Art Show

I attended a reception last night that the SRAC held  for their latest art contest.  The art on view was phenomenal.  There were so many genre's of art, with each having it's own special merits.  The jurors of this contest have quite a feat ahead of them-How do  you pick just one as being the best when they all have their own unique qualities.  There were portraits, figures, abstracts, sculptures and mosaics and the list goes on and on.  I had no idea that North West La. had so much talent.  I could have wandered around the walls of that building for hours, dissecting each piece individually--taking in every every detail--an Artist's dream.  I scanned the room, trying to pick out the artist's in the crowd, most were easily identified.  Not just because of the way that they dressed.  It was more than that.  There was an exuberance  about them-- an air that they projected.  I sat for awhile at a table and watched the people meander around the room, looking at the art.  Some spent long minutes gazing into the pictures- really looking into them, trying to find the story behind them, others strolled by without stopping.  I guess each of us appreciates art in our own unique way, we all express it differently.  How much does our background and our experiences lend to our art?  Do our daily, mundane jobs effect the quality of our work--sapping the creativity out of our core  or does it enhance it?  Does the bleakness from everyday life actually make us appreciate the opportunity to create something.  Something that may not actually serve any purpose except to create.  You can't eat it our use it really.  It is just something to hang on the wall. I don't see it that way though.  I see it as a chance to energize myself--to wash the cobwebs away from a part of my brain that I haven't been able to use all week because I have been working.  Walking into my studio revives me--the smell of paint and paste makes me want to dive in and get "painters fingers".  For now, I may only be able to get into my studio once a week but the time that I spend in there effects me every day.