Wherever you are is here

“When you start working, everybody is in your studio - the past, your friends, enemies, the art world, and above all, your own ideas- all are there. But as you continue painting, they start leaving, one by one, and you are left completely alone. Then, if you are lucky, even you leave.”

― John Cage

Hi friends,

I am preparing for a transition. Moving from a well-funded company that funds my studio practice in a few months, I am about to jump into full-time self-employment with both my art practice and my coaching business, Visible Leaders.

Transitions have always been hard for me and there is a sense of in-between-ness that can often be a struggle, and that can show up in my practice in subconscious ways. Impatience with materials, wanting to something completely different or feeling stuck or lost are all ‘shoulds’ that I have been working through. This means, some days in the studio have been often challenging - there is a friction, a push and pull when I am trying too hard, the energy of which fundamentally alters the painting - gets in the way of it.

But then I have to remind myself what a privilege it is to have the space of trying and failing at something you love. I often think about the hard days in a relationship, the cycle of rupture and repair - I am in a relationship with my artist self and my creative process too, am I not? So how can I expect it to be without its own challenges?

By David Wagoner

Stand still. The trees ahead and bushes beside you
Are not lost. Wherever you are is called Here,
And you must treat it as a powerful stranger,
Must ask permission to know it and be known.
The forest breathes. Listen. It answers,
I have made this place around you.
If you leave it, you may come back again, saying Here.
No two trees are the same to Raven.
No two branches are the same to Wren.
If what a tree or a bush does is lost on you,
You are surely lost. Stand still. The forest knows
Where you are. You must let it find you.

Published in Poetry magazine, July 1971

To pull myself back to the present, I have been slowly making my way back to poetry, writing ekphrastic responses to paper studies. After a year and a half where my mind refused to produce poetry, bypassing the rational mind in favour of image making - poetry is now reemerging in a new way, almost as if out of a cocoon.

I have been using any medium I could find on my travels to paint with - coca cola, tea, sand, pool or sea water, allowing myself to capture the present moment materially. It’s easy to get stuck with your habitual tools, and it’s been freeing to experiment with less precious substances, seeing how the ink moves and swells differently with each new addition.

I have been slowly making some new works too. DM to enquire or comment below with your email to get a catalogue of work currently for sale. The rest of my works as always can be seen on sanaraostudio.com

I am doing a group show along with a couple of artists at the E17 Art Trail - come along if you’re around, private view is on the 5th June 6-9pm here.

x

sana