For want of a better term, “writer’s block” -or maybe “creative block” suffices here. It’s been a long few years. Caring for my aging parents (with a lot of help from my siblings) suffering from Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s and dementia the past 5 years has been heart breaking and frankly exhausting. Both parents have now passed and within 6 months of each other-curiously the same timeframe that my grandparents departed thirty years ago. As an artist and a very sensitive person, I feel deeply and completely. Maybe giving all my time and attention to my loved ones has drained creative energies too. Now that all the funerals are over, details have been completed, I have taken deep breaths. It’s time to continue with my own life. I have a very large canvas on the easel. I’ve been looking at it, and other smaller, unfinished canvases for weeks. This is the first time I have experienced it: writer’s block. I wonder, are my parents so woven into my psyche, my process, spirit that I have lost something fundamental in my art? (More deep breaths). They were my rock, my foundation for all that I am, my memories. After such a huge loss, even after a long goodbye, how do I pick things back up and move on? How will it transform my work? Will it mean new subject matter? Different color palette? New media? Or an indefinite pause for contemplation? Processing it all might take a while. For now, I’m taking baby steps. I continue to go to the Market Basket Cafe and draw my Stealth Sketches of the patrons there. I’ve added oil pastels for color, something new. I suppose it’s all part of the artist’s unique journey. This is what makes purchasing art such an honor. What stage or piece of her life was this particular painting? You hold in your hands the physical embodiment; a piece of her life, a memory and a precious story that explains what she was thinking and how that shaped her thoughts when she created the next canvas. Remember that when you go to buy any artist’s work. It isn’t just something to hang over the couch. It’s so much more. Creative block has a place in that journey; signifying a profound shift. So many challenges as a creative. So many miles to go before I sleep….(yes, a line borrowed from Robert Frost.)
