Structures #61 © 2007 23" x 32"
Some years ago someone asked me what I was willing to sacrifice for my art. My first thought was that I wasn’t willing to sacrifice anything. My thinking was that when presented with a choice I would pick what I wanted and the result wasn’t a "sacrifice" but was instead simply a choice. Sure I was choosing to forgo some things in exchange for time or money for my art but it wasn’t a "sacrifice". That sounds so negative to me. So I looked up the definition and sure enough sacrifice is probably the right word.
Sacrifice:
a: destruction or surrender of something for the sake of something else b : something given up or lost
Any time I make a choice to work on my art or focus some aspect of my life on my art I’m sacrificing the opportunity to place that focus somewhere else. I generally have no problem making these choices and they feel right. It’s okay with me there are things I don’t have time or money or energy to do because of the priority I give my art.
In several recent posts (here, here, here and here) I have discussed my need to work as a software engineer to pay my bills.
The stereotypical sacrifice artists are expected to make is that of living as a starving artist while waiting for the art to take off. I’m clearly not doing this. And for ridiculous reasons there are times when I feel as if I am not a legitimate artist because I’m not willing to make such a sacrifice. Which is just silly because there is no right way to be an artist.
I choose to work the fulltime well paying software engineering job with excellent benefits because it allows me to focus 100% on creating art I want to make, not art that will put food on my table.
In exchange for the freedom to grow as an artist in any direction I chose and the luxury of not worrying about health insurance, 401k funds, and my mortgage, I have sacrificed my time. Not just studio time but also time for just about everything else in my life: friends, family, house, recreation, etc.
I think there are times it sounds like I regret or resent this decision and that is not the case. Years ago I came up with a plan on how to reach my end goal of becoming the artist I wanted to be. This was the sacrifice I was willing to make, that I happily make every day.
The decision to sell my work this year is not a change in direction but part of the same over all plan that will help me achieve my long term artistic goals.
Admittedly there are days I wish I could just win the lottery and the past few months I’ve been a bit restless but I know the choice to continue working until my children are out of high school is the right choice for me at this time.
If all goes well I only have 7 more years to go, which really isn’t very much in the long run. I’ve been at my day job for 5 years now so I’m almost half way done. I just have to keep my focus and not forget the long term goals and the sacrifice doesn’t feel like a sacrifice at all. Just a really great choice I made to live the life I want and make the art I want to make.
Structures #61 is the second piece in the grouping of 3 I want to show this week. It was also completed last year. Below is a detail of the quilting stitches as they comprise a major portion of the design in this piece.
Detail of Structures #61:
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{ 26 comments }
I really like the criss-crossing/overlapping narrow bands in this one. I don’t remember that in any of your other pieces.
Hi Lisa
I thought you might be interested in the work of aboriginal artist Kathleen Petyarre which can be viewed at the start of this online catalogue. I came across this gallery only this afternoon and was struck by the angular parallelogram grid that you have both used. There’s lots of other interesting art work on the gallery too.
By the way, I like the shading effect that you have achieved by using different coloured threads.
Hi –
We just returned from a couple days in Iceland, and all the vertical lines in the houses there made me think of your piece from a couple month previous – it echoed the siding on a barn… They use a good deal of sheet metal siding with the ripples running vertically. The shading in the low sun is wonderful.
I’ve been reading your blog for a couple months now. I’m grateful for your straightforward good sense on the balance between art, life and earning a living. Your growth as an artist is illuminating. I am still working at the beginning of the process, making things steadily and honing my techniques and vision. I appreciate your thoughts on selling your work, and other marketing issues. The pointer to the gallery gentleman was most informative.
Cheers and fortitude –
lee
Could you share your binding technique sometime in the future??? Love how the edges of your quilts are so clean looking – it doesn’t detract the way traditional binding can. Thanks!
This post is very inspiring, and I find your choices impressive. And I am even more impressed that you create such beautiful work AND hold down a demanding job. It’s been about 2 years since I was finally able to step away from holding down a full-time job. And I am so grateful for that. But that choice comes with sacrifices as well – mostly financial. I don’t have health insurance, our car really needs replacing, and I’m not sure we’ll ever own our own home, but working just never really worked out for me, and I have the emotional scars to prove it, so being free of that is worth the sacrifice. (If we had children, I’m sure my choices would have been different.)
I recently read that the origin of “sacrifice” is the Latin sacrum facere – “to make holy.”
Is it about sacrifice? Or just priorities. I mean, life is messy and complex, and there’s never enough time for everything. No matter what you want to do — art, vacations, golf — it will require juggling and compromise to make it possible. I make art, so I have to find a way to fit it into my life, which is full of with kids, mortgage, etc. If it wasn’t art, I’m sure it’d be something else.
