Dear Artist,
I’ll have to explain myself. Many years ago I took a course in Transcendental Meditation (TM), and since then I’ve painted a few paintings (FP). The idea of combining the two has been sitting cross-legged between my ears ever since.
One of my early problems with TM was forgetting my mantra. Sorry to say I often had to phone my guru Ralph. One day I decided to customize what Ralph taught so it was more “me.” It seemed that any mantra worked as long as it had lots of “m’s” in it. About the same time, I was discovering that humming while painting seemed to help. Humming is loaded with “m’s”.
Studies of “flow” and “the zone” have been done using all stripes of artists. This is where the artist gets into a relaxed, intuitive state somewhere deep down in the lizard brain and the good stuff rains down like ripe pomegranates. Tired of rotten apples, I was curious about these concepts as well.
So here’s what I figure you have to do. Try to set aside several hours in a quiet, restful and uncluttered environment. You don’t have to sit on the floor. Squeeze out the sacred colours in advance so you can get right into the mind-set. Relax. Get centered. Think pleasant thoughts. Size up the job. Get started. The idea is to start seeing and feeling your work not as a product of effort but as an exercise in languid play. The brush slows down and feelings of contentment pervade. You need to trust your instincts and allow the automatic stuff to happen. Feel like a deep-forest green? Dip into it.
TM claims twenty minutes twice a day gets you “a silent reservoir of energy, creativity and intelligence.” If you do what I suggest you’ll also dip into that reservoir. Part of TM involves attention to your breathing. In my system, you pay attention to your brush. Follow its movement from palette to canvas and back again. Be mesmerized by the energy emanating from its tip. Let your brush put down those strokes directly and then watch it leave those strokes alone.
Feelings of discontent and misery float away. Time flies. Things go best if you have a fair amount of technique under your belt. Memories and motifs simply reconstruct, purify and manifest themselves. A blithe, spiritual confidence penetrates the artist’s soul and all becomes right with the world. Like a lot of TM, the system is really quite practical.
Best regards,
Robert
PS: “See the job. Do the job. Stay out of misery.” (Maharishi Mahesh Yogi)
Esoterica: One of my main problems has been my inability to levitate. I was never able to actually lift myself off and float around in front of my easel. Maybe it has something to do with the technical demands of art. But I think I know what those born-again meditators are talking about. When you finally get into the zone and accomplish something above average, it feels like levitation.
Stressed out by music
by Maggie Sloan, CA, USA
“Flute player study”
watercolour painting
by Maggie Sloan
I have discovered that I work best in complete silence. The other night I was in a watercolour class where they were playing loud, fast music (good music, I might add), and I found that I could not paint at all. The music filled that floaty part of my brain where I normally find images, and I felt like I could not hear the paint, or the way it spoke to the water and paper. Instead of finishing the evening feeling relaxed and tired, I went home feeling stressed and exhausted.
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Ten thousand hours
by Mary Mac
I was in Starbucks one day and I saw this man reading The Outcasts. Since I was looking for a good book to read, I asked him what it was about, and he mentioned ten thousand hours. When I was growing up, my parents always said, “If you want to get good at it, you have to practice ten thousand hours.” They often said that when I was working on my piano, guitar or violin. Since my parents never paid for art lessons, they never said that for visual arts.
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Re-centering with yoga
by Cathy Harville, Gambrills, MD, USA
“Saving the Dunes”
acrylic painting,24 x 30 inches
by Cathy Harville
I recently took up yoga, a very easy version, as a gentle way to unblock my energy, and loosen up. The gentle and restorative positions and breathing have made a tremendous difference in my work. I am more relaxed, and don’t get the tight shoulders from leaning over my easel. My body feels more open. The alternate nostril breathing has an amazing way of re-centering me, and my brain. I find I can paint for long periods of time, focusing on the process, rather than the finished product. I allow the painting to become itself, rather than forcing it to become what I may have envisioned.
