July 14 2019 was the last entry I made to this section of my website. Little did I know then, that in between writing “When we’re born” and “The Journey Home” the world would experience a global pandemic.
It’s safe to say, a lot has happened in that time, and not so much of the usual things, as I am sure can be said for the majority of the globe.
A beautifully tragic year that witnessed us divided and yet strangely connected, more than ever before.
A year that saw so many, who had found themselves caught in the cogs of life, suddenly having time to direct their attention towards other aspects of their lives and being, predominantly the arts.
In such times of uncertainty, art became for many, the therapy its long been known for.
And my goodness was it beautiful to see the news filled with such humans.
*
When think back, I can still remember the way in which my creative pursuits would make me feel as a child.
I suppose it’s a little similar to the feeling you get when a song from your childhood comes on the radio.
I vividly remember the hours spent replicating the covers of my favourite books with pencil, and following instructions that would transform a piece of material into a work of art, via a collection of tiny little embroidered crosses.
Somehow, life would have it that I’d spend most of early adulthood, not practising the arts at all.
But I’m not here to discuss the reasons I found myself neglecting such a fundamental part of who I am. Because the most important part of that story is that I have no regrets.
I’d prefer it to be more about me finding my way back.
I remember I read, or heard somewhere …
(or maybe I dreamt it, that stuff is possible with me too)
…anyway, I remember I read or heard, or dreamt, that eventually most people come back round to the things that brought them joy in their earlier years.
And I’d certainly like to think that is the case.
Ironically for me, photography was never part of my childhood. I mean it was, as it was for most other people. Mothers taking copious amounts of photos of you and your siblings, then having every single one developed and printed, before placing them into one of the 100+ photo albums that are now boxed away in the family home.
In school we had no darkroom, it played no part in any of my selected subjects, including art.
The first recollection I personally have of photography bringing me personal joy was when I packed my bags for a short break in the south of France with school.
I was 11 years old.
I was 28 when I next loaded a camera with film. Turned out that said camera didn’t work, and it would be another couple of years before I rediscovered the magic of film.
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I received my first DSLR camera as a gift on Christmas Day, 2013.
And really, I had just as much of an idea about how to work the god damn thing as I did about the kind of images I wanted to make.
For roughly a year, as I began to understand the basics of my camera and photography in general. I produced, mainstream, technical shots that looked pretty. There was little, to no depth to any of the photographs I took, and they were essentially, a reflection of the way in which I felt about myself, in relation to the world I was living in.
A little (or a lot) lost.
When I unboxed that camera and attended my first workshop, I’d have no idea the significant role photography would play in leading me back to a more honest and meaningful life.
And to the arts in general.
Nor could I ever envision the sheer amount of love, purpose, and determination it would bring with it, in my quest to not only better understand myself, but the world we live in, and to view it, and myself with a little more empathy. To learn to accept and trust myself, embrace pain, strive for growth, remain curious, and most importantly, introduce me to so many significant humans, who have consistently supported and encouraged a flawed, inconsistent and never ending cycle of change as I pursued a craft I grew to love so dearly.
Now this all sounds so delightful, I’m aware. What a wonderful journey I’ve been on. I admit it, my journey has been just that, a wonderful one.
A wonderful journey plagued with constant doubt, fear of judgment and a hell of a lot of banging my head against a brick wall (or walls) subsequently also leading to many a dead end. And fresh starts.
I don’t write these blogs often, in the almost 5 years since my first one, I’ve written, well, around 5. Averaging 1 blog entry per year, but lockdown seemingly had me questioning myself and my creative pursuits in a slightly different way than I had been doing prior, and so here I am. Emptying those thoughts into my computer.
I can’t remember exactly where this particular ball of thought started rolling, but I’ll start with this version in the gym…
I have right sided brain, so routine (even though sometimes I find it hard to adhere to), is definitely needed in my life if I’m to be at all productive in pursuing the things I’m interested in. Podcasts have been for me, one way of making the most of my time, whether that be on route, whilst editing, or exercising.
And so, when enjoying the luxury of running on a treadmill in my local gym (Yes, it was 2020, I do believe the gym adheres to the term luxury) I came across a podcast which was titled:
‘Imposter Syndrome’
A term I wasn’t familiar with with at the time.
