kellyangard.com » musings

the nature of art

kellya — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 19:21:00 +0000

As an artist, there are some pieces i create which are so personal, so poignant, so evocative, i find it difficult to share them with the world when they are finished. as much as a part of me wants to share my favorite and most meaningful work, i end up keeping these works to myself…waiting for the time i feel enough distance from them, separated from them personally. i wait until i feel i can put “them” — and therefore, myself — out there for the world to see. this one took a year and a half…

For some, this may simply be an image of two anonymous people captured in a moment…nothing more, nothing less. and that is fine; it is what it is to the viewer.

But for me, this work, this image speaks of so much more. For me, this image is a bank of a thousand thoughts…a catalyst for heart-breaking stories or song lyrics yet to be written.
For me, it whispers to a curious mind…i want to know more.
i want to imagine more.
i want to create more.
i want to be more.

monday musings…A New Perspective

kellya — Mon, 07 May 2007 14:32:00 +0000

“head over heels”
© 2007 kelly angard

“Her job was to turn everything upside down to see what might fall out.”
- David Leitch

There are so many thoughts running through my head lately, I find it difficult to form a cohesive thought, let alone paragraph. Rest assured, it’s all good…because great things happen when we are able to look at life and people and experiences from a different perspective.

I dare each of you to gain a new perspective of something that is utterly familiar: sit in a different chair in your living room, drive a different way home from work or look at your face in the mirror with one eye closed. Better yet…go outside, lie in the grass and look up toward the sky…and tell me what you see!

monday musings…Give Yourself Credit

kellya — Tue, 01 May 2007 04:43:00 +0000

art every day…4/30
“looking”
© 2007 kelly angard

I recently realized that June 1st will mark two years of blogging…two years! When I started my blog, I didn’t know anyone else who had one, nor did I have a “plan” for my blog; I did what I usually do…I just jumped in and started swimming! Since I was feeling nostalgic, I read over some of my earliest entries and felt like I was looking back in a old journal; amused at what I decided to post and surprised at some of my early insights. I thought this entry was worth re-posting because no matter how long we’ve been creating art (or blogging for that matter!), it’s easy to take what we do for granted. Maybe now is a good time to take a break…and give yourself a bit of extra credit!

Do you give yourself enough credit for what you do?
Creating art requires us to think outside the box, whether it’s about the objects or elements we select, how we use our supplies, or the way we assemble it. It requires us to creatively combine unrelated thoughts and materials with nothing but a vision of what we think we’re going to create or believe we can create. It takes a leap of faith.

Do you give yourself enough credit for what you create?
I’m not talking about how good of an artist you are, I’m talking about the fact that you sit down and face the blank canvas, paper, etc.! Creating anything takes courage; it takes belief in yourself to know something, even if you feel that you don’t know enough. I think it says a lot about the human spirit of each and every person…despite the unknown, we know we must move forward, no matter the fear or anxiety, we must create art…and so we take a leap of faith.

Do you give yourself enough credit for what you know?
We show our humility and our sense of humanity when we put our art out to be seen and make ourselves vulnerable to others’ opinions and criticism. We are at our most fragile when we display what has come from inside our hearts and minds, and we show our belief in humanity when we do; believing most will be honest but not brutal. It takes courage to be able to hear what someone has to say and not have it reflect how we feel about ourselves. We must believe in ourselves enough to know what we know, and we must believe in ourselves enough to take that leap…

**********
Now it’s time to give yourself credit for all that trivial knowledge you learned in 5th Grade!!!
Here are the answers to “Are you Smarter than a Fifth Grader” quiz I posted last Monday…
1. C
2. B
3. A
4. B
5. meter
6. C
7. C
8. A
9. 36
10. inside
11. Katmandu
12. B
13. A
14. 1,000
15. true
16. C
17. B
18. C
19. 150 degrees
20. A

(i missed five…#4, #11, #13, #14, #20)

monday musings…Unexpected Sadness

kellya — Mon, 16 Apr 2007 23:13:00 +0000

“entwined”
© 2007 kelly angard

Everything connects to everything;
therefore, as we change, the world cannot but change with us.
- Marianne Williamson

I started out writing my “monday musing” post this morning about unexpected kindness…but I stopped as soon as I heard about the shooting at Virginia Tech. Living here in Colorado, not far from the sites of two horrible school shootings, news of another campus tragedy hits too close to home…and a familiar sense of pain and shock reverberates throughout the community. I just couldn’t bring myself to go on about a few recent acts of unexpected kindess I’ve experienced lately knowing that there were a number of families who were surely experiencing one of the worst days of their lives.