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The zone — a real place
by Gena Lacoste, Medicine Hat, AB, Canada
“Pantaloons and petticoats”
watercolour painting
by Gena Lacoste
I teach workshops and I like to talk to my students about “the zone.” It’s a real place and it’s real important! If you’re going to do truly inspired work, you need to get there as often and as quickly as possible. I do about an hour of Yoga every morning. That way, my mind is already centered and my body is not whining and griping because it’s stiff or sore somewhere. Instrumental music (words pull you out of the zone) is a must. Pick what works for you. I used to have trouble getting into the zone because my left brain thinks it’s an artist too, but a few minutes of totally focused contour drawing sends it scuttling and I go sailing off into The Zone. What a sublime and wondrous place to be. Total contentment is the hallmark, and time collapses. When I’m done I emerge as if from a coma, and have no idea how the painting got painted, but there it is before me! As I continue to paint over the years, it’s easier and easier to access this place, and I can drop in and out of it as needed, but it truly is best if you have a whole day stretching ahead of you with nothing on the schedule BUT your painting. Sigh. Truly, Bliss is the best word to describe it and it’s probably the best reward of all for persisting in being an artist.
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Humming while into painting
by Annika Farmer, Mentor, OH, USA
“Look out below”
watercolour painting
by Annika Farmer
Great suggestion, to slow down and get more centered, before we start that new project.
Years ago, I also did the transcendental meditation but, as schedules and life in general changed, that part of my daily routine went away. But I never forgot my mantra; in fact, I even catch myself sort of humming it when I really get into my painting, especially my abstract work. Also, your suggestion to meditate before we start would most likely make the whole process more clear, and relaxing. In fact, I am sure it would for me, if I was working on a commission or realistic work, because that can often be stressful.
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Colour theory — walking proof
by Dyan Law, Pipersville, PA, USA
“Fleur”
graphite and white pastel
painting by Dyan Law
After several hours of painting late into the morning, I arose from “the zone” and walked across my yard returning home from my studio. Suddenly I saw colours as I had never seen them before. I seemed to be witnessing numerous psychedelic auras being emitted from the trees, grass — even my own hands! No, it wasn’t paint, nor some eclipse, nor was I drinking or drugging! Even the local colours were more vivid and clear. I thought to myself, “I must be totally exhausted or I’m dreaming.” And I was living the dream in technicolour, no less! I’ve meditated for many years yet never had I experienced such splendor. If one stares at a vivid red or green mark for a long period of time we can actually see that colour and shape elsewhere; a simple colour theory. After spending concentrated time with my multicoloured brushes and canvas, I’m walking proof that this colour theory works in “real-painting time!” I’m quite certain I’m not the only artist out there who has witnessed this phenomenon. Perhaps, after long hours of applying those “sacred colours,” we actually BECOME our very own painting!
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Use all the senses
by Linda Blazonis, Lisbon, ME, USA
“Wild flower”
original painting
by Linda Blazonis
One of the great things about plein air painting is the spiritual meditation before and during the session: arrive at destination, hopefully weather precludes rain; set up to paint; sit and imbibe the gifts of all senses, bring them to the highest point of life: look and see, see again, and look at the sky for sure. Enjoy the light and nuances of colour, while using your ears to hear the good earth’s sounds, and feel those blades of grass beneath you. If you are at seaside, be sure to smell the salty sea in all its mellowness. Use all the senses. Breathe. Breathe slowly and deeply. Breathe in your surroundings. When calm and saturated with the true reality of your “spot,” then begin to put pencil to paper and brush to canvas. It is a spiritual experience of the finest kind.
Painting is meditating
by Alan Feltus, Assisi, Italy
“Awakenings”
oil painting, 32 x 40 inches
by Alan Feltus
I have long believed that painting is meditation. I never wanted to take time to sit still and attempt to eliminate every passing thought from my mind in meditation — there are already too few hours in a day to do the things I do. I spend hours and hours sitting alone in my studio, painting. What happens between eye, mind and hand in the act of painting has to be at least as productive as sitting motionless with not a thought in one’s mind. Much of the time, when painting, my brush is on automatic in some way. But what I see as I paint also directs what is kept and what is changed. And things move along. Maybe all of us who create something from nothing in our work are meditating all we need and those whose work is not making paintings or composing music or writing poems and novels actually need to do something programmed to be able to balance things within.
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The crystal mandala
by Rita Bairstow
Many years ago I took courses in psychic and spiritual awareness, and one of the more advanced classes involved pretty much what you’ve written about. We were to meditate and focus on our own personal mandala, then draw and colour it, using pencil crayons. As I’m one of those people who insist I can’t draw, I was surprised when I ended up with a quite presentable crystal. This was a surprise to our leader for a different reason as she explained that mandalas usually appear in the form of a circle or circles, and mine was quite different from everyone else’s in the class. What was fascinating about it, and what made me want to share the story, is that I had borrowed a friend’s crystal to hold a couple of times during previous meditations, and when she saw the mandala I’d drawn, that friend exclaimed that it was exactly the crystal she’d wanted to draw but was disappointed because she hadn’t been able to picture it, so I gave her the drawing.
