Intimacy with the art - another artist speaks:
Here's a quote from a post to the Creativity message board at the Wet Canvas site, by Dana (used here with her permission:
"For the first time, I finished a satisfying self portrait over an extended 7 day period. Previously it was impossible for me to keep going successfully with one work over an extended period of time. I always lost the connection somewhere in the process and couldn't get it back. I'm also more frequently able to consciously go the next step from previous sessions when I start a new one. Previously I experienced frequently what seemed like a total loss of my abilities on several different occasions. It was pretty scary. I'm developing myself at a faster pace and its no longer so hit or miss.
If I look at the difference between now and then, I'd say that more time behind the easel has given me more opportunities to get intimate with the subject and my painting. When the intimacy is there, everything flows. But before, I lost it so much, I think, because I was experiencing it without really understanding what it was and why it was important. And since I wasn't painting so much, I didn't have a lot of opportunity to experience the intimacy even by accident.
But spending more time painting showed me that the intimacy made the difference. It was like the sweet spot on a tennis racket. So once I knew what I was looking for and what it felt like, I could catch even the least bit of intimacy and keep hold of it more often.
Today's drawing class was a case in point, I just let myself fully experience the classroom environment, the model and his pose, the paper and the chalk. At the very least, I wanted the paper to reflect the sensations, thoughts, and emotions I was experiencing and especially the experience of being in that room looking at that model. I kept going back to that every time the drawing got difficult or I got distracted. The woman next to me kept saying what beautiful work I was doing and when we were almost finished asked me if I thought it was good. I was at a loss for words, I hadn't been thinking of it in those terms, the drawing wasn't good or bad; it just WAS. And that is what the sense of intimacy felt like; everything just WAS, and that sensation felt great."
This is the way my own artmaking has been sometimes - so I know it can be that way again. It helps to be reminded that this is what I'm looking for. And that spending time with the work is an important part of this.
10:59:53 PM 
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