I think that when something like this happens, we all ask “why”? We struggle trying to make sense out of the senseless…and wonder, “what is the lesson here”? I look at my middle school-aged daughter and realize that this is the third school shooting she has heard about in the past six or seven months. And I don’t know what to say to her so that she will feel safe going to school tomorrow.

Maybe my original idea of writing about unexpected kindess wouldn’t have been so bad. Maybe it’s what we need to hear about and remind ourselves of at a time like this so that we don’t look at our neighbors with paranoia or live under a cloud of fear. I don’t know what the “right” thing to do is…all I know is that I am so very sad…and even more thankful for the unexpected kindesses I’ve experienced lately.

monday musings…An Artist’s Work

kellya — Tue, 10 Apr 2007 01:39:00 +0000

“seeking the light”
© 2007 kelly angard

Almost every Monday, I leave my studio at some point during the day and head to Starbucks where I write my “Monday Musings” post. I do this because my mind seems to clear of it’s usual thought processes the minute I change environments; ideas/topics somehow find their way to the surface with ease.

But today, it just didn’t happen. I went to Starbucks…and goodness knows, I wrote (pages and pages!)…but a viable idea/topic just didn’t surface. Sure, I filled pages with words…but in my mind, there’s “reporting” and then there’s “writing”, i.e., having something to say. And I prefer to post the latter…

I’d like to believe that the absence of brilliant content (ha!) in today’s post is because I ran into a few familiar faces; it’s always easy to blame lack of focus on distractions…but the fact of the matter is that today, I couldn’t put together a cohesive paragraph for the life of me!!!

Sure, I could go back in my journal and transcribe something I wrote last week or even last month…but why? What value would that be to anyone…especially myself? (Because here in my crafty little world, I am the queen of my own kingdom which means it’s all about me!) Seriously though, looking to the past for today’s post just doesn’t seem right or real…so I’d rather just be honest and tell those of you who do read my blog posts that today, I just don’t have “it”…but I am still putting pen to paper (and fingers to keyboard).

There’s a great quote on the wall of my studio which I believe speaks specifically to days like today:

“The artist is nothing without the gift.
But the gift is nothing without the work.”
- Emile Zola

Work…one of my favorite four-letter words. I think that our “work’ is not necessarily what we do on our good days…rather I think the “work” is what we do on the days when we feel like we just don’t have “it”; when ideas aren’t flowing and all we see around us are too many pieces of art that still need to be finished.

I believe that these are the days we need to give ourselves an extra serving of patience and have faith that somehow, we will find our way through the creative wasteland…and instead of giving in to frustration and apathy, we face the challenge head on, and sit down and write or paint or whatever we do when we create. Who knows what might happen? Maybe we’ll sit down without a thought of what to say or do and something good will come out of it…because whenever we embark on a creative journey, we rarely end up in the same place that we started.

monday musings…One for the Road

kellya — Tue, 20 Mar 2007 16:13:00 +0000

My monday musing is being posted on Tuesday this week because of a sick child at home yesterday…such is life sometimes! :)

When was the last time you said to yourself, “Some day I’d really like to…(fill in the blank)”? How long ago did you state your dream? Have you done the thing you’ve dreamed of doing? Whether you have or not, we all have dreams; things we think about, long for and dream about doing…
if only we had the time.
if only we were good enough.
if only we had enough money.
if only we were younger…blah, blah, blah.

Tell those things to Burt Munro, and he’d probably pat you on the back, look up at the sky and give a quiet, little chuckle. And then, with his utterly engaging yet humble personality, he’d ask you, “What were those reasons again?”

I rented the movie The World’s Fastest Indian which stars Anthony Hopkins this past weekend. To be honest, I wasn’t all that excited to see it; the title didn’t really speak to me and I hadn’t seen the trailer, but I love Sir Anthony. He always brings so much depth to the characters he plays, so I thought I’d give it a chance…and I am so glad that I did.

This small independent film is one of those cinematic treasures…one of those true stories which stays with you for days, sitting at the edge of your consciousness, reminding you of the dreams you have yet to fulfill..

The basic premise of the film is about a real-life New Zealander named Burt Munro, who spent 25 years fine tuning a 1920 Indian motorcycle with hopes of setting a land speed record on it. In 1967, at 68 years old, he risks everything…including his life…to achieve his dream. But this movie is so much more than that…it’s so much more than a man who is driven by a passion for speed or about following his dream.