Visualization exercise
by Alfred Muma
Untitled
stained glass painting
by Alfred Muma
One step farther in the process of meditating, visualization on a blank white screen in your mind’s eye is also a good exercise. Visualize something really good that you want or desire (need) because it too really works. I don’t know how but it does. Hold the picture of your need for as long as you can. A few minutes every day will make your life much different. It could be the desire for world peace (ok that might be stretching it but it will help your own environment), finding a great art consultant, the means to overcome a challenge… anything. It really helps with the creative process because it is part of that process.
Personally trained teacher
by Marney Ward, Victoria, BC, Canada
“Essence of Rose”
original painting
by Marney Ward
Well, I am an artist who was trained personally by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi in the mid-seventies, to be a teacher of transcendental meditation. If you learned TM in Victoria or Vancouver in the mid-seventies, Robert, I could even have been your teacher, as I have instructed over 200 people to meditate. TM is a technique to take you, with relative ease, to a level of the mind we call transcendence, a level characterized by bliss, silent awareness and physical stillness. The breath slows down automatically; there is no focus on breathing, though that may be a part of other forms of meditation. The whole body metabolism slows down while the consciousness, though still, awakens to a heightened level of awareness. You don’t need a technique like TM to get to transcendental consciousness; it’s a natural state of mind we all have within us and we can get there spontaneously or via other techniques, though TM seems one of the simplest and most efficient techniques around. Once your brain has learned how, it becomes easier to dip into this level when doing enjoyable and settling activities, like painting. Some people are aware of this state in the moments just before they fall asleep. Many artists I know have told me that when they paint, they sometimes spontaneously reach a level where time seems to stand still, their awareness of colour, value and balance is heightened, their thinking becomes more spontaneously creative or intuitive, and there is an overall feeling of pleasure and contentment. This means they are functioning in a more refined level of consciousness, close to or actually in the state we call transcendental consciousness. Sometimes they say it’s as if the painting was painting itself and they were just watching it all happen.
Living creatively
by Pamela Ellis, Mission, BC, Canada
Untitled
original painting
by Pamela Ellis
This is the painting I know. In fact this is the only way that I will paint, draw… create. However I don’t specifically associate it with TM. It is simply a spiritual exercise that connects me with the source of creation. I can honestly say in doing this, the image that is produced does come from my hand but it does not come from “me.” After a few years of playing with this method, honing the process, I decided to teach it to others and have been doing so for a few years now. I am happy to say that it has connected well with all who have participated to this point. My workshop is called “The Art of Spiritual Painting” and can be found by visiting (http://KaizenInspiredLife.com) . I also use the techniques extensively in my creativity coaching practice, passing them on to my clients so that they may apply them in other forms of creative expression; music, writing, quilting, gardening, cooking — LIVING CREATIVELY. One thing that I have discovered through this journey is although it can be helpful to have some technical knowledge in your creative pursuit of choice, it is most definitely not necessary in the least. In fact, I have found that those who have no prior painting experience have been far more open to the process and have produced some amazing, spine-tingling works of art.
The most wonderful thing that I’ve discovered through this style of painting is that if done on a regular basis it absolutely and effectively plunges you deeply into the pure joy of the PROCESS rather than focusing strictly on PRODUCT which often can create paralyzing blocks. It also produces a feeling of connectedness that brings you fully into the present moment. The memory of this feeling can then be transferred into other areas of your life, opening the doors to the creative Spirit in everything that you do. What it boils down to for me is this: Our life is our greatest creation… our most amazing work of art… so why not do all that you can to make IT a masterpiece.
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On Fire original painting |
You may be interested to know that artists from every state in the USA, every province in Canada, and at least 115 countries worldwide have visited these pages since January 1, 2013.
That includes Eleanor Blair of Gainesville, Florida, USA, who wrote, “I’ve come up with a silent variation of a verbal meditation mantra. As I slowly breathe in and out, I visualize the colors in sequence as they move around the color wheel. So, breath in (see yellow in my mind’s eye), breath out, breath in (see yellow orange), breath out, breath in (see orange)…. well, you get the picture. After a few trips around the color wheel, my crisis du jour has faded away.”
