make do

I always have these grand plans for research studies and book writing and paradigm shifts and no real way to start them because I don't have
1) an independent financial backer
2) good time management skills
3) motivation to do anything further than make grand plans

My big idea last year was to get a bunch of different kinds of artists together and discuss/publish how art isn't really something you make, it's something you do.

Art isn't something you make, it's something you do.
It isn't about the final product, it's about the process.

Writing is therapeutic for most people who would happen upon this post.  Writing something that other people want to read is a gift, a talent, a blessing, a skill.
Writing things that other people want to read has nothing to do with anything remotely therapeutic.  Just about anyone can feel better by writing things down.  People write things down all the time and throw them away.  Burn them.  Drop them in the mail to nowhere.  To God.  To an old home address.  Why not do other arts the same way?

I read something somewhere about how we can tell children are developing a sense of shame because they stop doing art just for the sake of doing art.
They begin to try to make art.
Make good art.
Make good art that pleases others.

How sad that was for me to watch Jacob stop doing drawing  How sad it was to see him frustrated because his hand can't put on paper what his imagination can put in his mind.
How sad it is for me that I knew exactly how he felt.

He hasn't stopped doing singing yet.  Or doing dancing.  Or doing painting.  Or doing Play Dohing.  Or doing one thousand other things that make me happy just to watch.  That make me jealous because I can't do those things without trying to make those things please others.

I've learned that what we see at shows and in galleries and online and in stores is just a tiny fraction of the art that "real" artists do.  What we see has been done and re-done and worked and re-worked and practiced and rehearsed and criticized and done again.  There is a lot of stuff that gets mailed to nowhere.  Filed under G.  Materials are never wasted, they are used.  Expensive canvases are used many times before being tossed in the trash and leather-bound journals are scratched up and filled up and torn up and blackmarket cadmium pigments that cost more than a month's rent are rinsed down the drain.  Every day.
And it's okay.
And who even likes half of what they see at shows and in galleries and online and in stores?  Not me.  I think most things are terrible.  Aren't good.  Aren't art.  But I'm wrong.

There's a saying that says something stupid like dance as though no one is watching.  I hate that saying.  But it holds a truth.  We need to stop dancing as though those who are watching actually care about how we are dancing.  Because they don't.  They are just happy we are dancing.
 It's like what you were told in seventh grade.  No one is watching you because they are all so busy worrying about you watching them. 

Homework for today: do your art.  Do two arts.  Hell, do every kind of art you can think of during the day.  Don't worry about what you  make.  Concentrate on what you do.

The art of
drawing,
shaving,
singing,
kissing,
dancing,
helping,
building,
litigating,
conversation,
sculpting,
eating,
loving,
reading,
crying,
writing,
painting,
arithmetic,
driving,
childrearing,
sewing,
playing,
whistling,
strumming,
fingering,
drumming,
photographing,
collaging.
journaling,
acting,
advocating,
listening,
teaching,
touching,
weaving,
cooking,
laughing,
flying,
joking,
doing.