I love this piece. It reminds me of the pencil drawings you showed some time back.
Mechelle – someone else asked me the same question and I’ve been promising for about a year to do a photo tutorial on my process. I worked on it again last night a bit so look for it in a week or two.
Hi Lisa, like this new mono-chromatic work (is that the right term?) Would love to see it in the real. You know I’ll always support your decision to work a different job and be an artist, because that’s what I do.
I don’t think of it as sacrifice however. To me the world is too fluid and complex to allow myself to say either/or. I’m always re-analyzing my work patterns, and I’m definitely not as productive as you, but trying to become more so. Have you heard of the third eye? There’s a poem somewhere I read about confronted with two choices, the third thing is unexpected, but can bring surprise solution. Sometimes I think we look at two choices, but a third option might bring resolution.
Pam and Daniel – I used to be like the 2 of you – I didn’t view my choices as sacrifices – but the meaning of the word sacrifice makes it pretty clear that is what they are because I do have to give up things to make the art fit. I don’t regret the choices but the reality is something has to give.
Pam – I agree – and I’ve looked at more than 2 choices. And I continue to explore new ideas on a frequent basis.
Brenda – thanks for the pointer to the aboriginal artists – there is some amazing work to be seen on that website.
Lee – thank you for the kind words and interesting imagery thinking about the houses you saw.
Angela – if I hated my job I would definitely look to get out of it but I have pretty much the perfect job. You were smart to follow your instincts- some things aren’t worth suffering.
Wanda and Olga – thank you! I’ll be writing more about this quilt soon.
The wisest thing my brother ever shared with me was something he told his young son: We can have anything we want. We just can’t have everything we want.
This really helped me see the big picture, not feel sorry for myself and decide what was the most important to me.
It appears you’ve done the same.
I like that – to make holy. And “We can have anything we want. We just can’t have everything we want.” Both very wise.
I guess for me sacrifice is often about making choices with the greater good (including mine) or long terms goals at the front of my mind.
~ Diane Clancy
http://www.dianeclancy.com/blog
Yes, Lisa. Love the new work.
And this is an interesting question that needs to be asked of artists. When we make certain choices, we often sacrifice in order to get there. We sacrifice living in a certain place or taking vacations.
These days, I believe artists are more mainstreamed–less apt to make the difficult sacrifices so many made in the past. But it’s still important to realize that an artist usually has to make some sacrifices in order to compete on a higher level. There are too many working artists out there who are doing the same in order to focus on their art.
You do an amazing amount of work for someone with another job. I honestly don’t know how you do it.
You wrote: “I choose to work the fulltime well paying software engineering job with excellent benefits because it allows me to focus 100% on creating art I want to make, not art that will put food on my table. In exchange for the freedom to grow as an artist in any direction I chose and the luxury of not worrying about health insurance, 401k funds, and my mortgage,”
Lisa, I am right there with you. In fact, I am a member of an online artists group and we were discussing this very topic the other day. Another member was balking at having to get a full time job. She said she didn’t want to “sell out” and leave her creative dreams in the dust. I told her I don’t see it this way at all. Even though I was a Bohemian artist for many years, I finally started teaching full time 15 years ago. Yes, it takes up time. However, it offers me something even more important. FREEDOM!! I am now free to create my work with ample money to buy supplies. I am free to create my work without worrying if it sells or not. I am free of frets about paying my monthly bills. I am free to create the art I want to make without having to bow to the demands of the market. I don’t see this as a sacrifice at all.
Sheree Rensel
http://www.shereerensel.blogspot.com/
Hi Lisa,
I remember that I had a painting teacher who posed that question to his students,”What are you willing to sacrifice for your art? ” It’s been a major part of my thinking ever since. And like you, I see it as choices, which no matter what we do, we are always faced with choices.
Your new quilt has a feel of an aerial view of plowed and planted fields, crissed-crossed with highways, but in a more organic way. I enjoy the patterning, like herringbone and the muted tones.
Joann Wells Greenbaum
Hello Lisa,
I was blown away by the timing of this blog. A friend has been preaching to me for months now about how she is NOT wanting to take on a full time job because she wants to “find herself” with her art. And how she thinks I am sellng out by working in a corporate setting. However, in the meantime she and her family are suffering. She does not have the freedom to think with a basically untroubled mind. And it shows with what comes across on her canvas. And for me, working and painting gives me another avenue of people who are able to view my art first hand and it is beginning to open more doors. Perhaps the feeling of sacrafice is nothing more than another form of feeling quilty….all for the wrong reasons.
i was blessed with an opportunity to not work for 9 months which gave me a lot of time to work on my art. when money became an issue i went back to work and must admit i loved the freedom of not having that worry. my ultimate goal would be to have my art support me and am finding that working put a big dent in my energy to think about my art business, but i preferred not having to worry about my finances. it is an ongoing evaluation for me of where to put my energy and focus. and im with the rest of your readers who don’t know how you do both! kudos to you.
