I’m painting like a beginner!” Why do I do that, and equally as important is why do YOU do that? Possibly the difference here is that I recognise myself doing it and so take control, but if one does not appreciate that you are digging a hole for yourself by those utterances, then there is a problem.

In watching a DVD of the American artist Richard Schmid painting outside for an audience, and then later in his studio, the thing that really struck me was how he ‘talks himself ‘up’ all the time. He says things like “How about that brush stroke..Isn’t that just something?” or “Just a little dab here…just perfect!” “Look at that - a beauty” He never says “Darn look at this mess” or “Tsk, now I’ve messed the whole thing up!”
Do you recognise saying one or the other?
Ingrid my very positive wife, recently brought home a DVD by a watercolourist. Not quite in the same league as Richard Schmid, but what impressed me was that she talked herself ‘up’ through all the difficult bits. The paintings were competent but not mind blowing, but the DVD was so darn elevating and inspiring I felt I needed to grab for my water colour box!

I know that in my art classes the thing that I hear most of all, are people saying “I can’t do this” and "I can’t do that" or “I am making a mess of this whole thing I think I must try something else”. In so many cases the utterances are negative and I’m sad to say that in the cases where this is most apparent they are seldom disappointed…they do end up with messes and they are continually frustrated. I do believe that even if things are difficult, and art IS difficult, and is all about solving problems, and then if all artists used positive affirmations and talked themselves through those problems they would find they are far better than they think they are, and would get a great deal more satisfaction from their endeavours.

Someone sent me a little e-mail in which a Native American was saying to his grandchildren that within all of us there are two wolves.
One is mean and aggressive
The other kind, positive and so on …they are continually at war with one another.
The kids asked which one wins?
The old man said “The one you feed the most!”

Pretty much what I’ve been trying to get across!

In my two previous articles, those being January and February 2009, I have discussed the subject of “Embracing the quest for Excellence” as opposed to accepting mediocrity. There are various views about this but one must be careful not to become embroiled in semantics, and when all is said and done, we DO know ‘right from wrong,’ or if we are doing well or not, and we have a pretty good sense of what is acceptable or isn’t. Despite what the ‘experts’ say, we as humans would not have progressed the way we have in all fields if we did not have that instinct. Obviously we become better able to pronounce on the detail with experience, but I do really believe that in spite of all the brainwashing we endure, there is still a deep down “sense of knowing.”

We are Cybernetic creatures, and so for most of us life is a quest of selecting and then aiming for some known or even unknown targets. We veer this way and that and follow dead ends, but even so with all sorts of manipulations we get ever closer to the bulls-eye. That is unless we give up or are persuaded that our targets are not the right ones and we buy into that. (How many people have spent an unhappy and often even miserable life buying into parents' dreams for us, or that of some misguided teacher?)

Deep down inside we know even subconsciously which are the right targets, but we will never find that target or possibly the bulls–eye if we talk ourselves out of it. I believe this applies to everyone and not only artists. Is art not a microcosm of life though?

I’m going to try and talk my way to those goals with passion, I hope you are too.

Till next month....