What it means to be an artist.

Recently someone accused me of being an artist. How dare they!? Then I began to realize like many things in life you can only be something by definition of having been what you are. Nothing highly sciencey about that -- the Government "recognizes" this method all the time.... How do you become a Non-profit organization for example? You act like one, you walk like one you talk like one, and then after a while they are willing to recognize that you are one.

So I guess I am guilty of being an artist, but let me tell you why I wasn't sure I was....

Many years ago in a pubescent land of pimply tweens, I was sitting in a mandatory Art class in Middle school, where I was told by the School art teacher that I sucked at art and I shouldn't bother trying. That seriously hurt. I realized years later exactly what the opinion of this teacher was worth when after driving a hour from the school to a park to have our Senior class photos taken..... and after driving back to school this same art teacher realized there was no film in the camera.....and she had wasted all of our time for nothing. For modern reference this would be like taking all the photos and then realizing there was no memory in your phone and your photos never saved.

I went on a 14 day cruise on the world's (then) largest cruise ship, and one of the other kindly cruisers offered to meet with anyone who was interested every morning in the main dining room to learn to decorate paper with watercolors. On the first day she taught us some basics of the media, and let us just play with water and color. Every day after that she would have a sample that she would walk us through. That first day of the cruise water color class I sat wondering why I was bothering as I could hear the voice of that filmless, clueless middle school art teacher echoing from my water glass.... that I sucked and shouldn't bother trying. Then staring at my water glass... I started to paint a picture of that red solo cup, holding the grey water soiled by the residue of the colors washed out of the brushes of my fellow water color decorating cruisers.

There was something beautiful and thematic about decorating cardstock with watercolors while on the world's largest cruise ship riding across the ocean.

After day 3, as I was painting, I noticed people glancing on my paper seeming to care what was showing up there, I noticed that people stared to ask how I was doing what I was doing..... now that's really just the blind leading the blind... but the teacher here wasn't a jerk, she encouraged me by coming by day 5, day 6, asking what I was doing.

I guess I may be okay at that.... It is very relaxing and fun, but it's hard to find time to do art, and when you make the time to sit down and actually paint there is this entropy that takes some amount of effort to push over, and a need for some sort of inspiration. Further, often times, I have realized that while I may not be able to realistically paint any thing, sometimes the results are more desirable when I don't try to hard to make it look real, and like that first Red solo cup, that came out well when I wasn't really trying, the acidic advice of my nasty art teacher mellowed like the dirty color stained water in the glass and became a bit of a truth... I shouldn't bother "trying", I should just do. I've watched more proficient artists (that are actually "good" at it) over think things and take something they started and looked good and not know when to stop....and as a result destroy their own art (from my point of view....) Paint or water color don't have an "undo" feature like the computer has, so it's like watching a tragedy.

So when I was Accused of being an artist, I realized I might be one, but I just can't see my self spending the rest of my life painting the same image again and again and again like I have seen for sale at some art auctions.... how tedious that must be. So some day someone may find my art, like my early author attempts, trapped, imprisoned, either at some Second hand store, or in the landfill after someone tosses my work after I have shuffled off this mortal coil.... either way at least I bothered to capture those images unlike my feckless middle school art teacher who forgot to put the media in the camera and wasted away the lives of others.