And also Rosanne Licciardi of Raleigh, NC, USA, who wrote, “I was inducted in the ’70s into transcendental meditation where each of us was given our own private mantra. You know what I found out years later? We are all given the same mantra.”
And also Angela Treat Lyon of Hawaii, USA, who wrote, “I can see them now, all kindsa TA-Mers writing and saying, ‘O Great Guru of Painting, I wanna come live at your Artshram and bow at the foot of your easel!’ ”
Archived Comments
Enjoy the past comments below for Transartistic meditation…
Robert, if I had to wait until my environment was uncluttered, I would never paint.
Hmmm….
A hybrid of zen meditiation that I’ve practiced for a dozen years or more has changed me to the point that I’m able to focus sufficiently to paint. It allows me to be where I am, doing what I’m doing, and not have my mind wandering in unproductive territories. This is good stuff, and any of it that can be applied directly into the art process will, in my opinion, pay dividends. (On the other hand, the practice also allows me to have an opinion, but not be particularly invested in it qua opinion. The thing I know is that it has worked for me.)
The only way I’ve ever gotten into “the zone” is through a lot of drudgery and persistence long after I’d rather stop. Your way sounds a lot more pleasant. However, the best sketches and ideas come when I’m not trying to think of anything in particular. Then I have to do a lot of work and make a lot of mistakes to make them into paintings.
The world is too much with me late and soon…I used to easily enter a state of flow while working, immersed in the colors, movement, seeing, and time would pass unnoticed. I admit this happened in the chaos of an unruly studio, but was where I wanted to get myself. Over the years I have found that I can watch and see students in my classes lose themselves into the work and it is amazing to see the pace of the progress they make in their work.
My comfort in painting has come from finally developing enough discipline to work at it regularly. Being a natural procrastinator you have no idea how managing that flaw has brought me rest. As I have aged (sixty) I made up my mind the only way I was going to produce was to keep something on my easel (or two) at all times. Usually not all day, but at least several hours. I allow myself a few days leisure between paintings but return to work before I get distracted. I’m simply happier when I’m producing.
And let’s face it, if we wait on inspiration to pick up a brush we’d never get anything done. Disciplined work is the only thing that produces, whether it is art or daily exercise.
I zone out when the work is going particularly well, when what I am trying to achieve begins to take form. Sometimes I have the radio on in the background but I usually work in complete silence. Sound can be comforting to some but is distracting to me. The only music is the quiet tapping of my brush mixing paint on my palette or drawing the brush across the canvas. I apply another sense to the work – sound. My mind is free to concentrate on the painting. The important thing is to find what works for us as individuals.
…..for me I KISS…and thoroughly enjoy the process which instantly… well at least 5 or 10 minutes in… takes me to that blessed island of “the meditation of painting”…..guess its the MANY years of working at it.
Bob, I think you are somewhat confused on levitation – it is the VIEWER, not the artist who levitates. The artist is just the brush held in the hand of the Universe!! Happy painting….
For TM, the month you were born in determined your mantra — I was born in January so mine was “Iam”. I have found that power naps offer similar benefits. Like Popeye, “I am, what I am.”
Having visited over 50 gurus in about 18 trips to India I can assure you that none of the good ones, and maybe none of the ones I met, ever gave a rats ass about levitation. The primary issue was whether proximity to their person could energetically benefit me in such a way that I could truly see the unity of all. In that state of oneness there is no higher or lower, no interest in powers. However, as the state of consciousness comes back closer to the norm, such things become more interesting. And some great art can be made. Once the state of consciousness descends back closer to the level of the physical a grittier experience, like watching movies and eating gets more interesting.
Being an artist does include lots of dreaming, thinking, meditating, and being in love with art and in love with making art. If not true, the art might just as well be machine made, because it will be cold,sterile, and not unique. The subject doesn’t have to be extraordinary. It does have to mean something to the artist! For whatever reason, it has to capture the imagination.
I’m always attracted to color first, the variations in the color made
by light and dark next and then the balance of the lights, darks,
lines and shapes. I like things made of smaller things – it’s from my childhood, watching my mother make quilt after quilt!
