Friday, February 6, 2009

Being An Artist...(copy)

(This is actually a copy of a post I put into my General Blog on 27 January, 2007...but I am copying it here as I believe it is a good thing to post in my Artist Blog the reason I am an Artist in the first place. I will blog about my drawings in my next entry ~ to catch it all up!)
Someone once asked me when I knew I wanted to become an artist. I thought to myself, 'that's kind of a strange question...I have always been an artist, I never really became one.'
Oh, I know what she meant! She was really just asking 'Was there ever a defining moment in your life when you thought to yourself, this is what I want to do, this is what I want to be!'??
And, granted, when I was three years old my skills were a far cry from what they may be now...I don't mean to sound boastful, that's not it at all...it's just that I have been practicing my drawing since I was three, and I am now, after many years of hard work trying to get it right, fifty-six. So for over a half of a century, I have been practicing!
Every artist will tell you that it takes him or her a lifetime to 'get it right'...even the likes of a Marc Chagall or a Claude Monet (quotes below) were the first to admit that they had not achieved the perfection they sought ~ they were merely practicing!
My muse is forever turned on. It follows in my head throughout my day, where ever I may go, what ever I may be doing, I cannot turn it off. I have visions in my head, in my dreams at night, all the time...what I want to draw. Flights of fancy turn my imagination to a field of delight.
The simple sight of a wildflower at the side of the walkway brings to my mind dancing faeries, their music wafting into my mind like so many coral bells...and I long to put it on paper.
I see snowstorms in my head and I want to capture the sparkle of crystal icicles hanging from the branches of trees like Nature's necklaces.
I take a ride on a carousel, in some long-forgotten memory, and I imagine how I would decorate it ~ cover it in flowers? drape it in filigree? or maybe dress it with fine laces, posing the head thrown back, and ride off to...where?
And you see? That's just it!...wherever I want to go!
To me, that is what it means to be an artist. I can take a pencil and paper, and draw my own imagined world.
I have done many, many portraits, both for hire and for fun. I have been published, more than once, from newsletter publications, to yearbooks, to coloring books. My drawings are 'out there'...and I would not give back one moment of all the time it took me to achieve that!
I have dreams of being published again. I want to keep drawing portraits, both for hire and for fun. I want to give people the pleasure from my work that it gives me to produce it.
I do not do this because I seek any kind of glory for myself. I don't care if anyone pays me a compliment again for the rest of my life.
I do it because I love doing it.
I want my imagination to take others to places in their minds that mine has taken me. Whether it be a memory of their children's younger days, or a trip on a carousel to some far-away place. I want to show them that we are not bound to this everyday world if we don't want to be.
I have been a dreamer all my life. My own mother used to tell me I was always living in the clouds...and I have never come down!
And this, this dreaming, this wondering, this imagining, this beautiful creative place where God has sent me ~ I will want to stay here for the rest of my days.
And that, to me, is why I am an artist!

'Art is the unceasing effort to complete with the beauty of flowers ~ and never succeeding...' ~ Marc Chagall.
'I am following Nature without being able to grasp her...' ~ Claude Monet.

3 comments:

Telesia said...

Dear Jenny,
how interesting to read your journey as an artist, and the development of your God given talent! Of course, God gives the talent, and it goes without saying that it up to us as individuals to realise this talent - you seem to have done this and made others happy or enriched their in the process. God bless you for it!

I have a question for you - I am nearly 60 now, I have a 'little' bit of talent i.e. I can draw but I would never call myself an artist. The little talent that God has given me has not been developed; is it too late to begin?

Gail

*~JennD.'J.M.J.'~* said...

hi Gail ~ I don't believe it's ever too late to "begin" lol...you have probably been on your own journey all your life, right? ;)
I am now 58 years old, am not the so-called "famous" Artist that my family used to think I would one day become, but that isn't important to me. The main thing is that I have never stopped enjoying what I do, others have gotten pleasure from it, and one day when I come face to Face with God, I can honestly tell Him that I have loved every minute of it! xo
In this month's issue of The Artist's Magazine, there is an entire article devoted to others like you who are just now (early 60s, even into their 70s) finding their way as Artists! Just look at Grandma Moses & Georgia O'Keefe!!! ~ to name but two...
I say, go for it! :)

Telesia said...

Hello Jen,

thank you so much for this encouragement - I will take your advice.

Gail