by Elizabeth Monks Hack
February, one year ago. The Cypress Gallery reopened its doors in celebration of a months long, much needed remodel. “Welcome back art!” I wrote. Chris Jeszeck had mounted a bounteous show, a riot of color, form, shape and technique. February, two years ago. The gallery celebrated the month of love with the show “An Occasion for Red.” Gallery artists submitted heartfelt, joyous works that set the walls on fire. I still remember Tonya Shultz's expressionist vase of flowers, “Heritage Rose,” with its background and foreground colors throbbing in harmony. February 2021. The gallery is closed, for the second time this year. Not because we artists have lost our mojo. It is due to a pandemic that has taken its toll on art as well as people. We open our doors by appointment only, showing works that have been up since the last show. Some artists have used this time to open new creative pathways, while others of us really struggle to keep our mojo working.
Perhaps the month of February, with its shimmering Valentine phantoms made visible only in the garish commercial spots open to us, is a good time to consider the depths of our love for art. To consider origins of inspiration and motivation. Whew, that's heavy. I'm getting tired already. Voices of the pandemic pundits ring in my ears, providing me with so many reasons to stop. “You're not lazy — you're stressed. That's why being at home during the Coronavirus pandemic is making you feel so tired,” read numerous articles. Experts in psychology inform us that extreme tiredness is the body’s natural reaction to anxiety and trauma. Psychologist Dr. Jen Hartstein* explains, “We are on emotional overload. Many of us are feeling anxious, which activates our sympathetic nervous system. That system is responsible for our fight-or-flight response, and for triggering our adrenaline. The stress we are all under leads to some adrenal fatigue, which causes our bodies to need a break, and we automatically shut down.” Well, that's helpful. I will buck up and force myself to keep the valves open. I'll harness some energy to explore the heart of art-making, because art is worth fighting for.
Why? Oh my goodness. Why do I make art? Why do you make art? The pandemic has been a time of relative isolation, as if we are all in a tiny spacecraft only capable of relating to the outside world through an artificial, electrical pulse. We subconsciously interpret the admonition to stay-at-home to avoid contagion as a directive to remain in our figurative space capsules until it's over. What is missing? Touch, smell, vibrations, resonance, each other. Paint strokes. The essentials of human experience. The resonance of color, the magenta bougainvillea ablaze in the sunlight, the sapphire of an ocean. The thrill of an outstretched hand, the shock of blood drawn in a fight. To see a work of art by a great artist in the flesh. Sure, we can see it all on TV. See it digitally. Ah, but to experience experience in person, to pick up the sensations and absorb them in your bloodstream. The artist has a real need to respond, someway, somehow, through art-making. That's the deep down motivation. Onscreen, after a while, the thrill gets gone.
Another issue confronting the artist during a pandemic concerns social life. Art is the work of an individual who connects with the self in response to personal experience and feeling, but the odd conundrum for many an artist is the very real need to connect with others. We need to communicate, network and above all share. Few artists, like James Hampton, are content to work a lifetime in a garage making shrines to the almighty out of tin foil, that no one knows about until after his death. The great tragedy of Van Gogh's life is not so much his unpurchased output but his lack of requited connection. To put it plainly, we need to show and tell. To collaborate. To compare notes over a glass of wine, visit the galleries and museums, to make the scene, to make a sale; to make that connection concrete. During the pandemic this is hampered, curtailed, made difficult. Zoom, after awhile, doesn't cut it. Socially distanced gatherings somehow seem futile. We neglect our art supplies for days. Empty the dishwasher, take a nap. We've got time.
I so admire the artists who have been able to keep it going within the sur-realities of 2020. Who work on their craft. Artists who most likely follow the advice of pandemic pundits to “stay connected, keep your body moving, get some sunlight, establish a routine!” Sure there are artists of extreme self-sufficiency and discipline who consider the pandemic a boon, for its lack of social obligations and interference. But somehow for many of us, alone, something is lost. Dropped from our hands. What can I do if this is me? How can I stroke a swath of watercolor across my mind? I can simply re-address the wonder of creativity.
If it were not for human creativity, nothing would ever get done, would ever get made, would ever change. We work together to make our increasingly complex existence happen, solving problems and meeting challenges as they arise. Human creativity and ingenuity, and a whole lot of teamwork makes our wheels go round. “Art” is the last stop of human creativity, an outcropping on the mountaintop where an artist stands alone to take in the view.
If you are in a slump, climb back up there. In the vastness of all that space are the little things too. From here your art power issues forth. It may be the first birdsong heard in the morning, the beats of your favorite music, or something darker, deeper, more sad. What colors will it be? Take a look at your own mojo; a good long look at your magical charm. Give it a shake. What spells will you cast in the context of art and life?
*https://www.drjen.com