Kelly Rae and aesthetic

I’ve spent a few moments during my lunch break today reading Kelly Rae Roberts’ early blog entries before she became the artist and teacher she is today (link is to one of her first art class reviews, where she went to learn in 2006). While she was creating and learning…when she doubted and her art was in the learning curve still. When she had to ignore to her inner critic. When her inner critic told her she wasn’t good enough.

It brings to mind the writer Ira Glass’ quote about (paraphrasing) just doing a lot of work, that everyone starts out in the same sucky place, but the ones that make it just keep going. It's incredibly inspiring!

I’ve been worrying the threads of my aesthetic. I don’t have a specific style of art. You can't look at all of my pieces and say "oh yeah, that's Amy Carden's work." In some ways I wonder if I ever will. I don’t want to be put in a box, labeled one thing or the other. I want to be all…both…everything. I want to paint and draw and do portraits and landscapes. Mixed media and cartoons.

This is the same argument I’ve been having since forever, just now it’s in a different form. When I first began my writing career in advertising, I would get art directors putting me into the category of “writer” without really paying attention to the fact that I have a very visual eye. Putting me in the writer box. I couldn’t stand that!

But when I look at the Kelly Rae’s and the Flora Bowley’s, you can tell from their portfolios that even if it’s not labeled, you know it’s their piece. So that makes me think that I “should”/”need” to make my art all look the same and have the same feel. But as I’m growing as an artist, it doesn’t feel right to lock into the “same” space.

Then again, won’t I always be learning? 

There are some things that I love to focus on:

teal

travel inspiration

Paris

quotes, mantras, inspiration

oddly colored skies (purple, orange)

colorful faces (non-flesh colors)

depth/complication on a piece (lots to discover within it)

the moon/stars

poppies

landscapes

seriously. how is any of that going to work out to one style?! Did Picasso have his blue period simultaneously with his cubism period? Because, while I'm no Picasso, that's what I feel like has to happen for me to be satisfied.