I feel a call to get crystal clear on what I am saying and how I’m showing up to art and life this year. The word that arises in this moment is refinement: the clarification of something by making small changes. Not to cast aside what has been said and done up to this point, but to refine it.
In the sunroom painting studio I am finishing a body of abstracts and I just inherited a new-old bench from a dear friend — also a Buddhist, a scientist, and a weaver! So this is a bench of substance, and it is inviting me back to work in a way that feels supportive and welcome.
I recently remarked to my partner, “if you refresh a space, the space refreshes you,” and that is something that I believe wholeheartedly. I am not procrastinating by my constant rearranging and refreshing of things, I am refining.
And objects that have lived have stories to tell.
So, what is my story?
I turned forty and that feels like a milestone of some sort, or at least I have decided to make it one. I spent the past decade of my thirties in transition; moving from a corporate career to fully walking the path of an artist.
Now as I sit down on a new bench, in a new decade, I find myself pausing before I jump into the fire of creation, because I have questions.
Another dear friend and mentor once told me that she and her husband decide whether they want to continue their marriage at the beginning of each year. It’s not a given, it’s a question.
I would like to put a similar practice in place in my relationships with art and life — Do we want to stay together? And if so, how can we meet each other, now?
My answer comes in the form of a yearlong project, called Pearls - to explore the living questions that arise as I walk the path of an artist. My hope is that together, we can make a tiny contribution to the rippling of inspiration.
x Jess
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