I was recently at an art show where the artist had painted some very interesting and vibrant images. She painted busy images of cows wearing hats, and dogs in dresses and such. It was all colorful and visually appealing but not my taste of art. I found the images a little disturbing. I found myself grinning despite myself, not because the art gave me a silly or whimsical feeling, but because the artist looked very much like one of her subjects. She had on a huge Silly hat and what appeared to be her entire collection of jewelry, though I doubt it. Through the evening she repeatedly blurted out unrelated statements, lost her train of thought in the middle of conversations, and made a general mess of each area she landed in.
My encounter with this artist’s personification of what an artist is, or what she represents got me thinking of how untrue that eclectic, messy, unorganized, and generally discombobulated image of a professional artist is. In my experience it is quite the opposite of the perception.
It offended me that many people might see her and affirm their pigeon hole view of the typical artist. I could almost hear folks making the excuse “she’s so artsy…” when trying to bring some rationality to her appearance. Her stage show seemed to represent all that is rare in the qualities of an artist.
Art is no less a process of detailed dedication and standard method than any engineer must employ. I know this because I make my living as a Quality engineer, I get paid to design and develop mechanical and automated processes. And I am an Artist, I was born that way and like artists everywhere I must understand the basic requirements of my medium, physics and chemistry and composition. I must also understand how to design and develop an idea. These are all traits that are required in any other technical field of study. So why is the quintessential artist seen as a flake?
An artist must be more than just creative, to be successful he or she must also be able to develop mentally and emotionally to the point where they can “feel” the world. Like the mechanic who listens to a car to diagnose it or an machinist who can put his hand on a machine and tell if it is working properly an artist must understand his tools well enough to use them only when needed. An artist must be able to methodically mix paint, prepare a surface, mold or carve a material and envision the next step or an end result. An artist must learn to act on this internal feeling. An artist must be organized so that they have the right tool when they need it. They must be systematic so that they can automatically perform tasks that might draw their attention from the moment of creation.
I have been fortunate enough to have two very artistic parents. At an early age I was steeped in the arts. Museums, art shows, performances and art classes were more common than baseball to me as I grew up. We camped our way up the east coast visiting outdoor arts festivals and craft shows and always found our way into some of the greatest museums and galleries of the US. I rarely met or read about a professional artist or craftsman that was a babbling, disorganized person in a ramshackle wardrobe, though I am sure that Picasso may have been close to this at times.
Writing this I can call to mind many friends and acquaintances who meet my description.
I think my friend David Greenbaum expresses this well. He is a potter of some renown and has been a professional potter for 37 years. David has his silly side, he is a joker. He often has clay residue on many of his daily wear clothes and under his nails but away from his studio you would not know he was such a successful artist if you were to meet him at a party. His studio is well organized, straight and tidy and maintained for folks to drop by. My friend Linda is a professional painter who’s studio and style are equally businesslike and structured. She keeps detailed notes on each painting and her colors and materials so that her students can benefit from those hurdles or experiments that she takes on. I have many artist friends who for one reason or another are not full time artists; these folks too are structured and methodical in their job. I work with a Quality analyst who is also our technical writer but as a musician he comes alive, he teaches and judges competitions all over the US and has been collecting and cataloging early American music for 30 years. He is meticulous and scrutinizes every action with the precision of a surgeon. He wears the casual business clothes of a corporate employee, but he is an artist.
I know and respect Perry Yung as a musician, actor, and craftsman. He plays and makes the Shakuhachi flute and in learning to do so he had to learn to recognize the bamboo that will make a good flute. He had to learn to see and feel the possibility in a living stalk. And he had to develop his awareness of the mechanics and a method of a shakuhachi’s construction so that he could understand how it will work before it is completed. Like a machinist Perry must build a flute in a methodic and precise way. He must have the ability to overcome the unexpected with the awareness of a master machinist. When he plays in the process of making or repairing a flute, he must be able to “feel” the music and in doing so he must have his tools and work space clean and organized. His abilities are articulate and his manner must be that of a perfectionist. And in playing a flute that Perry has made or repaired, his patrons know him to be a master craftsman.
The artists of the 60’s and 70’s are stereotypes that need to be changed. In our hearts all artists are free spirits but in reality we are creatures of habit and organized existence.
So I did some research into what the term artist refers to exactly. What I found is that artists are classified very differently depending on who is performing the research. A “population” of artists is classified most commonly in the following ways.
