Michael Gormley Editorial Director of American Artist writes:
You Are An
Artist
How do you know if you are an artist? Most
children give their imaginations free reign, drawing and painting their wildest
dreams with selfless abandon. Unlike most grown-ups, who put aside their art
materials to pursue more “serious” activities, artists keep at it, committed to
preserving a childlike wonder with the world and a deep desire to express that
wonder. That’s how you know you are an artist—you need to create as much as you
need to breathe. The world calls this art, but really you’re just doing what
comes naturally.
*******************
Yolanda Martin
(editing attribution BetteLou Tobin)
What is Michael
Gormley saying?
Isn’t there more to being an artist than the uncontrollable impulse to create? As we mature we learn to think that unless we can create what is judged to be good art by others then we stop creating, or else we must work and learn to improve our art so that we can continue creating art, but still seeking approval from others as validation that we are artists so as to continue to enjoy doing what gives us so much pleasure.
Too often, the professional artists building their reputations in the art community emerge, separate, and distance themselves from other nonprofessional artists, those who with childlike wonder simply enjoy creating art and expressing themselves emotively, with originality and sensitivity resonating with the subject being communicated. The artists, whose priorities and motives are to make a living from their art, create art with underlying emphases that their work must be sold, should never feel more important or better than the artists creating art solely for the pleasure, health, and happiness they get in the art making process.
Art is, for the majority of artists in the world, an enjoyable, quality ’me’ time, leisure pursuit, not a laborious, competitive business enterprise fraught with details of marketing and commercial economics trying to obtain revenue from the art created.
You are an artist simply because as a human being you were born with a need to discover, to experience, and to communicate your perceptions and life interactions, sharing those with others, affirming your realities and your existence through your own original creations. You are an individual worthy of enhanced positive self concept obtained through your personally chosen artistic endeavors. You should judge your art by your own standards, and not those of others who would discourage you perhaps only to better themselves by suppressing your individuality and personal worth.
The world is advanced by those who create, not by those who conform. You are an artist who can create what no other artist can create because you, and you alone, have a right to be you, the right to express your unique individuality. You are not a rubber stamp of another’s thought constructs about you. No one should be allowed to oppress and suppress your abilities and potential.
Build on your strengths, improve your weaknesses, and create love and positive energies around you because you are an Artist!
Isn’t there more to being an artist than the uncontrollable impulse to create? As we mature we learn to think that unless we can create what is judged to be good art by others then we stop creating, or else we must work and learn to improve our art so that we can continue creating art, but still seeking approval from others as validation that we are artists so as to continue to enjoy doing what gives us so much pleasure.
Too often, the professional artists building their reputations in the art community emerge, separate, and distance themselves from other nonprofessional artists, those who with childlike wonder simply enjoy creating art and expressing themselves emotively, with originality and sensitivity resonating with the subject being communicated. The artists, whose priorities and motives are to make a living from their art, create art with underlying emphases that their work must be sold, should never feel more important or better than the artists creating art solely for the pleasure, health, and happiness they get in the art making process.
Art is, for the majority of artists in the world, an enjoyable, quality ’me’ time, leisure pursuit, not a laborious, competitive business enterprise fraught with details of marketing and commercial economics trying to obtain revenue from the art created.
You are an artist simply because as a human being you were born with a need to discover, to experience, and to communicate your perceptions and life interactions, sharing those with others, affirming your realities and your existence through your own original creations. You are an individual worthy of enhanced positive self concept obtained through your personally chosen artistic endeavors. You should judge your art by your own standards, and not those of others who would discourage you perhaps only to better themselves by suppressing your individuality and personal worth.
The world is advanced by those who create, not by those who conform. You are an artist who can create what no other artist can create because you, and you alone, have a right to be you, the right to express your unique individuality. You are not a rubber stamp of another’s thought constructs about you. No one should be allowed to oppress and suppress your abilities and potential.
Build on your strengths, improve your weaknesses, and create love and positive energies around you because you are an Artist!
