My students would often describe themselves as ‘passionate’ about making art. For some of them this had a ring of truth, and of course there are many ways of defining the term. I’m reflecting on today’s long, tiring and not entirely fruitful session in the studio, and I think: this must be what ‘passionate about painting’ is. Why else would I spend such inordinate amounts of time, money and energy wrestling with paint? (Not literally wrestling, obviously, though sometimes it gets close…) One of the paintings I was working on has been through several incarnations over the past year, of which at least three (as I recall) were actually pretty successful. It looks completely different now. Definitely not better (yet). I keep struggling on with it because – why? – because of the search for resolution, I suppose, resolution on my own terms. I’m tired. But I can’t let it go. I sometimes think I could make a piece of video art by setting up a camera in the studio to record my practice over a long period of time. (Being video, it might be seen as more ‘contemporary’ than painting – or perhaps that’s just me being cynical and simplistic…) Anyhow, it could play a part in the debate about what on earth painting is for. I wonder how many other people I could find who would agree that there was a point to all the working and re-working. And out of those, how many would see ‘resolution’ in a piece at the same point as I do – probably none! As a friend of mine says about her own artistic practice, ‘it’s as if I’m a scientist, devoting my life solely to studying the particular effects of frost on the left front hoof of a certain type of llama when above 1000 metres – how many other people are going to care about that?’
But it’s okay. Put the dinner on and get the kids to their swimming lesson.
