Thoughts on the Healing Nature of Art

Glass and Clay class are always on wednesdays for me. For two years I have looked forward to the oasis of friendship and creativity while I was coping with three major illnesses. Some days just getting out of bed, and getting there three blocks away, sitting through a class was major achievement. As I listed to the laughter and companionship of the group, it became a magnate of positivism for me. Art has healed me in so many ways and places in my life.

Crafts were never my world, I have always been a fine artist. It is my university training, my career, and my major art work. But, from these people in my class and trying something new, that I had an antipathy towards, I have opened my world to a larger universe. I appreciate craft and those who are skilled in perfecting a technique with persistence and study. For me creativity rules and I am open to the all media and not perfecting one skill. For me art is intellectual thinking, discovery, experimentation, and creation.

I look at my fellow classmates in glass and clay and see their joy in creation and learning a new skill. I see art moving in peoples lives and adding to it. I am a peace with that. I think in art appreciation of each others world is important. Not everyone will become a famous artist, not everyone will become a gallery showing craftsperson, not everyone will have an installation at the MOMA, but we can all be encompassed by the large umbrella of art and creation. If you love realism is it necessary to think modern art is stupid and for the unskilled? If you are a fine artist is it necessary to look down at crafts. I would say understanding would be of help to both views. Whenever anyone criticizes modern art, as a university trained artist, it shows a lack of education to me. When an artist can't accept any thing but realism because they are skilled at representational art, it tells me they need to open their minds a bit. It is not necessary to reject something to make ourselves feel better or more superior about what we do in our own art. I am speaking from as a recovering art snob. Lets all be more understanding, more welcoming of all art and artists. Art makes the world a better place, a more peaceful place, and a place where people can be uplifted not trod down!