“Punch-In” and Paint

I think this will be more than one blog post by the time I am through with the subject. I might not even do it in sequence. This week I am going to talk a little about the problems professional artists face when they cannot emotionally connect to their work.

Before I start though I want to thank everyone for their patience. I was very sick last week and did not get a chance to write my post. I am doing much better this week and my doctors are working to figure out what’s up. I am not going to discuss it at length but I have an inherited auto-immune problem that at times causes problems for me. Sometimes those things snowball and I have to be careful. This situation is actually why I do not travel to do shows unless it is a very special occasion or I am being asked to speak or give a one off special class.

I also want to thank the shocking large number of people who are coming to the site and who are reading my post. I am honored you are taking the time and I invite you to send me emails with any questions or subjects you might wish for me to discuss.

Back on topic now.

I diverted from the initial post I planned for the week to this one in part because I got sick last week. Recently I have gone through a terrible and long down time in my painting. In fact many of my creative pursuits have suffered. Some of the issues it turns out had their origin in treatments I have been taking for my illness. Some of the problem has been the terrible stress my family and I have gone through as a result of our move to Fort Payne. Although Ginger and I grew up coming to the mountains outside Fort Payne, namely to Mentone, we have found the Fort Payne community to be a difficult fit for our family.

The result has been my struggling to set aside every day life and connect to my work the way I have been able to most of my life. I have a great place to paint with a huge wall size window beside my easel. There is a fig tree, flower gardens and other beautiful trees and plants right in front of my eyes. Not to mention being able to see the top edges of Lookout Mountain rising above the horizon. Yet I am finding it very hard to keep my brush in my hand and my mind focused on my work.

Now I have mentioned before that there is a black and white difference between creating something that is art and creating something thing that is craft or technical execution. It is the Artist vs. Artisan reality that is so often ignored for PC feel good reasons in the modern world. So often you will hear the advice “Just sit down and work. You have to make yourself work. You must treat it as a job.” Now in many ways those sentiments have value and are true. Sometimes artists are horrible procrastinators. Being an artist means being your own boss and its pretty easy to ask the boss for an extra hour here or there. Before you know it you have goofed for a day or even many days. Working to discipline yourself around a schedule and reminding yourself to just start are all good things. I am particularly guilty of the big “P” and need reminding.

However, this is not what I am talking about. I am talking about when you as an artist sit down to work, or truly desperately want to but you are not connecting to your piece at all. You can sit, or stand, and go through the motions. Technically you are painting correctly. You are successfully creating the image or piece that is the subject of the work. It all looks like the right thing and maybe someone who did not know better might not even notice the difference. Maybe only you notice the difference. The problem is that you are not connecting with the work. That transcendent state never occurs and the reality is that you are just producing a technical reproduction of your style. Often not even a good one because you are creating something new and there is no template so creatively you are in the dark. Knowing what color should go where to create the correct feel and balance is not the same thing as painting that color because you “know” where it should be and exactly how much is enough and how little is too little.

Those of you who are creative artists out there know exactly what I mean. It is the difference between speaking a language with an accent and speaking it with perfect diction and clarity. In both cases you might be able to communicate the basic idea you intend but in the former your listener will always be distracted or having to concentrate to insure they get the correct message. In the latter it is only the message. So it is with art work. As an artist you might be able to plow your way through paintings but what you create is generally confused and derivative. Keep on doing this and you will run the risk of becoming like a great football player who plays through injury over and over until he is no longer a great football player but just a football player who plays injured. Collectors pay thousands of dollars for our works and I am of the opinion they should get our artwork not a craft project version of our artwork. The moment you have lost that emotional other worldly connection to your work is the moment you begin executing technique alone.

Perhaps if you still are not quite getting my distinction between execution technically and execution technically while guided by artistic connection you will recognize this analogy to painting.

A painting executed when the artist cannot establish that creative connection is very very similar to playing music technically perfect but lacking emotional input from the musician. Many musicians can play a piece of music absolutely perfectly. Every note is perfect. Everyone knows exactly what the music is and no technical fault can be assigned to the musician. However a truly great musician cannot only execute technically perfect but they connect emotionally and artistically to the music. Maybe they hold a note just a fraction longer or add the perfect flourish in the perfect place for exactly that one performance. Who knows exactly what or what combination does it but the musician who is an artist transcends technical perfection and as a result of that extra connection they become the artist and not just the artisan.

Here is the rub for the professional artist. Although I am sure you know exactly where I am going with this I will spell it out none the less. If you are working solely as an artist and must therefore pay your bills, support your family and all the other demands life makes on all people you must produce works that can be sold. What happens to you when those times come that you cannot connect to your work. Maybe it is just the stress of life, maybe you have been sick or are taking a medication that effects your artistic empathy. Whatever the case may be, you know that you are doing less than you are capable of or, even worse, you are frozen in front of a blank or partially painted canvas completely befuddled by what to do next.

So what do you do? Bills have to be paid. Maybe a client or patron has commissioned to purchase your next work. Do you take the path of the hard worker and simply get that painting done even if you know it is not representative of your work as an artist? Are you cheating yourself and your patron by producing something that not only falls short of being artwork but ultimately devalues the artwork that came before? Is it unreasonable for the world to expect day in and day out production? Is it really any different from the salaried professional or attorney who has a bad day but still draws their paycheck or bills for their hours?

If you think I have an answer for this dilemma served up at the end of this post I hate to disappoint you. The answer is I do not. I simply know this is a HUGE problem that we as artists do not always address but should attempt to. The problem is not just an ethical one but also a practical one that can directly influence not only the financial value of our life's work but far more importantly the value and legitimacy of what our work communicates.

In the second half of this post I will discuss the practical aspects of dealing with painting when nothing is coming naturally.

-STUCKEY-

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