Still here
I’m sorry that I haven’t posted in a while folks life has been a little hectic over the past week or so. In the next few posts I want to individually write about artists that have inspired me whilst making art works. I’ll make the posts artist by artist hopefully this will make the artists more concise and relevant.
For this introductory post then I would just like to talk about the process of finding artists and my thoughts in regards to artists in general. I think it’s a shame when people turn around and say “What’s the point in looking at someone else’s work?”
For me it’s the same reason why you read books if you’re a student of literature or why you listen to Bach if you’re a music student. It’s quite a therapeutic process when I’m looking for artists, normally I would leave an afternoon free wherein I get lost in the library and find some books or I start with a Google image search.
What’s therapeutic about the process is discovering artists who deal with the same thoughts and feelings as I do, it’s comforting to read about how artists became the artists that they are today, you can turn around and think “Wow someone else had the same thought as me” or “He deals with a lot of the same issues that I want to explore”. And that’s one of the most inspiring aspects of art: finding artists who inspire you.
Quite often being an artist is a lonely process mainly because most artists like to work on their own or work in the confines of their home where they feel the most confident. I prefer working in the university studio with other people around me, I used to love working at home stuck in my bedroom all day creating some grand masterpiece but you don’t learn a lot on your own and you most certainly don’t make the use of the spaces which are given to you.
I think I prefer working in the studio because it’s an artistic environment, there’s a little hustle and bustle, and most importantly there’s life. It’s quite strange to think about how people want to make art. I don’t think that art should be a torturous process, created by the lone ranger instead art should have its own life and growth. You should be able to talk to other people about your art work, you should try to answer someone’s questions about something you’re working on, you should enjoy spending time with other artists and communicate different thoughts and ideas. Well that’s what I think anyway.
