preconceived notions

By -

I'm always relearning things when I make art... probably because I haven't fully learned it in the first place. 
I know that you aren't supposed to compare your work to other work, and yet I do it anyway. 

I know I need to stop having a preconceived notion of how I want a painting or drawing to look and yet I do it anyway. 

These are probably the hardest things to learn in the art world...and also the hardest things to learn in life as well. Take preconceived notions for example, a lot of the times there's things I expect out of an experience, things I expect out of my future, my choices, my desires, my day to day life... time and time again the world will yield something different from what I expected - of course it isn't always a bad thing. Just like how I would expect a work of art to turn out one way and maybe see it turn out better than I hoped... or worse than I hoped. The problem is when I waste a lot of energy trying to pin down what I want from something. The energy, no matter how insignificant, will always be a waste. Because I really cannot know what to expect of something until that something is right in front of me. Only then can I examine it, learn from it, enjoy it...
That isn't saying I shouldn't have goals or desires... it's saying I shouldn't have rigid expectations for those goals and desires. It's not about being disappointed so much as it's about being able to see things for what they are, embracing unpredictability and realizing things you may have otherwise never noticed. 
The clearest example is illustrated through my desire to be an artist (full circle woah). I make presumptions about what being an artist even means, and before I arrive at an answer I come to a stopping point - where once again I'm shown another facet of questioning and an angle of truth that was previously hidden. So maybe I'll never know but I think I can begin to get comfortable with that...
And this comfort should carry over to my work as well - putting an end to how I think things should look and how I think they should be looked at. It's a hard lesson to learn - unpredictability - but perhaps it's also a place for new ideas to breed. 


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

I posted this without a title :P

By -
I've been sitting here with a blank post open for a few days, trying to think of a story to tell to make my life sound interesting.  I mean, here I am, 3,000 miles away from my hometown. In the last month, I've been through 3 national parks, like 10 states (? I can't even keep track anymore), 4 different time zones.... It's insane. And yet, I try to write something about what I'm up to, and all that comes to mind is how snuggly my cat is.   I'm ridiculous, I know. Anyway, you've all heard plenty about my trek west and seen all the pictures. That's not so much what my life is about these days although that would be ideal in the future.  Right now, life is a hot cup of ginger tea and video games. It's overcast skies, with crows swooping past my windows. It's endless rainstorms, with the cat purring in my lap. It's watching the leaves change to vibrant oranges and reds, and fall from the trees, floating gently to the ground like raindro
Read more

why i mostly write/speak in lowercase

By -
hello. i know this will drive some (if not all) of you crazy, but bear with me. i have reasoning behind why "i" is no longer "I". you'd think, as an english major, i would rigidly follow the rules of language and grammar. and, of course, when writing academically, i do. college requires formalities. however, when it comes to my personal expression on social media, i've been using capital letters less and less. why, you ask? well, it's just one of the many ways my spiritual life has bled into my writing. basically, i believe capital letters should be reserved for the most important or sacred concepts/feelings/beings (Love, Spirit, God, etc.) (that being said, there are always exceptions, even to this belief - usually for the sake of aesthetic when presenting my work to others, as i mentioned.) to me, "i" is an ego statement, something that this body and brain says in this life. it's a lower level of consciousness, one that's li
Read more