Thursday Thoughts...

“Artists are driven to do what they do no matter what. It’s a very powerful ambition and they pursue it in whatever way works best for them. Artists have a practice and pursuing and developing it is always the motivating factor, not whether or not they will sell something or even find a venue in which it can be seen.” 

Whitney Museum curator Carter Foster on grit 

I must admit I think an artist, or a maker's, mind is constantly sifting through signals, connecting disparate thoughts, seeing images and translating them in their own way. I think their minds are often viewing the world in a particular way and are quietly, sometimes subconsciously, formulating ideas about telling a story, or making a work that expresses certain things. 

Many of us are then compelled to make a piece in response to this gathering of stimuli, thoughts and experiences. I certainly can't speak on behalf of artists who sell really well or are held in prestigious collections, but in my own small way I know that I sometimes really need to say something; or I really need to feel something. And make it I will, with no real thought that a buyer exists for this; or a collection might be interested.  I need to make the work I need to make and then afterwards comes the latent pondering of whether I should try to sell it, or contact an institution, or enter it in a show or a prize.

Fortunately I don't have to make my living as an artist, if I did, perhaps my thinking might change.