And I Will Feast
One by one I opened my presents each a piece to a much larger puzzle. A pad of canvas paper. A set of paint brushes. A palette. A set of acrylic paints, 6 colors total. Our new Christmas Eve puppy whimpered from his cardboard box as Dad took a snapshot of him with his newly gifted Polaroid camera. I set off to my room, presents & Polaroid in hand. I sat looking with great affection upon the image of my puppy, our family's new adventure. I thought, I bet I could paint this picture using my new art supplies. So as witnessed in the movies, I set up Mom’s drawing easel with a page of canvas paper torn off the pad and clipped to a masonite board. With a pencil I sketched my puppy’s Polaroid image and proceeded to dole out paint onto my palette, one by one mixing the colors in the photo and applying it to the paper. I was hooked. At 12 years of age I painted something new everyday during winter break. A glowing human heart, a Native American (Blockbuster released Dances with Wolves on VHS that winter), each painting more challenging than the previous. I marveled with glee at the discovery in creating surprisingly accurate images with paint of the things I felt a passion for. No lessons, no videos, just an innate understanding of color and how to create any one I wanted. A language I knew well, painting and drawing always came easy to me. But I met my one true love a year or two later upon receiving a set of materials to produce paintings in oil. A medium I studied mostly while watching PBS airings of Bob Ross, left me intoxicated in more ways than one, it still does. Like a drug, “Considerately killing me” one blissful hour at a time. Each time returning to my studio, the smell of toxins in the paint, like pheromones, fill me with the promise of an enthralling conflict in each passing hour, calm and excited, soothed and stimulated, assured and challenged by a perfect balance held with immeasurable joy. But as it does, life took me away. Art education opened doors to new thoughts, all to be replaced by life’s one true foe. And like so many, I settled making one of the biggest regrets of my life.
Sitting in the living room, she handed me a manilla envelope. Wanting to wait till I was 21, Mother agreed to share my adoption papers while home for the holidays from my 3rd year in Art School. Shuffling past my birth certificate, and a medical report on my bio grandparents (as my young parents lacked any real medical history), I saw it typed by typewriter “BM (biological mother) was in her late teens in college studying art.” A shiver shot all up and down my body upon realizing I followed in her footsteps for 20 years without knowing. In all the possibilities in this grand life of mine, I found myself in the exact same place she did 20 years later, a truth that makes my flawed decision all the more heartbreaking.
As my grades & awards reflected an assured future in art, my parents offered me a deal, a full ride to a state college or get a scholarship to pay half of my tuition at a private college. My highschool’s Advanced Placement (AP) Art program attracted art schools across the country making us a regular stop for recruiting and portfolio reviews including The Kansas City Art Institute. Having met with the recruiter on several occasions, my school visit to KC on MLK Day 1996, sealed the deal. January, a dismal miserable month in the midwest, remains a pearl in my heart. That day marked the first of a grand journey I would make. Woefully unprepared for the frigid temperatures, I bared the 20 degree tour in bare legs. I met with Nancy, my recruiter, in her round office surrounded by dark wood built-ins and wood floors. I made it clear that a competitive award seals my future at the school. I asked for what I wanted. A few weeks later by phone, Nancy congratulated me not only for my admission to the school but for being a recipient of a competitive award, $38K, half my tuition, over a 4 year program. This gift represented a belief in me, a belief that they valued my attendance as much as I valued attending. A belief that I may bring further prestige and vision to an artistic institution revered in the country as a leader in fine arts. I was to be a legacy. I was an investment in their future. And after choosing a safe road, one with a promise for employment, I failed to fulfill this promise. A regret that I only discovered mid life after a 20+ year commercial creative career I grew bored with with each passing year. Blinded by some abstract expectation, for over 20 years I squandered my potential and traded it for a safe and stable life. And I felt it, the growing resentment. So I quit. I quit everything. I sold my business and sat by the pool for an entire year. Numb with exhaustion and disgust, I sat with it, with the pause my life must take. This road went nowhere, so I stood still in the middle of it for several months languishing in my directionless existence when we were reintroduced. A casual stop on our summer road trip, we wandered into Rule Gallery in the town of Marfa, Texas. I spoke with the resident, James William Murray, an artist from the UK when I felt it. There in the middle of the hot July desert, on a road to nowhere in every way possible, I recognized her. The 12 year old staring back at me, filled with joy, curiosity, and confidence. The 20 year old staring back at me with hope, knowledge and history. I never made good on my promise to these girls, my promise to follow my true potential free of fear. And like a disease, the malaise of my sickness lifted unveiling a fearless 40 something with nothing to lose. The twist reveals that although I focused on an education to prepare me for a commercial industry, KCAI developed the fine artist Nancy saw when awarding me the scholarship. I began to realize like a hibernating bear waking from an extended slumber, I felt hunger, hunger for something commerce fails to sell. Thoughts, feelings, visions, 40+ years worth hungry for their light. A new master to feed, far beyond the junk in capitalism’s teeth, my brush with new purpose breaks an 11 year silence with a roar. And I will feast for the next 40 years, as long as it takes until I feel satisfied.
Feet with Light Bulb - 2022 (Arousal From the Banal Series)