Now to keep this simple, Wikipedia’s definition of this term is as follows:
‘Imposter Syndrome (also known as imposter phenomenon, impostors, fraud syndrome or the imposter experience) is a psychological pattern in which an individual doubts their skills, talents or accomplishments and has a persistent internalised fear of being exposed as a fraud’
Oh, wait. That’s a thing? The thing I feel and have felt? Has a name? And other people feel that too?
(Of course they do Stacey, not everything is about you)
By the time I fell in love with photography, I’d spent 10 years not practising any of the arts, and as a result my life, resembled anything but a creative one. I battled with the fear, as I moved towards a creative field, that not only was I an imposter in a world of ‘real artists’, but that the reality I’d created, and the people within it, would view me as one too.
And my god, is this a difficult thing to move away from thinking and feeling.
For much of my 20’s I felt, that there was more to life than what I had allowed, or was allowing myself to experience, or that there were people I could relate to on deeper levels, than what I had previously known. So when the time came for me to finally break out of the comfort zone I’d been sat in for far too long, all I really knew was that I had to keep moving forwards. That I didn’t want to go back to a life where I ignored the need to express myself, via whatever medium I felt necessary.
It just so happened, it all began with a camera.
And so with my new found creative pursuit, and imposter syndrome subconsciously and firmly rooted in my thought patterns, I invested myself into photography, personally and commercially and convinced myself that In order to ‘fit in’ I had something to prove.
I knew, or thought I knew, two things.
1: I loved this craft like no other.
2: That this meant the label I should attach to myself was
‘Photographer’ and, I must ‘succeed’ at becoming one too
I was wrong on one account.
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If you pursued the arts towards the end of your high school years like I did, you’ll probably also remember the exams that came with them.
The ones where you were so restricted to the kind of art you were supposed to create, and be judged upon, that really it contradicted (or at least it did for me) the whole point of what the word Art even meant?
Like, here is a subject you’ve chosen, that in essence is very different to most others.
But wait there are rules you must follow if you choose to pursue it….
In order to pass said exam, you must select only one of these three categories or questions, and when you’ve done so, you must excel in it.
And if you don’t, well, I’m sure you know how that goes. I know I do.
When I think back to the things I was taught in art class, it was mostly shading and composition, light and shadow, we were ‘taught and told things’ but I can’t really remember ever ‘discussing’ them as such. I don’t remember how the lessons addressed what art even meant, or what it meant to want to pursue it.
I’m not sure I was ever asked my reasons for pursuing it.
Now I get it, art lessons are supposed to talk techniques, we need to understand the ‘How’ to art, but what about the ‘Why’ to art?
Listen to me, ever the idealist, like those things can be taught in school.
I’m not really insinuating that they can, does anyone really understand it?
But seeds can be planted.
I teach the babies I work with, yoga and meditation, some of them are not even one. Teaching our youth the importance of being still, and turning their focus inward, is equally as important as supporting them in their learning of colours and shapes.
In some ways I believe the world is becoming more mindful. I just believe, that more can be done to support children in their personal, social and emotional development, in all areas of their learning, including the arts, and that maybe we should be prompting children to talk about and reflect on why they are passionate about certain subjects, rather than asking them what they want to ‘BE’ when they grow up.
And now you’re probably wondering what the point to all this rambling about art class even is?
Well, let’s get back on track.
A few days I came across the following words by Christopher Doyle as I scrolled through my social media (Via @Nitch), words which funnily enough went hand in hand with some of the reflections and thought processes I was already embarking on myself.
He states:
‘Art is what artists make. So the process is to become an artist, it’s not to make art. And thats the journey as a person…to get to a point where you are at ease with yourself, where you are open to all the possibilities, and then it will be re-channeled through you as an artist. So the process is actually of you. The process is working on yourself’
I guess what it is I’m trying to say, far less elegantly than Christopher, is that from my experience, people would do far better expressing themselves via the arts if more emphasis was placed on the reasons behind the expression itself, rather than the labels, processes and categories we subject ourselves and it to.
Because I failed to acknowledge or understand the relationship between myself and my art, on the deepest level, I found no alignment in it, my outlook was built mostly on ‘how’ to become a photographer, not why, and so when I embarked on this grand mission to prove myself, things didn’t quite go to plan. And I found myself, stagnant (again) in the pursuit of a new career.
