Painting

It is much easier to take a leap when you know there is someone to catch you.  Painting with Julianna is much like that act of faith.  For me, at least, painting is a test of courage, and I have more courage because she is there guiding me.  She encourages me but also only lets me go so far before she pulls me back and insists that I stop and put the canvas on the wall and analyze what I have done thus far.  She points out the strengths, asks me about the painting’s weaknesses, insists once again that I not retouch certain areas and helps me plan my next steps.  Only then, does she take the painting off the wall and put it back on the table and I begin to paint again.  And when I paint can be freer because I know there is little chance that I will mess up or overwork it  (my biggest failing) because Julianna is there is stop me.  So I paint some more, trying to focus on making bolder more expressive marks.  I breathe deeply, quieting myself and looking for some feeling or memory or image that has moved me, I try and let my brush carry that spark.  And then she stops me again and we begin to analyze the painting again.  It is a dance between my left brain and my right, between free expression and the careful controlled dissection of the intellect.  And it is also a dance between Julianna and I.  She is both endlessly encouraging and genuinely excited about the process of what emerges on the canvas.  And that excitement is contagious and inevitably leads to bolder expression on my part.  It was become a mantra for living for me in many ways.  Move boldly forward then stop and reassess and then more boldly forward again.  I have painted for a few years now and this is my third group of lessons from Julianna in the last two years.  The richness of what I get from her, the confidence she instills is exquisite.  I am not nearly so brave or methodical on my own, as yet, but I hope to get there.  Until then though I feel with her , as with my metalwork teacher Gilbert , that I have found some secret code to my creativity.  It is as if I have discovered the piece I have been missing to unlock my artistic expression.  Perhaps the road to one/s creative soul it is initially just too lonely and frightening when it is undertaken alone.  Perhaps we need others, who have come before to show us the way and recognize the kindred artist in us and say, “Yes, you are one of us. Let me show you the way.”