So, I have emotional reactions to the colors, and to images made
up of lots of small shapes and colors. If I am unable to paint for some reason, I think about painting and what to try next! If I never picked up a paint brush again in my life, I would dream about painting and making art. Again, as ever, enjoyed your newsletter!
Thank you so much for this letter. You are speaking my language! I’ve been doing this for years and can testify that it works, at least for me. Work done by this method is nearly always successful and I am often surprised by what appears on the canvas. Frequently it seems as though it is not I who is doing the painting, but some other, higher force, while I merely hold the brush. Done this way creative work is never a chore but always an adventure in discovery.
An artist friend signed me up for these letters and I absolutely love them. Keep them coming!
The letter on TM was very exhilarating! I find your philosophies regarding painting helpful, especially for the Abstract Expressionistic approach I take with my work! Finding an uncluttered room, however, may be difficult! I am a collector of fintiklushki (Polish for “stuff”)! Also my apartment has multitudes of paintings leaning against the walls! To clear it all would mean to show, sell or move!
I think you got the point. You do not have to follow in anyone else’s footsteps when it comes to practicing anything, including meditation. Learning how someone else does it gives you an experience of the results you might be after and a method or methods of getting there.You can then take what you have learned and custom make it for yourself. I think I remember reading somewhere that ideally your life becomes a meditation and you no longer have to take the special time to sit in silence. I say do whatever works for you. Everything in life can be taken on as a creative project. Isn’t this what truly makes life an interesting journey? We are all here to make our own trails to the mountain top. Some of us follow a path already paved while others explore paths yet to be discovered. Viva la creativity!
this is all you have to do… sounds easy eh???
…is this a joke?
odd.
Just wanted to let you know that I love your Twice-Weekly Letters (TWL). They are so helpful and diverse. I thought today’s on Transartistic Meditation was especially great. Thank you for sharing your thoughts with all of us. By the way – good luck on the levitation.
You’ve out done yourself, Robert. Hilarious. Absolutely hilarious. I’m sending it to all my friends. After reading it aloud to myself at 3 am, I have seen the light, well, the porch light. It beats all. I’ve tried everything from reading Kafka while sitting in the middle of the street in the dead of night, to squeezing my eyeballs for inspiration. I, too, have never experience direct levitation, but I’m getting there, as Mose Allison sings.
I have enjoyed your missives for years. You’re my favorite Canadian. I can say that with ease. I have been with the Corner Gallery in Ukiah for two years and have now become Professional, with a check newly deposited for $12.75. But I haven’t actually promoted my work. Perhaps its that deep interior monologue: “no one wants to hear about it.”
I am kept alive by unrequited love no one has any idea about, not even the beloved. It’s really a Charlie Brown affair. Lunch on the bench, wistful, shoulder slumped, deeply spiritual sighs…we should all be so lucky.
I’m getting ready to go to India. I have always wanted to go, and since my mother is in her final months of virulent cancer that has been claiming her, bit by bit, cell by cell, for almost two years. My sisters and I are under lots of pressure with repeat hospitalizations and doctors swearing the end is nigh for all this time. They don’t know my mother, she does not go gently into the night; good bad or ugly, she rages against the light. Her feelings about benign entities, powers greater than oneself, freeing herself from the karma of the wheel or just plain TM have fallen on deaf ears.
My painting has slowed and I need to tap into the well of creation, the zone, the flow. This is the right time to go and recharge and get madly in love with color again. Ashes in the Ganges, a look up at the Himalayas, a visit to the holy city of Benares (Varanasi), a trip thru the backwaters of Kerala on a houseboat. I didn’t realize how much spirituality related to creativity, and how grief can derail the most dedicated painter. I’ll send missives from the road.
Spiritually questing the muse, I’ll settle for cowpatties and color,
You are so appreciated in the Portland Plein Air arena and beyond…………….I have considerable years in the field of of transcendental approach to creative process. I am now smiling because I see a full circle of marketing “lalafoofoo”. The basic pleasures of painting have not changed for thousands of years. We are simply overwhelmed currently by a plethora of egotistical-somewhat-educated-sudo-intellectuals who seem to think that what they “see” is “new” in the world of laying down a dollop of pigment. Now-now we know this is a smile. The timeless pleasure of laying color to a two-dimensional surface is a given.
A delightful detail of Einstein’s theories of quantum leaps………….painting is a yes, when understood as a communal expression of the Infinite!