I sought out opportunities to take photos for others, weddings, families, small businesses, but the more I did so, the more I began to understand how strongly the arts were attached to my emotions and how there was still always something missing.
You see, no matter how much photography was getting into my veins, I still felt the weight of those art exams, the weight of the world and its expectations, (or maybe the expectations I thought the world had of me, but really I had placed on myself)
And if I were to be honest with myself, I knew my pursuit of self expression via the arts didn’t begin and end with a lens, so, I began to seek out alternative crafts.
If not a photographer than what?
I must BE something.
I felt like a creative soul in search of a label to attach to myself.
An embroidery artist, a weaver, knitter, ceramist?
I practised them all, and I wholeheartedly emerged myself in every one.
But the more I began to pursue one, the more I also felt myself disconnecting with the very craft that ran through my blood.
How was it possible to still feel restricted by a craft that consumed my thoughts and my days.
Sometime in 2018 I read Leo Tolstoy’s ‘What is art’.
I’m always fascinated by our journey’s and how, everything aligns when its meant.
The book has been sat on my shelf since I closed its pages the first time round, until these past few weeks when that very question has circled around in my thoughts repeatedly over the last few weeks.
‘What or more importantly, why art?’
Why, do some of us feel so compelled to create? And others don’t?
Why was I finding it so difficult to figure out ‘What I was’
Tolstoy suggests the purpose of Art to be as follows:
“To evoke in oneself a feeling one has once experienced, and having evoked it in oneself, then by means of movements, lines, colors, sounds, or forms expressed in words, so to transmit that feeling that others may experience the same feeling - this is the activity of art”
And just like that, it all started to come together.
I didn’t have to choose. I didn’t have to BE anything. I didn’t have to separate my emotions from my craft.
The journey isn’t about becoming anything other than myself. Movements, lines, colours, sounds, words, images… they’re simply tools I had to use at my free will.
I didn’t have to label myself anything other than a human who was curious about the arts and my world, and the emotions practising them evoked not only in me, but millions, or billions of others.
I could in essence free myself from the labels I’d accumulated throughout life.
*
‘What the Artist is always looking for is the mode of existence in which soul and body are one and indivisible: in which the outward is expressive of the inward: in which form reveals.’
Oscar Wilde- De Profundis
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There’s still a lot I don’t understand about myself, there are some things I’ll possibly never understand, but one thing I do know is at the core of my creativity and self expression are three things, Nature, light, and Human connection.
They’re the three things that bind together everything I do creatively.
By spending so much time with my thoughts and having the ability to pursue a career in photography, taken from me temporarily, I was allowed the freedom to experience a fundamental shift in the way I view myself, and therefore the way in which I approach my art.
And so I’ve decided to drop the labels, and begin incorporating the crafts I love into my images, which might seem such a simple and trivial task, but it’s one thats allowing me to open up a world I’ve grown comfortable sharing visually with others, and transform it into one I not only see but feel with every inch of me.
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And I listen to myself say it, and I read and re-read the words on this page, and it seems such a simple revelation. How did I not realise any of this before.
Because I hadn’t allowed myself to open up to that part of my journey yet.
I still lead with a focus of ‘making art’.
When I should have lead with my journey as a person.
The latter, it’s a difficult, long emotional journey to embark on.
It’s demands you look your demons in the eye and that you take responsibility for yourself, your habits and your thought patterns.
It’s a beautiful, and torturous way to live, as an artist.
But really I wouldn’t have it any other way.
And it sure does feel a lot more like home.
Sending love and positivity always
Stace
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‘The most fulfilling human projects appeared inseparable from a degree of torment, the sources of our greatest joys lying awkwardly close to those of our greatest pains…
Why? Because no one is able to produce a great work of art without experience, nor achieve a worldly position immediately, nor be a great lover at the first attempt; and in the interval between initial failure and subsequent success, in the gap between who we wish one day to be and who we are at present, must come pain, anxiety, envy and humiliation. We suffer because we cannot spontaneously master the ingredients of fulfillment.
Nietzsche was striving to correct the belief that fulfillment must come easily or not at all, a belief ruinous in its effects, for it leads us to withdraw prematurely from challenges that might have been overcome if only we had been prepared for the savagery legitimately demanded by almost everything valuable’
Alain De Botton -
Consolations of Philosophy