Soothing My Artist Soul with Card Making : Happy Father’s Day
I’ve always dreamed of a having an art studio with a housekeeper! Open the door , create, make a mess, walk away — TaDa, pure bliss!
I don’t quite have that, but I do have a 10×10 jam-packed room that I call my office and art space.
It’s so crowded I never use it and the housekeeper is nowhere to be found.
So my new favorite place to go, even more than the wine bar, is a local business called FiberFlame.
Imagine…a huge modern art space that’s wall to wall art supplies with tables ready for you to spread out and make stuff…I can’t even begin to explain it.
For some folks I understand this environment causes near heart failure, if not sweaty palms, but for me spending even as little as an hour surrounded by mixed media art supplies, clears my head and cures my soul– because you see I HAVE to create, I crave it, ache for it, yearn…you get the point.
Deep down inside my soul are the remnants of a teenager who just wanted to be an artist, but was told,
“Kit dear, it’s all well and good to be interested in art as a hobby, however you really should study something more practical and besides it is very difficult to be accepted into RISD (Rhode Island School of Design)
KABOOM! One dream successfully destroyed…yay adults!
That’s okay I showed them and didn’t go to school , but instead traveled 3,000 miles away to be a Rock Star –ahem–that didn’t work out so well either, which is another story for another blog post !
So today I “got my art on” and made my Dad this mixed media Father’s day card — simple, to the point and no saccharine coated Hallmark message that doesn’t quite define my relationship with my father (again another story). I do love, love, love my dad and now that he’s older he is a real appreciator of art, he’s married to an art historian and has spent the last 15 years of his retirement sharing art with kids as an art docent at a large prestigious museum.
By the way , Dad has no recollection of ever telling me not to study art. I still love him.
I can’t wait to read more about being Kit! You and I both know that a college degree in Art does not make you an artist. Being an artist is, very simply put, the act of making art. For some people it’s just the act of being creative that feeds the soul and for other’s pushing the boundaries and being highly successful with it puts money in their pockets. But… for most of us, it’s like breathing and gives us energy. It’s a fairly important part of my own mental health!