OUR ART PRACTICE
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“An artist cannot fail, it’s a success just to be one” - Charles Horton Cooley
As artists we are finely tuned to notice and observe the world around us....we’re just wired differently, and, as a result, we can’t deny the relationship between our art and our lives. They are inextricably interwoven. Recently I read a passage in a book on yoga, ‘Light on Life’ by B.K.S. Iyengar, that really resonated for me. I’ve been a student of yoga for many years and have often noticed that what I am learning in my yoga practice also translates to my painting practice, particularly when it comes to the mental states that one has to hold while being present for one’s work. In yoga if you allow the mental chatter to permeate your mind, you are not doing the work of yoga....as it requires a certain type of mental training as well as the physical aspects of the Asanas - the poses.
I like to think of art making as a practice and attempt to bring as much awareness to my internal relationship to it as possible. One of the most challenging aspects for me is noticing when my ego is at play and how it may be sabotaging my efforts. It’s a slippery one, the ego...and it manifests in many forms in our mental-scape. Knowing when we are responding from it is very useful and can help us to take bigger risks in our art and our lives. When we can rein in our ego, this brings a refreshing "newness" into our world, that stimulates us and invites possibilities. If we can better understand our emotional landscape and practice discernment, we can then be gentler and kinder to ourselves as we work, getting results that are more in alignment with who we truly are.
Mr. Iyengar speaks of the ego in this way...he says that we are governed by mechanisms that resist change. The mind and the senses that inform it seek to repeat pleasure and avoid pain. And, we know that making our art can bring about much discomfort at times, especially when we are pushing at our growing edges. He also states that the ego defines itself as the totality of the experiences that have made up our past: my childhood, my university degree, my career, etc. It is the running total of all that has happened up until now...and our ego is in love with the past and these identities.
He says that what the ego fears most is its own death, and that lives in the future....in the unknown. The unknown, which we as artists engage with in nearly every moment of our work, activates the ego's primary fear of its own impermanence - the fear that one day its impersonation of the true self, the unknown soul, will be unmasked, at which point its very existence will be terminated.
As we open ourselves to being more truthful in our art and in our world, we risk touching on the unknown, on rejection, on the loss of our past. This is why it's so very challenging to be an artist... and so rewarding. We become trained observers of our internal responses and notice when fear, self doubt and even anger comes up for us. It is then that we dance with our ego, calling it out, and deciding if we want it to lead the way. If we surrender ourselves to the call of our soul instead, and reach further than we think we can, then we have a fighting chance at making the art that only we can make.
It is our attachment to the past, to what we know, our habitual ways of working, to needing and comparing, to avoiding the discomfort that inevitably comes with growth...that tells us that we are being informed by our ego. The simple act of recognizing this, and making a choice to be present again, allows us to open that door that brings risk and soul into our painting practice....and helps us to feel the expansiveness of that. What a wonderful gift to give to ourselves....and to our art.
