Art through the eyes of a child

I am recooperating from the festival at JBWoods.  Was a lot of fun, wonderful to see so many painting friends…

Sunday I went to visit my 6 year old niece.  I need my “fix” with her once a week.  This little girl makes my soul dance.  I just enjoy her so much.  When I arrived she had two friends over.  She came running over to me, wanted me to pick her up….. “You guys, this is my auntie… she brings me paint brushes and paints and teaches me how to paint”.   I smiled.  How nice that she identifies me with that and not “the bitchy auntie!” lol.  Anyway a bit later we were outside drawing with chalk on the driveway.  “Draw a sun, draw a house, draw a cat….. and on and on”.   So as her and her little girlfriend were busy “filling in the leaves and lines” I heard Brianna say “My auntie teaches art all over the WORLD!”… I said, Um, no lovebug, not the world, but yes, I do teach art.  She said “Well Auntie, you are the bestest artist I know!”… And do you know, for that moment and the rest of the day, I felt pretty darned important in this big old world.   It was just wonderful.

Harry Chapin wrote and sang a song once “Flowers are Red”…It talks about how we conform children into what we think.  So if they have an art teacher who is rigid and only allows them to see what they see, they are in fact, severing or at minimum squelching this childs creativity.  This can be done in so many ways, not just by an art teacher.

My niece has quite the imagination, I have to tell you.  She tells long tails and her eyes roll and get big, and her arms flare and her hands flinch… she’s quite the little actress.  I find it humorous.  She also has a pretend sister named “Flower” who runs a beauty salon out of her parents bathroom!    She knows reality… this isn’t something that I would be concerned with, this is her imagination, her creativity very alive and well, and its beautiful!   It is so refreshing, comical, hopeful to me.  She is uninhibited, not stagnated or judgemental.  She is just “being”… and it is the most beautiful thing in the world to me right now.

Just paint!  Just design!  Just be one in the moment, and so what if its not a masterpiece?  If no one else but you likes it?  Does it matter????   Whats the difference between a good photographer and a bad one?  The good one throws away his bad work!  lol.  Okay, that is not slamming the many talented photographers that I am in awe of their vision, their eye, and how they are able to capture it with a lense…. it was simply saying…  Not everything we create is going to be good, liked, or a masterpiece!  And it shouldn’t be.   But we can certainly learn from the experience!