Excerpt from an email interview I had 2 yrs ago:
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1) How does it feel when you paint? What do you enjoy most about the process?
It feels like an adventure, the blank canvas or board is like the open road - it’s easiest to take a route you know well but most satisfying when I have the courage to go down a path I have not travelled before – that’s when my most interesting compositions emerge. I love each step and am often tempted to leave it as is, but then have to carry through with my process: the rough black sketch of my initial composition...the abstract color field created after and then bringing it all back into focus with black line.
2) How do you feel when you've successfully completed a painting?I feel a giddy happiness, a sense of accomplishment and sometimes a sense of surprise and wonder that I did it. It gets me excited about the endless possibilities of unknown creations ahead...
3) What does "successfully completed a painting" mean to you?
It means I’m experiencing the feelings in #2! Sometimes it takes several days, weeks or months for me to really appreciate or fully see what I have created. I have plenty of unsuccessful pieces around – but these are critical as the most treasured advice I ever got was “you have to make a lot of bad art in order to get to the good stuff so you better get to work!” ...George Cramer, my Sculpture & Foundry Professor and mentor in college.
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4) What three words describe how you feel about your work?
Happy, hopeful, grateful...
If you are still reading this...Now it's your turn, tell me how you feel when you are creating... be it art, writing, cooking, gardening, etc.