No matter how you cut it being an artist isn't easy as you have your Ego and Id on the line. Every piece you complete you have your level of comfort in the final result somewhere between a failed mess and elements of what you believe to be your personal best masterpiece.
Regardless of how you feel you have to be prepared for the reactions or lack thereof by the viewer.
Around the campfire the other night we were talking about the stupid things that comes out of peoples mouths. I remembered a quote, attributed to Mark Twain that went something along the lines of "It is better to remain silent and thought a fool than to speak up and remove all doubt". Art critics need to learn that one, and until then I'll continue to work on a thicker skin. Anyone one into assisting me with this project in self flagellation?
On that note, damn the critics and full speed ahead. I am exploring several avenues of late, most are in the impressionistic vein. Wonder what Freud would have to say about that...A trained photographer deconstructing reality and reconstructing into a new image of the world and new set of emotions in the process. Better than a heavy dose of SSRI and cheaper than an hour on the couch - simply reinvent the world around you.
The good thing is that on occasions you get invitations to join new galleries where you least expect it. A new group sculptur.com saw my recent nomination as artist of the month at the electronic cottage arts site and invited me to join them after they viewed my work there. (I really need to update the site and soon as I have a lot more and different stuff up to show). So there you go, validation is good, especially when it means you can drop your guard a bit and do what you love doing!
A few of the images I worked on today were just that - reinventing what I saw and pushing the envelope on how I present what I saw. To be truthful the trip to Bodie wound up being about shooting with the intent to breakdown and reassemble the final image.
One of the images was a dusty old bowl of buttons in a window. I flashed back to being a little kid visiting my Grandma Jasovec's house in the woods outside of Ely, Minnesota. On a windowsill in her kitchen she had a jar of buttons where loose ones were tossed in the event she needed one. Amazing how one image on the other side of the country can make you flash back to one from when you were a kid (even more amazing was the trivial thing it brought back into focus).
Another building I spent a lot of time on was the old Bodie church. You can tell it was a church, but now its shell is there, the stained glass windows removed and the hole boarded in, the cross missing from the steeple. Hollow.
Anyway enjoy the images "buttons and basin" and "Bodie Church"