Here’s what I found. Princeton University has done some interesting studies of artists, The percentages here are from one such study. All can be found here: http://www.princeton.edu/~artspol
Identifying artists by population in percentage of most common to least common (This might truly surprise you.)
Membership in a Professional Artist Group or Association (32 percent)
The Amount of Paid Time Devoted to Artistic Work (24 percent)
Professional Qualifications (14 percent)
Reputation and Recognition (10.5 percent)
Self-identification (10.5 percent)
Directories (9 percent)
Donnell Butler, Working Paper #12, summer 2000
So when identifying who is an artist we have way to many points of reference. Is it based on time producing art? Is it based on education? Or is it based on the groups you belong to or the awards you’ve won? Personally –I was born this way.
So here I am thinking about the woman I met. She was unusual, that’s true- but I have rarely met or read about a professional artist or craftsman that was a babbling, disorganized person in a ramshackle wardrobe.
My encounter with this artist’s personification of what an artist is, or what she represents got me thinking of how untrue that eclectic, messy, unorganized, and generally discombobulated image of a professional artist is. This understanding has been rising in me for some time and a funky smelling lady in a huge hat wearing a patchwork dress clinched the perception for me.
So as I sat down to start writing about how inaccurate the image of an “artist” is in our society.
I began to realize that the image and personification is kept well fed by some very talented folks. The entertainment industry occupies the other side of the arts, the performing arts. The likes of which include the band Kiss, Marilyn Manson, Lady Ga Ga, and many of my favorites The Red Hot Chili Peppers, Ministry, various Jamaican bands, the list goes on and on. Mainstream media helps feed these freakish personifications by exploiting every action and incident and I am sure that the PR manager for most performers orchestrates a good deal of the publicity negative or otherwise. Then there is the culinary arts, martial arts, and even architecture and mechanical arts. In the end I think I will just give up. We are all artists in some degree. Those who make it as a professional artist are organized and well planned –but not always. And who is classified or pegged as an artist could be anyone. We are all artists in many ways. Some write, some build, some design, some act, joke, teach… the list goes on and on. To me an artist is a person who creates, and we all create something. We are all passionate about something. But in my eyes a professional artist combines passion with perseverance and skill, and structure and mastery. So the sky’s the limit when it comes to artists. We are what we are, weird to some, artsy to others. But whatever the stereotype I am sure that most of us will never fit into that mold, but in time maybe some of us will become it.
My encounter with this artist’s personification of what an artist is, or what she represents got me thinking of how untrue that eclectic, messy, unorganized, and generally discombobulated image of a professional artist is. In my experience it is quite the opposite of the perception.
It offended me that many people might see her and affirm their pigeon hole view of the typical artist. I could almost hear folks making the excuse “she’s so artsy…” when trying to bring some rationality to her appearance. Her stage show seemed to represent all that is rare in the qualities of an artist.
Art is no less a process of detailed dedication and standard method than any engineer must employ. I know this because I make my living as a Quality engineer, I get paid to design and develop mechanical and automated processes. And I am an Artist, I was born that way and like artists everywhere I must understand the basic requirements of my medium, physics and chemistry and composition. I must also understand how to design and develop an idea. These are all traits that are required in any other technical field of study. So why is the quintessential artist seen as a flake?
An artist must be more than just creative, to be successful he or she must also be able to develop mentally and emotionally to the point where they can “feel” the world. Like the mechanic who listens to a car to diagnose it or an machinist who can put his hand on a machine and tell if it is working properly an artist must understand his tools well enough to use them only when needed. An artist must be able to methodically mix paint, prepare a surface, mold or carve a material and envision the next step or an end result. An artist must learn to act on this internal feeling. An artist must be organized so that they have the right tool when they need it. They must be systematic so that they can automatically perform tasks that might draw their attention from the moment of creation.
I have been fortunate enough to have two very artistic parents. At an early age I was steeped in the arts. Museums, art shows, performances and art classes were more common than baseball to me as I grew up. We camped our way up the east coast visiting outdoor arts festivals and craft shows and always found our way into some of the greatest museums and galleries of the US. I rarely met or read about a professional artist or craftsman that was a babbling, disorganized person in a ramshackle wardrobe, though I am sure that Picasso may have been close to this at times.
Writing this I can call to mind many friends and acquaintances who meet my description.
