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2004-02-18 @ 4:40 p.m.
artistic mayhem

"What wrong with the hair? Is it a girl? Oh, there's the boobs" were the first words out of my mom's mouth as she looked at my first nude drawing in person.

Certainly inspiring, wouldn't you say? Certainly made me want to submit it to my first art show. Did I mention I'm afraid of being criticized and ridiculed and think I suck, even though I don't think I do. Now where do you suppose I get that from?

I've been taking this nude drawing class since late November and have been improving steadily. I don't draw stick figures. My perspective isn't perfect, but my style, and I definitely think I'm developing one, is kind of lush and somewhat sensual. I work in pastels and do a lot of shading. And what I lack in perspective, I definitely make up for with fairly releastic skin tones and depth. I'm coming along. I really am. I'm pretty proud of myself. I haven't taken any lessons. But I'm coming along.

Have I ever mentioned my mother used to paint? She had average skills. She has her work hanging in her living room. She has one nude. Her perspective isn't that great either. And her images are very flat. And she only tried the nude thing once. I remember she invited the mailman into our house once when I was a kid. A little kid. The mailman asked if the nude, who clearly had breasts was me. Hmmm? Me? I was 8. And clearly lacking in boobies at that point. Whatever did he mean? And why was my mom inviting the mailman into the house to look at her nude painting? Clearly we all have boundery problems it seems.

But what brought this all on, was an e-mail I got from my nude figure drawing class this week. As a member of the class I was invited to submit a piece of work for a show that will run from February 29-March 5. I am terrified to come forth with a piece of work. And the e-mail even said that EVERYONE WILL BE ACCEPTED! As in no matter how much you suck, your art work will be hung in an art gallery. Of course, I only suck in my head. So, even though I am filled with the kind of terror that only a person showing their highly critical mother a piece of their most personal artwork could experience, I decided I would try to frame one piece of artwork and bring it tonight.

GULP!

I don't have any money to have anything to framed professionally, but I did buy a frame this summer at a garage sale. And it did have this really ancient sage green mattboard tucked into it via some tiny rusted nails. The mattboard was actually a little too big for the image (meaning it covered too much of the picture. Or as my mother said this morning, it "cut the legs to infinity" a quote that will definitely be showing up in the New York Times art review).

So I took it to Michael's Craft Store today and timidly took it to the framing department and asked if it was possible to trim off about a 1/2" on the inside. I don't know anything about mattboard trimming. And the guy took it, eyeballed it for a second and then gave me some fraction amount. I kinda gulped wondering how much it was going to cost and then he smiled and said, "I'll just do it for free".

Yay! And he even put a nice beveled edge on it for me. Guess I looked like an appropriately starved artist.

So now I have a mattboard. And I have the glass and frame. And I have the artwork sitting on the floor and I'm just trying to get the courage to put them all together and bring it into the nude figure drawing class tonight so I can submit it to the artshow.

I even borrowed my mom's car today, so I could get all my errands done and go to my class tonight. So everything is bending me in the direction of submitting the artwork to the show.

Christ Witty...just do it. It's good. You're not going to be rejected.

I kind of wonder if I submit it, if I will tell anyone like Married Guy or my shrink. The show is only a week or so. Married Guy's wife is a professional artist and I feel like he'd just have to grin and bear it if I invited him to the show. And my shrink, well, he would probably just have to be nice.

Damn, I wish I was more confident. Maybe this show will make me more confident. I don't know. Damn. Ya gotta do it, witty. Just do it. Submit your damn drawing. Why?

Because if you don't nobody else will. Oh yeah, right!

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