Happy New Year!!!!
As this new year begins I thought I might take a little time to re-evaluate what it is that I want from it. I know that I want to expand the audience that my art reaches, that is a given, but who are the people I want to reach and what do i want it to say to them?
You know, when I started my art career some 25 years ago, I had a dream. I had a dream that I would be the next Andy Warhol or Keith Haring or by looking at my work the next Nagel. Yet, as I grow older I find myself wanting to be more... me. I have this yearning to explode-not in a negative way but I feel that I am full of emotion and ideas and it seems as if it wells up like some geyser being powered by the building steam working it's way to the surface until it spews forth covering everything with the mist of something that had been hiding so far deep below the surface.
I used to think that my rights as a gay man were my cause, that I had to prove to myself and to the world that I was worthy. Worthy of life and the freedom to love and share my life with the person I was attracted to. I have always taken comfort in the accepting arms of my GLBT community and they have never let me down. I have used my art to take a stand against oppression, to raise awareness, to feed the hungry, shelter the homeless, and fight diseases. I have had celebrities, authors, governors and sports stars and singers autograph the portraits I have done of them. I have had audiences with people that I would have never dreamed in a million years would have any reason to speak to me and when I see them in the media I am in awe of the experience, but I still feel like I haven't accomplished much. I still feel like I have something to say. Something bigger and much more important.
I have done pieces that have to do with religion and it's not that. I know where my faith lies, I am looking for something else. I have a well of feelings and experiences that are bubbling below the surface just waiting for a crack to give it the opportunity to find it's way. I would like to think that the military mural is the beginning of that but I am just not sure.
I guess I will have to keep my eyes and heart open and leave myself available to the opportunities that lay ahead.
Until next time......Make this year the year YOU did something about it.
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