It is about believing in oneself, no matter what others say…
…it’s about knowing one’s truth and only having to look inside one’s self to believe it
…it’s about not knowing the outcome, but enjoying every step of the journey
…it’s about inspiring others without any intent of being an inspiration
…it’s about the difference of living a life and being truly alive
…it’s about being fearless

Utterly fearless. Burt explains the reasons behind his fearless nature in an exchange with a young neighbor boy:

Tom: Aren’t you scared you’ll kill yourself if you crash?
Burt Munro: No… You live more in five minutes on a bike like this going flat out than some people live in a lifetime.

Sounds like the power of now to me; a deep understanding of what it means to truly live in the moment. So now you can probably understand why I love and am recommending this movie…I mean, how could one not love watching a true story about a person who openly embraced and experienced the power of now?

Oh…and here’s one more for the road…for your week…enjoy it. Live it.

“If you don’t go when you want to go,
when you do go, you’ll find you’ve gone.”
- Burt Munro

monday musings…The Power of Now, Part 2

kellya — Mon, 12 Mar 2007 20:44:00 +0000

Ever since writing “The Power of Now” last Monday, the concept of being fully present and in the moment has been at the forefront of my mind. Thinking about living in the “now”, about the power of this very moment, led me to realize something big…something really big; something I wasn’t prepared for…

I realized how many decisions I make out of fear. Fear? Yes, fear! Now I’m not talking about everyday fears…I’m talking about fear in disguise. Fear that doesn’t really look like fear on the outside. Fear that on the surface looks like apathy, procrastination, restlessness…or motivation, organization and goal-setting.

How can this be? How can fear look like something positive (motivation, organization, goal-setting) yet still be negative? Let me explain…

The action of motivation, organization or goal-setting is not in itself negative. However, it can become negative if the intent behind the action is driven by fear. If we are motivated to take action because we don’t want to suffer a negative consequence, or because we’re concerned about what someone else will think about us or because we want to influence another person’s actions, the intent behind the action is based on fear. Here’s an example of the difference between positive and negative intent behind an action:

I pay my taxes on time because I want to pay my bills and be a responsible citizen.
vs.
I pay my taxes because I don’t want to get into trouble or be charged with a late fee.

The first sentence shows the intent behind the action is positive, i.e., the way I want to live my life. The second sentence, however, demonstrates that the intent behind the same action is driven by fear, i.e., wanting to avoid a negative consequence.

While this may seem like semantics to some, and utterly simplistic and obvious to another, it’s neither of those things to those of us whose unconscious minds are ingrained with fear! There are so many ways that fear can seep into our minds and affect both our conscious and unconscious decisions.

I’m actually quite amused at the fact that I thought I was pretty aware of fear and it’s power, especially since I’ve been researching and writing my next book, “Creating Without Fear” for the past year! I have definitely learned about the benefits of fear…it is a necessary emotion in our lives which deters us from danger and serves as an internal warning signa. And it can be a huge source of energy as well as a strong and powerful motivating force. However, when fear is a constant, unconscious companion in our lives, it can not only shape the intent behind our actions, it can also prevent us from truly living our lives.

When this occurs, we usually suffer in one way or another, i.e., addiction, phobias, etc. which in turn prevents us from living our best lives. How ironic that the emotion which can prevent us from suffering (i.e., warn us of danger) can also cause us to suffer!!!

What I personally found really interesting was when I made a list of things that I would consider to be positive and negative traits about myself. While I could clearly see the fear factor behind my negative traits, I was utterly surprised and amazed to realize that many of my positive qualities have also been developed and fine-tuned by fear!!! Here are my two lists:

On the positive side, I have always been the type of person who:
…is really good in an emergency
…loves to problem-solve
…works best on deadlines
…can juggle many projects at one time
…can think on her feet.

On the other hand, I tend to:
…procrastinate
…feel restless and/or bored easily
…get myself overwhelmed
…be a perfectionist
…worry about what others think of me
…not take good care of myself, i.e., eat well, get enough rest, etc.

Oh…My…Gosh!!!
Talk about a monumental light-bulb moment!!! This simple realization paralyzed me…and I mean utterly paralyzed me for awhile. I saw, for the first time, just how deep fear is embedded in my mind.

I felt a sudden rush of questions…so many questions…BIG questions, like:
If I change the intent behind my actions, will I still be good at those things?
Who would I be if I am not a person driven by fear?
What would I base my decisions on?
Would I still be able to create?
How am I going to change the intent behind my actions when there’s so many actions I take every single day???

Can you imagine how overwhelming this was to digest?