Years ago I met a man who taught TM. I felt that this was something that would benefit me in art, so I took a mini course from him. As I practiced the methods of getting into the meditative state in which all of the daily “noise” slipped away and the quiet non-verbal zone surrounded me, I realized that I was in a very familiar place. I had been there many times while drawing. Drawing, the kind of drawing process that becomes a deep search for the visual relationships and thus non-verbal, ushers me into that state. The quiet descends, the awareness of time disappears, the “oneness” with the subject surrounds me, and my ability to think rational thoughts, speak and be conscious of anything else evaporates. I exit my visual cocoon after 20-30 minutes relaxed and happy. The whole process is exactly like TM only a drawing now exists that records the moment.
Thus drawing not only helps us re-discover the world, it helps us discover ourselves. Drawing in this way is also a great method for overcoming those blocks we experience in painting. Drawing stirs my passion for painting.
I dont usually send fan mail, but I want you to know that I love the information that you send out in your email newsletter, and I thank you so very much for sharing your thoughts with the rest of us.
I teach Tai Chi Chih, and also meditate. I have recently done several wall pieces of art (enamels on copper) for an upcoming exhibition that are influenced by the thinking processes of meditation and Tai Chi Chih. There is definitely something to using these methods to create art. It is changing my work, and it was fascinating to see something written about it. I look forward to your emails, because they speak to the creative self and are always refreshing.
I enjoyed reading it very much. I have enjoyed your work for many years, I lived in Nanaimo and Vancouver years ago and often saw it in the galleries there. I have used the TM technique and now that I am not working so much, am painting more. I enjoy your website and have read many of the letters. You are a very inspiring person and very positive.
Yes, I hum, too. I understand humming activates/strengthens the link between left and right sides of our brains. Whatever, it is calming and keeps me from getting anxious; then I slip into that zone where no anxiety lies and the paintings that come directly from the Idea Fairy without my interference are always the best of all.
I am levitating right now just from the ethereal forces generated by the huge grin on my face ! I don’t know how you manage to do all that you do, but keep up the great work !
I just need to vent.
I taught another class the other day and again I feel like I am taking their money under false pretenses – Not that I did not give them a lot of information, demonstration, one- on-one time, even hand holding, but . . .
I look at where they are starting and I tell them what I think is the most basic of information and from the glazed look on their faces, I realize that I am speaking a foreign language to them.
They don’t draw. They don’t know the first thing about making a
plan. They have not been observing shapes and movement out there in
the world.
They have been listening through a filter of preconception – of prepackaged images and in one short workshop there is no way to penetrate that.
For the most part they have waited too long to undertake the journey
they want to make – that is to attain a confidence and competency.
They have retired and decided to paint as they have always “wanted” to.
I demonstrate how the brush can be held in different ways to make different marks. I talk about color and thinking shape instead of representation, about value and the impact of well placed lights and darks.
They look like a deer in headlights.
They love to watch me demonstrate – vicariously painting the very painting I am rendering – poor as it is in this environment and I shrink inside when they praise it.
I am trying to hurry so they can get to their easels, but when the retreat there and paint, I have to call them back to demonstrate simply mixing colors.
What have they gained?
I ask them to do a preliminary drawing – to include – in a very simple way the dark shapes and light shapes. For them that could be a workshop in itself.
Transfer that to the paper once I have checked their drawing.
Then it begins and I walk from student to student – amazed with frustration churning in my gut – for what I cannot “spock-like” lay hands on them and impart.
What they want from me – I cannot give – 55 years of drawing and painting and seeing the world through my eyes – the excitement of translating like a puzzle the patterns of light and dark, form and shadow, positive and negative spaces.
I leave with their praise – them asking for another session, another time – and I feel embarrassed and a failure.
Maybe one will go home, paint and practice.
I tell them – you are your own best teacher! – spend time looking,
drawing, practice – no time spent with the paint and paper is wasted.
You WILL learn something – if only what NOT to do.
The demon on my shoulder wants to shout – “Why is art the one thing everyone thinks they should be able to do without any effort – any time spent practicing and mental activity. When you take a trip you get your map or set your GPS – you make a plan – you pack and get an
itinerary. You think I have spent all this time with these materials
mindlessly! That no effort was spent – look at my crooked arthritic little finger – the miles of paper it has traversed!”
“When can we get you back?” they ask.
Oh my. You cost me the days after the workshop in anguish for what
I can not give you.
