I’ve been in full experimentation mode over here at studio sunshine (which is how I’ve been referring to my art space lately). It has been weird and surprising and fun and freeing and motivated by death.
Stay with me, I promise this isn’t depressing.
I told myself this was the year of experimentation, of making with no intention of selling. And that has just opened up all sorts of ideas in my head, new mediums and themes and colors.
I’m using canvas for one, after years of only using paper because I didn’t like the way the paint looked and felt on canvas. (turns out that problem is easily solved just by applying gesso which I was too lazy to do in the past).
And jewelry! I made jewelry years ago and stopped because it wasn’t feeding me creatively and yet I find myself back at it with all sorts of ideas brewing.
Then clay. Polymer clay is a completely new medium to me and one I’ve found so compelling because it takes my ideas into 3-D territory.
The idea of dimensionality is showing up in other ways as well, like adding fake greenery and flowers (along with clay elements) to a painted canvas base which is ticking off all sorts of creative boxes as I combine styles, mediums and colors.
Now back to death.
Allowing myself to make art with no end goal in mind was the permission slip I didn’t know I needed to unlock all sorts of creative ideas that have been so fulfilling and joyful.
The idea of permission is something I’ve bumped up against before. When I first started running and then trail running, I found myself feeling like I couldn’t sign up for a race or shouldn’t go run on a trail because I wasn’t a ‘real’ runner. That these activities were only for people who had permission to do so, who had passed some sort of test, came to the forefront of my mind strongly enough for me to pause and wonder where that notion-one that was strong enough to keep me from doing an activity-came from. I’d never received that message in my home, never told I couldn’t do something because of *insert random criteria here*.
I think it’s a societal thing, an undercurrent dragging at women specifically and so ingrained in many of our brains that we aren’t even conscious of it. I feel lucky that I was so compelled by activity that I was forced to face this idea that had probably been informing my opinions of my capabilities for years.
I was surprised (read: annoyed) that this notion of permission had still been stewing in me enough to limit how I created. I thought I’d dealt with this already.
So I’m re-iterating what I’ve learned in hopes that if you also have placed gates around yourself that you feel some unbinding and freedom as well:
You can do whatever you want. There’s no gate keepers around most anything you desire to try (a few exceptions exist-learning how to fly a plane comes to mind) and no one can tell you you can’t do it (except the plane thing). If some idea pops in your mind and makes you happy, just go do it. Knitting, learning a language, make a piece of art, going on a yoga retreat. It may look weird. You may even end up disliking it. And you know what happens then? Nothing. You don’t get a bad grade and there’s no score card being checked. You can just go do or make or be something else and keep doing that over and over as you find more and more bits of joy for your heart.
Because it ends someday. And I’ll be g*ddamned if I look back on my life and realize the reason it didn’t have more joy or beauty or art or connection wasn’t because of lack of opportunity or resources but because I stopped myself from the experiences.
Here’s to life. Here’s to joy. Here’s to freedom.
Here’s to YOU.
all my love-
Brandi