Quitting Painting or Pivoting?

This past year saw many changes for me, some positive and some challenging.

In early February, the gallery I was represented by in Santa Fe dropped me. It happens. At first, I felt relieved that I would have time for other painting projects that were looming, but little by little I began to feel deflated.

That’s when I almost decided to give up painting. Well, in any public sense at least. It sounds dramatic, but the reality is that events like this always cause me to reflect just a little too much and think I might be more useful selling shoes. It generally doesn’t last long.

There is some question whether old-fashioned painting with a brush and paint is a pursuit which fills a need, a pursuit that changes society. Each year seems to witness fewer collectors and patrons who are willing to invest their money in a static vision of beauty and meaning.

But the real reason I considered it is the periodic doubt I feel about whether painting serves a real purpose anymore. The type of painting I do, while it may be considered decorative, is really meant to be a point of meditation and reflection, a repository of beauty to remind us of the beauty around us and inside us. That type of meditation and reflection takes time. It takes looking. In a distracted world, that’s just what people need –  an antidote to devices and disharmony and a focus for meditation and discovery. But we don’t always want what we need.

I read in Austin Kleon’s newsletter the following quote by Raymond Carver who was speaking about writing, but it can equally be applied to the visual arts, I think.

It doesn’t have to do anything. It just has to be there for the fierce pleasure we take in doing it, and the different kind of pleasure that’s taken in reading something that’s durable and made to last, as well as beautiful in and of itself. Something that throws off these sparks—a persistent and steady glow, however dim.

If we all create a little spot of beauty every day, be it in painting, writing, singing, cooking, or whatever, little by little we can counter the gloom of unkindness that sometimes surrounds us, with an accumulation of these small glowing flames. It may take some time, but at least I can make a start…

Sometimes decisions seem to be made for you and in the end, a new opportunity presented itself which saved me too much ill-considered introspection. A friend moved out of her studio in downtown Las Cruces and I moved in. I thought I would move my studio and my classes there. It’s on the circuit of the monthly Friday Art Ramble so I would just open the studio once a month on that night. Easy peasy.

Because this space is so nice, the front room quickly morphed into a proper gallery to showcase the work. So far it has been a new fun adventure and since I opened before my ducks were all in a row, it has also been a continuously evolving one. I still have a studio and teaching space as well, but it’s now officially Jean Wilkey Gallery.

At this point, I’ve been open for two months. So far so good.

This February, for The Love of Art month, I’ll open for the First Friday Art Ramble night and I’ll also be open for extended hours on each Saturday from 10:00-4:00 pm.

I look forward to seeing you there.

Jean Wilkey Gallery
221 N Main Street, Las Cruces, NM
Hours: Thu/Fri 2-5pm, First Friday 5-8 pm, Sat 10-1 pm (Feb 10-4pm)