Does an artist need to work in the studio every day in order to be a real artist?

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 Creative Rhythms

Fall is in the air, I can feel the quickening and excitement as if I too am going back to school. It has got me thinking about this question of creative rhythm and the assumptions we have about what we “should” be doing.

Do you have those nagging internal voices that say you should be in the studio every day, or that you are not a real artist if you are not making stuff all the time?

Ernest Hemingway famously wrote every morning first thing for a few hours. This is a model that gets held over our heads a lot, and I am sure it works well for a lot of people. But not everyone.

The question is, what works best for you? It is painful and demoralizing, not to mention unproductive to try to fit yourself into someone else's concept of the right work rhythm. 

And let me just say that if you have not been working in the studio for a long time for whatever (usually very good) reason, I have another blog coming soon to address this issue. 

If you are feeling cranky and irritable for no good reason- and everything seems hard, like there is added friction- it may be your need to tap into your creative work that is making itself known. Don't beat yourself up, just listen to the need and see what you can do to make space, without too much pressure, for your creative work to come alive again.

I am deeply aware that there are rhythms to my work, and that it is not static. It is like time, there are seasons with their varied qualities and foci, and there are phases of the moon, and times of day, and the filling and releasing of breath- that is there are cycles within cycles within cycles, and they all breath in and out.

This all seems obvious, but the point is that rather than berate yourself for not being in the studio all the time on schedule, maybe there is a way to become aware of what part of the cycle are you in right now and what feels right to support your creative needs in this moment?

You notice the beauty of the leaves changing and you relish the air becoming crisp even as you mourn the passing of the glorious garden, or note what you would like to do with it next spring. 

Similarly, there is a way to bring a grateful awareness to the fallow times in your creative life, a time of taking in or resting, as well as the productive times when you are focused and dedicated and on a roll.

Try this: Look at your past- think about the art that you have made over the years. Now name the times that you have created a body of work- or completed the body of work and shown it. You might even make a time time line with events marked with strong verticals along the time line.  Now use one color to denote  when it felt like you were really productive, another when you felt like you were just poking at it, and  a third when it felt like you were not doing anything. See if you notice a pattern. Are there other kinds of flow that you want to denote?

I have to admit that often when I finish a body of work and have a show, I realize that all that time that I had been thinking I was just poking at it, I was actually making work that ended up being essential to the show. And usually after a big event, I have to take some time off to regroup and re-calibrate

Recently, as I rushed toward a craft show with new pottery in production, and I was loving the sense of productivity and energy. Now I am breathing out- re- calibrating, and I am aware that soon I get to settle into a quieter kind of internal work, making sculpture with a sense of meandering and enjoying the not knowing. And I am aware that having just accomplished the craft show, I need to rest and take care of my nest. I love the variation.

And it can be challenging to start up again after a fallow time, and how do you know if you are ready to start again. That is the stuff of another article. For this one, just remember to be kind to yourself and allow yourself to notice where you are right now in your rhythms. Breathing in and out, sleeping and waking, and having a cup of tea.

I am very curious about what you notice in how your rhythms work.

If you feel inspired to reply- I invite you to add your voice to my blog!

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