Making Bad Art for a Better World
Plus: 500 subscribers and free raven temporary tattoos!
I have been writing all my adult life, but I didn’t start drawing until five years ago. I drew when I was a kid and I loved drawing, but as I got older I felt pressured to choose where I was going to excel.
Adults always ask you what you want to be when you grow up, and then what you are going to study in college. Once you graduate, they want to know what you are going to do with your degree. When we are young, it seems that there are pressures everywhere to focus and get extremely good at one thing.
I loved birds, writing, and singing just a bit better than drawing. I was an excellent singer, but my family didn’t believe I could make a living on the stage. So, I went to college to study birds and be a respectable scientist, but I just didn’t have the focus for chemistry and calculus. Writing was easier for me. Instead, I got a degree in creative writing and kept writing. I published my first book at 30 and think it’s safe to say that I have 25 years of practice. I’ve gotten very good because I put my time in.
Now I’m at that age where I muse over my choices. I wonder if I would have been better at music, or drawing, and I wonder not with regret, but curiosity. There seems to be this prevailing thought that we only get to make that choice once if we hope to get incredibly good, or perhaps even one of the best. Our time is limited, and we only get to choose once. Except that this isn’t really true, is it?
I started drawing to give myself a new and different way into the stories I tell and the details I layer through them. I didn’t really have a goal to become more a proficient artist. I was just filling the well of inspiration for my “real” art - writing. Yet, a customer ordered a print of this roadrunner this week from my neglected Etsy shop, and I thought, “oh, I can do better than that.”
So, I drew a new roadrunner this week (the one at the start of this post) and was surprised that over the last few years, it seems I’ve been learning. I could indeed do better than four years ago and perhaps even a lot better. For a moment I was sad I hadn’t started drawing until my late 40s. Then I did the math. (I used my fingers, because I am still not any good at it) and I realized that if I continue to love drawing, it’s possible I could put 25 years into this as well.
No one is going to ask me how I expect to make money as an artist, because I already have a career. No one is going to tell me I’m not good enough to succeed, because I’ve succeeded in other things, and it doesn’t matter. There is no pressure and the fates willing, there are still decades to get really good at this if I wish.
Maybe talent helps, but not as much as putting in the hours and there are many hours left. Not only am I old enough that I can spend them as I wish, but I can do it without the judgements that pile on the young. What an amazing place to be in life.
Now more than ever, the world needs artists of all mediums to help us weather and emerge from tumultuous times. Art in all its forms brings us together, inspires change, and connects us. Understanding that it’s harder for young artists makes me want to be as encouraging to them as I possibly can. Realizing that we can all begin or renew a lost passion in middle- and late-age, makes me want to encourage the rest of us. So, pick up your pencils, your brushes, your clay, or your thread. Sit down at your keyboard.
What art might you make? Where will this journey take you? It doesn’t matter how bad it is when you start because it turns out that no matter your age, you will only get better. And I can’t wait to see it!
In celebration of crossing the 500 subscribers mark and with gratitude to all of you for reading along and helping me get here, I was wondering if you would like a temporary tattoo. It features the art from “The Third Instar.” Click here for a link to request one in the mail for free! Or you can pay what you want if you want to help with the postage. Thank you!
Or when you’re 77, you can pick up a piece of exotic wood, and turn a bowl. Then another, and another, etc :-)
This was lovely, I really enjoyed reading about your journey and insights. I think we fall into the trap of thinking interests, hobbies, careers are mutually exclusive. If I want to write, I can’t draw. If I want to paint, I can’t study birds. Etc. Especially when we are younger, as you point out, there is all this pressure to choose and excel and achieve. And yes, that is important. But I think experience brings the insight that we can pursue multiple activities and interests and even careers, for different reasons, probably with varying amounts of time and effort. Love hearing how you have added this artistic endeavor which combines multiple interests.