Let’s Start with Art

I used to volunteer at elementary schools to teach about artists through a program with a wonderful art gallery in Reston, Virginia, not too far from my house. The art gallery is called, “Greater Reston Arts Center.” They shorten it to “GRACE.” Every month, the gallery features two local artists that share a similar or complementary theme. One time, one of the artists made sugar sculptures. This artist added sugar and water to lots of bowls, then dumped it out. After the water evaporated, the resulting sugar mounds looked like a city of white sand castles.

Another time, the artist worked with things she found in nature and she made sculptures and drawings of leaves and sticks. That artist inspired me so much! I went home and made a wreath for my door out of the most beautiful golden maple leaves shed by my maple tree. I had tried to make wreaths before that and they always looked completely stupid. It didn’t keep me from trying again when I felt inspired to try.

That maple wreath now adorns the back side of my business card.

[A cream-colored door has a wreath made of brightly colored sugar maple leaves: the leaves vary in color from yellow-gold to deep red.]

The Greater Reston Art Center made up portfolios for schools to rent. They have over 800 portfolios. Parent volunteers would take the GRACE Art Portfolios to talk about the artist. Each artist portfolio has 15-30 posters of the artist’s photo, artist’s work, similar work, and a poster about the technique(s) the artist used.

The parent volunteers teach the class about the art, and share the story of the artist’s life and art for 10-20 minutes. Then the students experiment with a new art technique related to the artist. Every month is a new technique. I loved sharing these experiences with the elementary school kids.

One time we presented Leonardo da Vinci. I had the kids make little paper books and draw with different kinds of pencils from hard to soft. They drew inventions, leaves, helicopters, pinecones, feathers, helicopters, grocery lists .... They could write or draw whatever they wanted to. I taught 17the students mirror writing, also. They had me write up on the blackboard, “supercalifragilisticexpialidocious,” just to show them that I could do it. I ran out of chalkboard space writing it. That was pretty funny.

Over the years, we made clay sculptures, masks, and we built with building materials. We did cherry blossom prints using plastic water bottles. We did print making and used watercolors and watercolor pencils. We drew buildings. We made huge pointillism murals using bingo markers to hang in the halls. We did other big paper murals of water lilies like Monet painted. We also gave the kids mirrors and oil pastels and did self-portraits like Frida Kahlo. Oh my goodness, I loved teaching that monthly class so much.

Here’s the best part, for me. There was always 1 or maybe a few kids who excelled at the art. They knew they were an artist, and they worked hard to make something beautiful. They had a natural talent and joy about the process. There was also 1 or maybe a few kids who were so afraid of failure that they couldn’t even start. They did not feel that they had a natural affinity for art.

You know what I told those kids? “Go ahead and fail. So what? You’re spending an hour of your life right now trying something new. So give it a good and honest try. What’s the worst that could happen? You put it in the trash when you’re done and you go on with your life.”

I have to tell you, this was hard for kids to hear. I am sure that some people are going to backlash at me about this too. But, this is what I did, and it worked out. Because I believed they had talent. They just needed to TRY.

I would emphasize to the kids that I wanted them to try and I emphasized that I believed they could do it. I kept walking by and encouraging them to try the new technique. After a while, the student would generally put in some effort. Often, it was that starting point for them. They only needed a push to get started.

One time, I had a child who was intentionally trying to do the wrong thing. It actually worked out, which was funny. We were doing big murals that week. The students were using bingo markers to make pointillism dots. The students were working to fill in a big lily pad flower or a tree with a big blue sky behind it. The bingo markers came in 4 colors: red, yellow, green and blue. The mural was about 12 feet wide by 4 feet tall. We had the kids sitting around the whole thing, on the floor, in the hallway.

The students were dotting the top of the mural to be sky. The kids chose blue and a bit of yellow to make a bit of a sunset, etc. This boy decided he was going to add red wherever he wanted to. With so many white and random red dots wherever he felt like, I had to admit it started to look terrible.

I smiled at the kids, including this boy, and told them how it was going to add character and just “work with it.” Art is supposed to be fun. It isn’t all supposed to be a perfect piece that will hang in the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC. I asked the kids with the blue markers to keep going, and add lots and lots of blue around the red dots, for the sky.The kids went to work, and after 20 minutes or so, they had filled in the mural. We had 3 groups of kids working on 3 different posters that day. The most interesting poster turned out to be the one with the red dots that had been put in the "wrong" place.

[A pointillism picture, from the Canva app, with a green hill on the left side, diagonally sloping down to the right. A mostly yellow sky with blue and red and orange dots cover almost the whole top half of the picture. The right side, past the hill on the left, has water represented by mostly green and blue pointillism dots, with also pink and white dots. There is also a fuzzy image of what is probably supposed to be a boat on the water, with orange, red, purple and light tan dots.]

I was blown away. The one poster that had been sabotaged turned out to be the most interesting and beautiful poster. I still think about this when I am making art:

I don’t ever remember having another issue with that boy trying to ruin art after that. After that week, he realized he could succeed even if he was trying to fail. His art was fine and he tried to do the right thing after that instead of trying to do the wrong thing.

Stop criticizing your art making skills and just try. Seriously. If you want to be creative, or be an artist, just try. You can do it. I believe in you!

My book, “Mere Creativity: And Also Some Circus Skills” is available on Amazon with a full color version, (full color photos inside the book), a black and white “more affordable” version of the book also on Amazon, and a Kindle version that also has the full color photos inside it.