I quickly realized that I had to just sit with all of these questions. And sit with the fact that I did not have, or know, the answers!!! I wondered how in the heck I was going to make such a huge paradigm shift? How would I be able to go from…

Exercising because I don’t want to get out of shape
to
Exercising because I want to be as healthy as I can be

or…

Being punctual so that I won’t disappoint my daughter
to
Being punctual because I want to live a low-stress life
???

Coming to terms with all this meant that I had to realize that if I want to change the intent behind my actions/decisions, I will have to redefine myself…redefine who I am and become clear about the reasons I do the things that I do.

After a few thought-provoking hours, I came to the conclusion that like so many other challenges set before me, I would just have to take this journey one step (or one decision!) at a time. Which means that my new mantra will come in quite handy, won’t it?
Yes, I believe that I will truly see the value in “the power of now” while on this journey…

monday musings…The Power of Now

kellya — Mon, 05 Mar 2007 15:02:00 +0000

The power of NOW…this very moment.

These words have been ringing in my ears the past few days; moved me to create the art journal piece above and lulled me into a semi-hypnotic investigative state of writing. I even typed the words into Google to see what would come up…

First, I found a Eckhart Tolle’s site because he wrote a book titled The Power of Now. His site led me to another site which led me to yet another…until I stopped at Steve Pavlina’s site and read his interpretation of The Power of Now. Good stuff there…truth. A different way of thinking; a new paradigm.

So what is it that determines when the “old” ends and the “new” begins? Especially when “it” is not a date on a calendar; when it is a small, quiet, internal event that changes the way we see things…including ourselves? What is “it” that prompts the finishing of one chapter…and the beginning of a new one?

I’m not sure that I can define what the “it” is…but I do know that I’ve felt as if I’ve been on the brink of “it” over the past year; almost like everything I’ve been through was necessary in order for me to arrive at this moment. There is an undeniable and subtle excitement which reminds me of the first day of school (with new supplies in hand of course!) mixed with a touch of anxiety over the unknown and a twinge of sadness for having to let go of old thoughts and paradigms…and even, people. Letting go is the hardest part for me…especially of things that are familiar and comfortable even though I’ve outgrown them (like a favorite pair of jeans…or friends), but I’ve found that it is necessary so that I can free myself up and be open for what is to come.

Possibilities…new beginnings.
There’s so much in the power of now…in this very moment.

monday musings…Free to Be

kellya — Mon, 26 Feb 2007 20:43:00 +0000

Freedom.
…to think and express and create.
…to choose and decide and ponder.
…to question and seek answers.
…to fail and learn.

Freedom does not have ties to fear that tethers it to the ground.
Rather, freedom soars high, determining it’s own direction, charting it’s own course.

Yet freedom…true freedom…requires responsibility.
and action.

“freedom lies in being bold…”
Robert Frost

What is your definition of freedom?

monday musings…A Self-centered Journey

kellya — Tue, 20 Feb 2007 03:59:00 +0000

The self-portrait journey I’ve challenged myself with over the past year has turned out to be quite an interesting and insightful experience…one filled with anxiety, trepidation and surprise. I’ve realized that self-portraits are so much more than simply snapping a photo…it’s the baring of one’s soul; knowing that what is captured in less than a second is most likely going to reveal what is going on inside, no matter how much we’d like to think that our truth doesn’t show. It always shows. And because of that, I’ve had to push myself to work through the fear of revealing my inner turmoil and worse yet, my weaknesses.

This became more evident the other day when I looked at my set of self-portraits and realized that it took me six months to be able to look directly at the camera and show my entire face. Even more symbolic was the fact that my very first self-portrait was of my back…quite a statement as to the depth of my fear. Over time, as I became more comfortable “seeing” who I was at any given moment, I found myself emerging from behind my hair, showing more of my face and on rare occassions, even looking directly at the camera!

I don’t know that I would have delved as deep into self-portraiture if I didn’t have a digital camera. There’s a indispensible safety net built into every digital camera: the almighty and revered “delete” button! And I have no problem using it; quick and often. I like the fact that undesirable images can disappear as quickly as they appeared, way before they sear into my memory and I begin to focus on all those parts that I wish were different. I’m certainly not denying that the unattractive parts are there…I’ve just found that it’s quite a bit healthier (and more enjoyable) to focus on the good stuff. Nonetheless, it is a humbling ride…one which I am grateful for having the courage to take. It is a journey which I intend to follow until I reach my destination…a place that I can see off in the distance; a warm and welcoming place called “acceptance”.

***

for another musing on the growing popularity of self-portraiture, here’s a link a piece I wrote early last year: The Self Portrait: Self-Aggrandizing or Self-Expression?