I think my friend David Greenbaum expresses this well. He is a potter of some renown and has been a professional potter for 37 years. David has his silly side, he is a joker. He often has clay residue on many of his daily wear clothes and under his nails but away from his studio you would not know he was such a successful artist if you were to meet him at a party. His studio is well organized, straight and tidy and maintained for folks to drop by. My friend Linda is a professional painter who’s studio and style are equally businesslike and structured. She keeps detailed notes on each painting and her colors and materials so that her students can benefit from those hurdles or experiments that she takes on. I have many artist friends who for one reason or another are not full time artists; these folks too are structured and methodical in their job. I work with a Quality analyst who is also our technical writer but as a musician he comes alive, he teaches and judges competitions all over the US and has been collecting and cataloging early American music for 30 years. He is meticulous and scrutinizes every action with the precision of a surgeon. He wears the casual business clothes of a corporate employee, but he is an artist.
I know and respect Perry Yung as a musician, actor, and craftsman. He plays and makes the Shakuhachi flute and in learning to do so he had to learn to recognize the bamboo that will make a good flute. He had to learn to see and feel the possibility in a living stalk. And he had to develop his awareness of the mechanics and a method of a shakuhachi’s construction so that he could understand how it will work before it is completed. Like a machinist Perry must build a flute in a methodic and precise way. He must have the ability to overcome the unexpected with the awareness of a master machinist. When he plays in the process of making or repairing a flute, he must be able to “feel” the music and in doing so he must have his tools and work space clean and organized. His abilities are articulate and his manner must be that of a perfectionist. And in playing a flute that Perry has made or repaired, his patrons know him to be a master craftsman.
The artists of the 60’s and 70’s are stereotypes that need to be changed. In our hearts all artists are free spirits but in reality we are creatures of habit and organized existence.
So I did some research into what the term artist refers to exactly. What I found is that artists are classified very differently depending on who is performing the research. A “population” of artists is classified most commonly in the following ways.
Here’s what I found. Princeton University has done some interesting studies of artists, The percentages here are from one such study. All can be found here: http://www.princeton.edu/~artspol
Identifying artists by population in percentage of most common to least common (This might truly surprise you.)
Membership in a Professional Artist Group or Association (32 percent)
The Amount of Paid Time Devoted to Artistic Work (24 percent)
Professional Qualifications (14 percent)
Reputation and Recognition (10.5 percent)
Self-identification (10.5 percent)
Directories (9 percent)
Donnell Butler, Working Paper #12, summer 2000
So when identifying who is an artist we have way to many points of reference. Is it based on time producing art? Is it based on education? Or is it based on the groups you belong to or the awards you’ve won? Personally –I was born this way.
So here I am thinking about the woman I met. She was unusual, that’s true- but I have rarely met or read about a professional artist or craftsman that was a babbling, disorganized person in a ramshackle wardrobe.
My encounter with this artist’s personification of what an artist is, or what she represents got me thinking of how untrue that eclectic, messy, unorganized, and generally discombobulated image of a professional artist is. This understanding has been rising in me for some time and a funky smelling lady in a huge hat wearing a patchwork dress clinched the perception for me.
So as I sat down to start writing about how inaccurate the image of an “artist” is in our society.
I began to realize that the image and personification is kept well fed by some very talented folks. The entertainment industry occupies the other side of the arts, the performing arts. The likes of which include the band Kiss, Marilyn Manson, Lady Ga Ga, and many of my favorites The Red Hot Chili Peppers, Ministry, various Jamaican bands, the list goes on and on. Mainstream media helps feed these freakish personifications by exploiting every action and incident and I am sure that the PR manager for most performers orchestrates a good deal of the publicity negative or otherwise. Then there is the culinary arts, martial arts, and even architecture and mechanical arts. In the end I think I will just give up. We are all artists in some degree. Those who make it as a professional artist are organized and well planned –but not always. And who is classified or pegged as an artist could be anyone. We are all artists in many ways. Some write, some build, some design, some act, joke, teach… the list goes on and on. To me an artist is a person who creates, and we all create something. We are all passionate about something. But in my eyes a professional artist combines passion with perseverance and skill, and structure and mastery. So the sky’s the limit when it comes to artists. We are what we are, weird to some, artsy to others. But whatever the stereotype I am sure that most of us will never fit into that mold, but in time maybe some of us will become it.
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