~Sue O’Kieffe
Great post. My self-taught artist friend wrote software programs for the govt. She has a very mathematical mind and it comes out in her work. All the years she spent in her day job fed her unique voice.
I checked out your website. Love your work. Especially gallery 3.
I was so glad to hear that I am not the only one struggling with this. I don’t have a choice but to take a regular job. We live far out in the country. And while I thought the art would be the best route because of the distance to town, it put alot of pressure on me to market, which also costs. So I decided to get out of the house, be around people, work on my art for fun and one day, because I have had fun with it, can allow myself to be more creative rather than worrying about being able to pay the bills. I also think that the more we get out, the more we see and the creativity just comes.
Great perspective! Yes, let’s smash that myth of the starving artist. There’s nothing wrong with working on the side, and in fact it can be a far more responsible, adult behavior. Strangely, I get criticism for taking the opposite decision and chucking in my job to paint full time. I guess I am a typical ‘starving artist’. I’m hardly starving but consumer society just doesn’t get it. I live on very little, have given up most luxuries and people seem shocked. To me the sacrifice is worth it. I get to go in my studio every day and paint! I get to cycle the coast for me work. Okay, there’s the business side too but actually I quite like most of that as a contrast. I love the freedom. My situation is much different to many, as I chose to do this only because I have only myself to account for.
Whether we decide to keep working, go for a middle option, or decide to give up everything – artists can work whichever way is best for them. :)
Count me in as one who has struggled with the working full-time situation. I’ve gone from resenting my job (in a way), even though it’s a job I enjoy, to respecting it. I love this new way of thinking – that instead of holding me back, it’s actually allowing me freedom from financial worries, while I build my art business. Love that.
Wow. I can’t believe the timing. I’m reading this right now at a time when, as a responsible parent, I am in search of full time work but kind of dread getting it because I fear that my time making art will suffer. And making art makes me happy! After reading all the comments on this, I realize that I need to quit the whining and worrying and just get that job and deal with it! Lately I haven’t produced the quantity and quality that I’d like to anyway because I’ve been busy dealing with (and worrying about) the bills. Right now I think having the peace of mind that finances are taken care of is more important than producing that masterpiece. After all, life is a journey, an adventure. Worrying about it ruins the story!
Love to see the details of #61! I agree with Joann about the farmed fields. I’m just “planting the seeds of a series of paintings of the quilted midwestern farmland. (I fly across the midwest a couple times a year. You’ll know me; I’m the geek with the camera who has to have a window seat not over the wing.)
Ditto all the support for the split personalities. I’ve been wrestling with this for many years, though as time does by I’m getting better at fine-tuning the dial. I love my other business (I’m a massage therapist) and I’ll probably never give it up completely, but would prefer to do that less than 40/week.
Even though by definition it may fit, the word “sacrifice” has seemingly negative connotations. When I had no passion for the non-art job, I would have called it a sacrifice. With every step (i.e. other job) I’ve taken in the last 20 years, I get a little closer to finding the right combination that feuls me.
I prefer to see it as a balance.
Thank you for your delicious food for thought!!
What a beautiful piece of work Lisa. I love the interssecting lines and bands within the piece. The quilting is beautiful, quilting is what really makes the process rewarding to me, I love quilting lines. I’ve been under the weather for the past week and a half…and so good to come back online to such beautiful work and a great conversation.
I agree with the conclusion that you’ve come up with here. I think sometimes we look at sacrifice as a bad, or negative word, when in actually it isn’t. It just clearly displays priorities.
I look at my life for example, my husband and I have chosen for me to be a homemaker, and live off of his salary. We knew this going into getting married almost ten years ago, so we set our priorties when we were a young couple so that this lifestyle would be possible. For example, we made due with one car, even though we could afford more, we lived off only his salary even though I was working so that we would not be accustomed to or depended on two salaries to survive, and we also made wise real estate decisions so we could secure a nice home for ourselves once we started a family.
Once the time came for us to start a family and me stay home, the only sacrifice we had to make was the things we used my money for, eating-out, movies, buying “toys,” etc. In turn, we now have two cars with no car payment, a really nice newer home, and two wonderful pre-scholars. Sure, we don’t eat out, we live on a budget, and have to be careful to not over-spend. However we are most happy as a family.
I see your decision as making a choice, a very responsible choice to make sure that your children are well taken care of, and that you have a secure present and future. Imagine how wonderful retirement will be, not having to sacrifice then. Like the previous commenter Tracy said, you just have it in balance.
The detail of Structures #61 reminds me of your pencil drawings… :)
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