Opening Night

On the Way

During the fall of 2010, I was unemployed for a spell. As we say in the rooms, everything happens for a reason. My unemployed reason, it turns out, was to do The Artists’ Way—morning pages daily, all the prompts, and artist dates at The Met a few times a week. In the most basic sense, it provided shape to my unemployed days. In a much more complex way, it’s shaped my life.

 It’s a beloved sacred book—a life-changing book for so many reasons. It planted deep seeds inside me, which have taken a long time to sprout. And how life works is strange and miraculous. Julia Cameron is now a Santa Fe acquaintance, and I saw her on the evening of leaving for New York City for this show opening. “You know, Julia, doing The Artists’ Way 15 years ago led to this show,” I told her, my voice cracking with tears. She looked back at me with fantastically heavy turquoise eyeliner under her baroque gold-rimmed glasses and whispered, “Thank you.”

Finding the Way

Seriously, my gratitude for all the breadcrumbs leading to this moment is beyond my comprehension. I feel desperately inclined to couch my work in words like “It’s just a student show,” “It’s weird,” or “It’s not really art,” and I have to shut down that critic literally every two seconds.  

Today, I call myself an artist. Here’s my work and artist bio. Last night, we had our opening in Chelsea, and hundreds of people came. It was amazing. Truly beyond my wildest dreams.

Birthing the Artist

It took a year in my wonderful Artist Rebirth Cycle class to embody my artist self. Being an artist is not about being a great drawer, fabricator, painter, potter, or sculptor. For me, it’s about seeing and curating my own experience, taking whispers from the formless, and applying form. It’s been about expanding my toolbox from just writing to so many more mediums.

My work is deeply autobiographical, drawn from the lived experience and reporting on my life. And this is how I have chosen to express it for now—and more will come—more writing, more video performance, more cards, more copy-art, more more more. I won’t stop making art even though what I make is, above all else, for me alone.

And the reality is that doing the work is only half the deal—my peers were installing all week, and we have been posting our hearts on social media. I also feel art is about coming together and having the experience of seeing the work in a collective setting in real life. The community of support I have found in this class—and all my artist friends. It’s not easy being an artist—scarcity of money and resources has to battle with muse. But we persist.

Some photos from the opening night below. Enjoy!

The Pack Studio