They have paid me their money for what? Greed says, “good thing
they do not require a money back guarantee?” Shame on me.
At critique I try to point out the small successful spots of their painting. They, like beaming school children will take it home to put it in some mat and frame and some unfortunate relative will have it thrust with pride upon them, and I will be blamed for their effort.
“What did that teacher see that we do not?” the puzzled embarrassed
recipient asks as they put it in the closet. “If this is art –
then . . .”
And the cycle continues. I am helping create the ignorance and
misconceptions I abhor.
I think I will take your advice and learn to meditate.
I have taken on a left-handed experiment that has resulted in some surprising revelations – but that is another letter.
I’ve been getting your newsletter for the last few years and they have always been interesting and helpful, but this one today is undoubtedly the best one for me ever! Thank you so much. I call this “the last great high” because I once saw a film of a Japanese potter who was totally absorbed in the pot he was making – beats sex, drugs, rock and roll!
I like it transartistic meditation. I was inducted in the 70s into transcendental meditation where each of us was given our own private mantra. You know what I found out years later? We are all given the same mantra. Paint away :)
For Pamela Haddock: I have never heard this common frustration actually uttered before, let alone in such a poetic way. But take heart because there are a few who will catch the bug and dive in, beginning that long plow through the miles of paper and canvas. I always try to remember while teaching, that the product is not what is important -it is touching people’s lives with the gift of seeing their world through new eyes.
Sharon, you are so right — and Pamela you have no way of knowing how wonderfully you have affected these students’ lives! They will look at the world in a totally different way from now on. That is a gift of the highest order.
I have had the same feelings you have expressed — wondering why they keep paying me for weekly classes. I have some students that have been with me for almost ten years. I have a waiting list for my night class. So, I must be doing something right. Those long-time students are also taking workshops from other teachers, but they keep coming back to me for the weekly or twice-monthly class. I keep learning and they know I will be talking to them about what I am learning — therefore passing on that knowledge.
Some will go on to learn more and become quite good artists, some might even be exceptional. Those that do not every quite get it, will appreciate art more, and also the miles of practice they can now see it takes. My “mantra” has been for quite some time, “It’s the journey, not the destination.” The students are beginning to understand.
You can be proud that you are turning on some people to art, whether as an artist or an appreciator of art. Keep teaching!
TM, I don’t know, but the letter and all the commenters have caused me to levitate – due to amusement, the feeling of comradery and the magic cloak of abundant artsy talk!
P. Haddock, I can relate. It is a mystery why people think they can pick up a brush and become an instant artist. I’m not there yet and I’ve been trying since I was able to hold the brush – I’m 61! Most of them wouldn’t insult people in other occupations in this way. But, for some reason it seems everyone believes themselves capable of being an artist.
I have a friend who thought that about what I do. He attended my art shows and was complimentary, but also kept talking about trying this painting or that himself. After about two years, he came to me and said, “You are an artist.” I was confused and showed it in my face I guess, because he then said, “I thought I could do what you do. But I can’t. I appreciate your art more now.”
Maybe this will happen to your students. They will learn to appreciate art of others much more after trying to make it themselves!
People need to know there is something more to it than slapping paints on paper or canvas! A few people do have previously untapped talent, but many more don’t.
Another passion I have is decorating my home, and arranging things so life is easier, more efficient – get frustrated by being too poor to do what I’d really like but that’s beside the point! Back to my reason for bringing this up – I watch the home decorating TV stations. It makes me so aggravated when they copy art! They have no qualms about this, doing it on TV daily!!! Of course they do the same things about building and home decorating!
OK, thanks all for the conversation, insightful comments and thanks Robert ‘n’ crew for the chance to sound off!
I will put my money on the 10,000hours. TM, meditation etc is nice but give me a nice day, good light, good companionship and golden silence and I just might show you something.
While white noise or music helps many, to me it is distracting while I am painting or drawing. Even talking to my subject during a portrait session can be annoying when I’m trying to consentrate on where the light hits and what tone goes here or there. My 2 cents.
Repeat this mantra with growing speed whenever you feel blocked and I guarantee enlightenment will dawn …
Oh Whaaaaa
Ta Naaaaaa
Siammmmm
Like you, Maggie, I enjoy peace & quiet. Upon occasion, I turn on some soft music, but generally not. In this noisy world we live in, I think the vast majority are afraid of silence or to be alone with their own thoughts.