Art is a medium through which humans process emotion. It requires us to exist, perceive the world and to hold up a mirror. So start by existing: enjoy the five minutes of rest after snoozing the alarm, feel the gentle tug of anxiety as you arrive seven minutes late to your first tutorial, and get excited about the millionaire shortbread that you saved for later. Tiny moments, and tiny emotions, are packed with meaning when focused upon.
So, frame these small parts of the world as you see them, and create something small that illuminates that fragment of human existence. A collage made from stickers peeled off Pink Lady’s, a set of History notes on a Word document in an ugly font, a drawer filled entirely with different coloured fluffy socks, a library card and a train ticket in the back of a clear iPhone case. A doodle of a starfish with a baseball cap in the margin of a ruled notepad, an initial scratched into a wooden door in a club bathroom, a photo taken quickly of some decaying autumn leaves. Use creation as a much-needed break from consumption. Engorge yourself with your surroundings and produce whatever you can in response.
The biggest barrier to engaging art is thinking it’s anything more than a form of expression. It doesn’t have to be ‘good’, it just has to be something. After all, as Elbert Hubbard rightly put it “Art is not a thing, it is a way.” Sketch your cluttered windowsill with a biro, take a photo of your favourite bench, show everybody, or nobody; use art always, and let it use you.
“2015 Triangle Artists’ Workshop (photo by Claire Lesteven)” by Triangle New York City is marked with Public domain mark 1.0.
