Artistic Vision

Some of the heaviest comments made in a critique are the ones that are not said.  I remember experiencing such a critique my first year in graduate school.  I had been feeling pretty confident about the work I was showing, since I had spent dozens of hours cloistered in my studio, boiling all the elements down to their essential state. In fact, I couldn’t imagine any other work that I should be making.  But the instructor I had made an appointment with was not so much looking at my work as he was looking past it.  To the blank wall.  Behind it.  He was being very quiet, and he had a slight twist in his facial expression, like he was experiencing a small stomach cramp.  He seemed like he needed help getting the conversational ball rolling, so I started to list some of the decisions that had lead me to making the paintings that were hanging right in front of the blank wall. I told him about my choice of media, how the colors came together, and why I felt that this imagery fit me so well.  He interrupted my laundry list, and asked, “Have you ever had an artistic vision?”  The hanging, implied comment, of course, was “…Cause this sure ain’t one!”  I meekly responded, “Well, what do you mean?” But I was knocked off guard, and my ears were buzzing, so I have no memory of the rest of the conversation.  Consequently, I have had to come up with my own answers about this business of artistic vision:

·        I cannot make or plan an artistic vision.  There is no magic combination of media, concept, and motivation that will lead to revelation.  Not even when you are in grad school.   And you have a critique deadline.

·        Though I have had many high school students ask, I have never relied on illicit substances to tap into my creative subconscious.  Drugs do not make you see the world more creatively.  They just make you dumb enough to perceive some things as art; Pink Floyd laser light shows, Jim Morrison’s lyrics, tattoos designed by your buddy…

·        Though not as exciting as drugs, there are certain alchemical ingredients that, when properly combined, can create the conditions under which brain waves are generated.  They include (but are not limited to):

o       slow meals in large groups

o       road trips

o       relaxed and rambley conversations with my wife

o       playing with my three year old son

o       long walks with my ten year old daughter

o       making almost anything with my seven year old daughter

o       competing fiercely at any sport with my twelve year old son

o       giving open-ended instructions to a classroom full of teenagers and standing back to watch what happens

o       washing a warm and sudsy sink load of dirty dishes by hand at the end of a long day

In other words, artistic visions are not made in the studio.  Objects are made in the studio.

·        Not only is inspiration more difficult to predict than the weather, it is often difficult for me to recognize at first.  Great art does not begin with lightening bolts.  It is more like a fog that slowly envelops me, clouding my thoughts with a haze that just will not lift.

·        A sure sign that I am in the throws of a meaningful creative problem is insomnia. I am not content to just “put it away” for the night, but will continue entertaining possibilities, like trying to fit puzzle pieces into places that they almost fit.

·        Eventually, artistic vision builds to compulsion.  Just like the nervous tick that will not let some people leave a room without flipping a light switch repeatedly, my twitching fingers can develop a phantom-ache as I imagine the physical manipulation of materials.  And then when I do get my hands busy with studio work, a lot of time might pass before I even consider how strange it is to be, say, wrapping cinder blocks in packing tape…and scabs of dried paint…two hours past bedtime…

So, in the end, an abstract vision leads to concrete objects.  And those objects will be critiqued.  The best measure of any artwork is not just whether it catches your attention on the blank wall.  The best work somehow transcends itself and makes you start dreaming about more that must be made.

 See my work at kevinpkellyart.artspan.com

Leverage

It is tax time, and budget balancing time, and as a public school teacher, I’m also thinking about contract negotiation time.  This all coincides with the dreary months of January and February. So, in Kansas, I can wake up in the cold dawn, grab the newspaper out of my wet gutter, and read about how very little our elected state officials value my career as an artist or my career as an educator.  I can turn the page, and in my pre-caffeinated fog, I can read about how the school board will need to stop action on voter approved fine arts facilities that were promised to my school after they canceled the last voter approved fine arts facilities that were promised to my school just a few years before.  In the frosty and bleak morning, I can also read about how the district is forecasting salaries for next year that are still frozen from three years ago, even as the national and world pages predict soaring fuel and food prices.  I'll admit that sometimes, as I sit in my dimly lit breakfast nook, rubbing my face and trying to make sense of it all, I'll wonder aloud "How did I get here?"

My life has evolved from decisions that, at the time, felt like natural choices based on my world view.  But, “natural” is a funny word. In Darwinian terms, it can bring to mind images of a society that preys upon my existence, clawing and chewing on my benign efforts.  For example, I pursue an art career because I believe in dialoguing creatively with my surroundings.  CHOMP! Creative dialogue is abolished; it is a luxury we cannot afford.  I teach in order to bring opportunities into the lives of young people. SLASH! I have to provide more and more to my students with fewer and fewer resources.  I am married and have a family because I met my soul mate and because we knew we could be great parents.  CRUNCH!  What if I do not earn enough money to bring opportunities into the lives of my own children?  In the natural world, the friendly little altruistic fish is always swallowed by the larger, more market driven fish.

