It’s funny how our egos can churn a simple statement into a personal affront. An artist quoted as saying he doesn’t paint cows because it “doesn’t mean anything,” offended the part of me who’s insecure in my lack of formal artistic training.
In my mind I defended my work — that while my art is not about social injustice or political statements, people experiencing it relate to the emotions they feel in my expressive animal paintings. Aesthetic work, though bucolic or banal, can still speak through the way it’s expressed.
Then I found myself thinking, just like that artist: “My paintings say more than art of the ____ style.” Sonja, you’re such a hypocrite! Don’t we all do this at times: place our work and ourselves on a sliding scale of assessment against those we regard as above or below us in our particular preference? If not with what we create, we likely do this in some manner with our appearance, occupation, income, religion, political beliefs or social standing.
Mark Twain said, “Comparison is the death of joy.” If our self-worth is based on where we or our work stand on the scale of public opinion, we’re missing the point; likewise, if we’re judging others on this same scale, we’re missing experiences that will help us relate and grow as artists and as people.
Many artists prefer art which lies close on the spectrum to their own style, or what they are striving for in their work. People identify genres they consider “not real art.” We’re all biased for or against particular styles of art, just as we are with music, books and food. Some people see “love and joy” in my loose, painterly works, yet many others, especially in this area, prefer photorealism, merely tolerate my work, and disparage more modern, or abstract art. In another part of the world, the public opinion would be flipped over.
I’m grateful to live in an area where cow paintings are appreciated, to make a decent living creating what some consider “not real art.” But instead of placing my work on a mental hierarchy against work I don’t appreciate, I can explore what the artist was expressing. Instead of agreeing with and indulging people’s biases, I can help them understand art they don’t favor by pointing out qualities that make it “art,” and thereby aid viewers to experience and accept a broader world of artistic styles. They don’t have to like it, but I can encourage them to search for meaning in it.
Knowing that as artists, our art won’t please everyone, we shouldn’t disregard any artist’s work or genre until we’ve seen it in person. I didn’t esteem Mark Rothko’s work as “real art” until I walked into a room of his large color field paintings at the National Gallery in Washington, D.C. Personally experiencing the extreme emotion of color on large canvases spoke volumes, compared to the boring little strips of colors on pages of books, that didn’t say or mean anything to me.
If instead of categorizing it “not real art,” we sought to personally experience art we don’t like or understand, it could broaden our minds to trying new foods, music, books, and, in turn, reduce our need to fit in, judge or compare ourselves or our work to others.
Sonja Caywood is a local artist in Dayton.
