Nothing helps you focus on your art like suddenly realizing you can no longer make it.
Through college I made figurative drawings and paintings, sometimes realistic still lifes, sometimes completely abstract splatter paintings.
In my twenties, I dabbled in portraiture, mixed media, mixing collage with writing.
In my twenties, I didn’t really take my art seriously. I thought I had all the time in the world (maybe you can relate). Besides, I had to work.
It’s pretty common that most Art teachers barely have time to make art and many stop making art all together.
Then one day something happened to me that lit a fire inside of me.
I had children.
And by fire, I mean a fire in my mind and in my heart…because my body was exhausted.
Overnight my life completely changed. I completely changed! I knew I would be a good mother because I always had that nurturing instinct.
I cared deeply for my students and I always wanted to help people and share everything I learned with them.
(One of my favorite photos with my son and me. A rare moment where he was relaxed and let me hold him!)
My sons were everything to me and still are. I reveled in their beauty as babies. I kissed their cheeks a million times.
I breastfed them, swam with them, walked with them, and I relished all the primal feelings of motherhood. Their joy and their comfort were my joy and my comfort.
I carried them in my arms, on my shoulders, on my back, and on my hips. I teased them. I laughed with them. I even cried with them a time or two.
I loved them not because they came out of my body. In fact, I rarely thought about that. I loved them because I was responsible for them.
I developed a deep appreciation for food when I had to feed my babies. I wanted to nurture them into healthy strong men.
I loved the sounds of them chewing and crunching on crackers and apples. In their teens that went away and I just urged them to chew with their mouths closed!
But I still find great joy in feeding them when they get home from a long day of school and sports. And I find even greater joy seeing them getting creative in the kitchen!
At the same moment that life threw me into challenges of motherhood, I also felt this burning desire to make art. I think because I was so inspired by love. And because two precious things I took for granted - time and energy - were gone.
At the same time I loved being a mother, it was also really really hard.
They were sick a lot in toddlerhood with chronic ear infections. Since I wasn’t sleeping enough I caught whatever they brought home from preschool and mine usually turned into raging sinus infections.
I developed chronic sinusitis and an autoimmune thyroid condition.
I was sick and exhausted.
I taught Art History online for awhile when my first son was a baby. But I’d ended up staying up all night creating lessons, or working all weekend when my husband was home so we had no family time.
My immune system was shot and my sinus problems just kept getting worse. And the pay was less than desirable.
In middle school my sons were diagnosed with ADHD.
It made sense. That was why they struggled so much in their academic classes but also why they excelled in soccer and music. (The beauty of neurodiversity!)
It also explained why when they were little I couldn’t stay home and make art.
I had this idea when they were born that I would create an art studio in my living room. I would make a little studio area for them too, with little easels and all their art supplies.
HA! They literally climbed me and threw all the art supplies.
The term “stay-at-home-mom” always bothered me. I WISHED I could stay at home most days, but I couldn’t.
Staying home meant my life was a frustrating, crazy-making circus.
I had to get them out EVERY day.
Every day we’d walk to the park. They’d climb trees, roll down hills, pick flowers, and build with sticks. I told them I liked the ball moss that grew on trees, so they made it a mission to bring me every piece they found!
(What do you do with a ton of ball moss…?)
In nature they were completely engaged and in their element. Watching them and being with them reminded me of my childhood. It made me feel healthy and alive.
I remembered how much I loved playing outside as a kid. Texas heat makes you especially grateful for cooler days, and those were my favorite.
I felt so inspired by my love for my sons and for being with nature that I started taking photos…lots and lots of photos.
Photos of my boys splashing in puddles, and throwing rocks into creeks. I took closeup photos of leaves, flowers, piles of branches, or any interesting textures I found.
I always had a great appreciation of photography as an art form, but I always felt this urge to draw and paint. So for me the photos were reference photos for some drawings or paintings I’d make some day.
In those moments, chasing them around parks and fields, I couldn’t sit and draw. I had to be alert and on the move. Ready to scoop them up before they ran through an ant pile and follow them up ladders on the playgrounds.
Making art is not a hobby for me in the sense that it’s something I do for just the enjoyment of it. I HAVE to make art. Like I HAVE to breathe. It is who I am.
My husband is a software engineer. He can code for ten hours or he can code for two minutes. I really can’t work like that. I tried.
Constant interruptions make me extremely agitated because to make art I have to get into a flow state. Deep concentration. You can’t get into a flow state when you have to stop every two minutes.
It also made me angry. I didn’t want to be an angry mom. Or an angry person.
To make art I needed good chunks of time. Quiet time. That was really hard to come by. When I did find the time (which was no easy task), I was exhausted. Sometimes mentally, sometimes physically, sometimes both.
So I was left with only my thoughts. As I chased my boys around the park, as we looked at fossils at the natural science museum, as we picked out fruit at the grocery store, I thought about painting the trees, the fossils, and the fruits and vegetables.
My body and my soul were telling me we needed MORE nature. So we moved from the HUGE metropolis of Houston to Austin, Texas. There we found endless wild places to explore. Parks, trails, springs, and creeks became our new playgrounds.
And all that while I thought about art.
The ideas evolved in my mind like I imagine they do for authors, planning out every aspect of a novel. Using the people they meet, and the daily happenings to inspire their story along the way.
By the time my sons went to school and I had a little more time, I knew exactly what I wanted to paint.
Over the years I thought about nature. I thought about love and life. What destroys us and what makes us feel alive.
I thought about the environment and what it means to our children and their children…And this idea came to me, or through me rather, of a series of paintings about our relationship with the Earth.
The thoughts went into my sketchbook, where I started to sketch each painting idea. I saved reference photos into folders that I printed out.
And one day, I finally took all those years of ideas, and I started to paint that series. It took me six years to paint twelve oil paintings.
I tell you this because I think there are times in our lives when we simply don’t have the time or energy to make our art. Even when our inspiration pulls at us with such fiery intensity.
I used to get mad at that constant nagging. Why me? Can’t you see, I don’t have time! I’m too tired. I’m sick. Besides, I’m not even that good of an artist…
But that nagging never goes away. And I absolutely love making art! It’s that delicious satisfaction of doing what I was created to do, like a bird flying!
I agree with the advice that you should make art as often as you can even if just for 15 minutes a day. I wish I had taken that advice and made it work somehow.
But I’m here to tell you, that THINKING about art is still a really important part of MAKING art.
Don’t underestimate it.
Don’t feel ashamed if you haven’t made art because you’ve been chasing children around, feeding or caring for people, or working your ass off.
Think about art as much as you’d like. And look. Really look at what is going on around you. The beauty, the complexity, the curiosities, the pains, and the joys.
Delight in your mind and in your visions. Record them if you can, whether that’s through snapping photos, writing notes in your phone, or texting your ideas to a friend.
Just don’t give up. On the hard days, surrender. Go for a walk. Go to bed early. Cry it out. Then wake up and try to make something.
And when life pulls you in the opposite direction, come back. And come back again.
Just keep coming back. For you. For whoever needs to see your art. But mainly for you.
Thinking about art is important. But also being curious.
And sometimes I wonder if my nature is really just that I must make something to solve my curiosity with it?
I don’t know. I just keep trying. And hopefully throughout this messy process, I continue to make some art.
And I hope you do too.