In desperate times like these, idealist such as myself are left with very few beams of light to warm ourselves in, so we turn to the only source of artificial light and heat that we can find: Inspirational quotes! Tom Brokaw has been bouncing around in my mind a lot lately.  Well, okay, I’ll admit it, I do not watch televised news, and I have not read any of his books.  But I did once read this quote from Mr. Brokaw: “It's easy to make a buck. It's a lot tougher to make a difference.”  This is the magic of an inspirational quote.  Even removed from the context of his life and work, I can bask in the light of this little proverb and draw some strength from it’s relevance to the here and now.

And it is relevant, here and now.  Why struggle with making a difference, and not just focus on making a buck?  My best answer is not a witty quote, but another analogy.  You see, when I think about making shallow, short term changes to the world, it reminds me of trying to move against a great force with a short lever.  You may feel like you are in closer proximity to the problems at hand, but your efforts are pretty much futile, and you can effect very little change.  But if you work against large forces with greater leverage, like intelligence, and compassion, and creativity, real movement can happen, even when you feel as though you are operating far out in the periphery.  And, at least, the view from the periphery is more interesting than the shallow view.

 Please visit my work at kevinpkellyart.artspan.com

SAP Not Sappy

One of my strongest sources of joy and heartache in teaching high school art is a class called Special Art Production.  It sounds like art for special needs students mixed with factory work, but it is actually just an independent study class for art students who have already taken several art classes and are ready to try their hand at developing their own art projects.  Of course I tell my special art production students- or SAP students as I usually call them- that their job is to work me out of a job.  “Mr. Kelly will not be your art teacher after this class, so you will need to know how to make these choices for yourself, and I want to see you feel confident about making art in the future.”  I tell them this, then I hover around them to make knowing glances at “good” decisions, or to furrow my brow and nod slowly at their work, or, when I can’t help myself, to jab questions at them.  This was my mode of operation the other day when I was working with a student that I will call Mary.  Mary is eighteen, a senior, and she would be a 4.0 student, if not for the interruptions in her education.  When I worked with Mary last year as a drawing and painting teacher, I noticed her talent, smarts, and great work ethic right away.  And then days would go by where she would not show for class.  She finally shared with me that her older brother had been battling cancer off and on for sometime.  When she was absent, she was staying home to get him to appointments and to care for him.  She eventually dropped out of school for a semester to work full time to pay for Chemo treatments- her family had lost health insurance- and returned when her brother had died.  So now, Mary is just starting this process of planning and making “independent” high school art.  She has started with a photo composite project that is heavily influenced by David Hockney.  This is okay with me, really.  Copying the process of an established artist is a great way for young art students to get their feet wet.  They may not be swimming yet, but whatever.  Mary started by laying a full sheet of mat board on the table, opened a photo envelope from Wal-Mart, and without any gluing yet, she started to piece together a composition.  Before too long, I was hovering enough to notice her holding two photos with a frustrated expression on her face.  Her very horizontal composition was running up against the edges of the mat board, and she could not fit these two photos in that she really wanted to use.  I could hold it in no longer.  “Mary, what are you doing?!”  I caught my breath and continued, “First, you laid out this mat board.  Right away you are letting the company who made this mat board this size decide how your project will look.  Second, you let Wal-Mart decide that all of your pictures would be 4”X6” rectangles.  Did you make a rule for yourself that you could not cut the photos?  Did you make the conscience decision that they had to stay rectangles?  Why not lay everything out on the table the way you want and then figure out how to mount them.”  I was a little worried by the shocked expression on Mary’s face, but then a look of recognition came to her.  How long had it been since she felt in charge of her decisions?  How long had she been in survival mode, just doing what it takes to get by?  Sure, she has been told for quite a while that she is artistically talented, but how far has that gotten her with life pushing her around so much.  Has she ever really pushed back?

I do not really know how much Mary has thought about this day in class, but I have been thinking about it a lot.  As artists we hear that art is about expression, or that art is about beauty, or that art is about some spiritual connection.  No wonder artist statements can sound so loopy, flowery, or foggy.  In the end, art is about making decisions.  It is about controlling some part of a chaotic or oppressive world.  We need projects that physically remind us that we have a will, that we can exercise it.  I thought about that episode in SAP class this morning as I was convincing myself that it was worth rolling out of bed early.  I had to get to my studio and get to work.

Please visit my work at kevinpkellyart.artspan.com