Tags
choice, Creation, Determination, Devotion, Dreams, Giving up, Healing, Imperfection, learning, Living Life, Starting Over, Strangeness of Life
When people walk into my room, they often comment on all my art on the wall. They don’t know how I believed I’d never make art like this.
I wear my world on my sleeve, so to speak. I remember hiding in the library at school, half the time I’d be reading stories or books about psychology or religion, the other half of the time I’d be drawing.
I almost failed GCSE art. I dropped out of Art A-level after a month.
I knew I loved making art, and yet I could barely pass the class.
For years I doubted my ability, lacking formal training, how could I really make art? How could I be an artist?!
And still I kept at it. In fits and starts, not so much an undeniable impulse but more like a slowly building pressure, only relieved by the soothing sound of colours stroking the page.
There is, simply, nothing like it.
Once I start, I never want the process to end at the same time as impatiently longing to see the finished picture.
I couldn’t jump through the hoops of formal training because, frankly, I just wanted to make art.
I dropped out of art class after a month.
I wanted the skills, but the formality was destroying me.
When I went to university to study Philosophy I secretly thought I’d left art, sadly, irrevocably, behind me. I could still draw, doodle, play, but I could never really be an artist.
But then I found myself painting, drawing, more and more… I painted my thoughts out for an essay, then wrote the essay based on the painting. Friends loved the art I made, asked me to make piece for them, which sit proudly on their walls.
Somehow, I’d dropped out, and tuned in.
Somehow, as an art-class drop-out, I found I could still be an artist.
I am grateful that I only gave up on my dream for a moment, and, in returning to myself, I find myself here… making art.
It makes me wonder what dreams the people around me have given up on, even if they haven’t realised it. It reminds me why the old cliché exists: it is never too late to do what you love, to be who you are, regardless of what the world might think.
Halo Quin 
Pingback: Tweets that mention Art class drop out « Haloquin's Blog -- Topsy.com
The best writers and artists seem to always be the one’s who do their own thing rather than changing their style or talent to appease an institution’s standards of “quality.”
“I wanted the skills, but the formality was destroying me.”
great quote. I think a lot of people felt the same about philosophy at lampeter, and I certainly felt the same at the start with regard to my computer science degree. With a more rigorous discipline like CS and to a lesser degree Philosophy, the formality serves a useful purpose, but it could be argued that it also obscures the bigger picture. There seem to be two schools of thought in relation to art; the more technical side, dealing wih the presentation of form, composition, allegience to particular historical movements all those kind of rules you no doubt get taught at art school, and then the more aesthetic side which is focussed pretty much solely on the experience of the viewer, or the relationship between artist and viewer, without any real consideration of technical detail. For me it’s easy to see how the latter can be considered a purer form. Just my opinion 🙂
Fantastic – and how inspiring!
Burts: I agree entirely… of course, thats often easier to say than it is to remember on a daily basis, or so I find!
Howard: Heheh. Thanks 🙂 I was lucky, I reckon, in that the modules I took led me to the more creative side of philosophy, with enough of the technical side to at least get by 😉 I can play the word games, which helps!
Susan: Thank you!!!