What's It all About, Anyway?
Soft pink and neutral tones, shadow and light streaming through the open window, give this painting a lovely and subtle beauty. This woman is decorating pottery. Her name will never be known. She doesn't sign or date her work. She is doing what she is doing because she wants beautiful things around her in her every day world. Barren as it may be of any luxuries, not even a chair, yet she is painting her pots. This seems very brave to me, the kind of bravery which doesn't give up, doesn't give in to the bare poverty in which she lives, the kind of bravery which accepts with peace life as it is, while at the same time working to make it better.
When I see photographs of Native American artisans I am struck with the difficult environment in which they had to work their crafts. Women are usually always on the ground working with only a blanket beneath them. No ergonomic chair to save the back. They didn't run out and buy another tube of paint when they needed more, but had to make all their colors from the natural world around them. All of their tools were handmade, as well as the materials they utilized. Because we live in such an easy world, this modern world, we might not give thought to what level of sacrifice and to what length these early artists were willing to go in order to make beautiful things.
As I painted this woman and her pots, I thought about the artists down through the ages that just had to be creating, had to be making things beautiful, taking the world around them and making it peculiarly their own through their art. I was glad to number myself among them. I know a woman who is very old. She use to be an artist, and was always very busy doing something important. She has dementia now and isn't capable of doing anything. I think of all her early hours, getting up at five, all the framing and business that consumed her, and it was all seemingly meaningless. I doubt any of her various paintings will ever be thought valuable. They are just paper with an application of watercolor, kept by the family or friends who love her. It kind of gives me the shudders. Am I doing the same thing? Will I be just a puff, a whiff, here today and feeling the importance of the hour, and then gone? When all my endeavors cease, those that seemed of such moment, of such important significance, will they in the end turn out to have been meaningless? What is it all about anyway? Why am I doing the things I do? What is behind and even beyond who I am as a person, those driving forces that seem to compel me as an artist?
Two thoughts come to mind as I ponder these questions. The first is the fact of our spiritual dimension, and the believing that there is something more beyond this life; that we are more than physical bodies. We are eternal souls; the artist is in my soul which is temporarily lodged in this body. In this vast universe there are forces of evil, and there is the Great Good; there is Love. God is love. Knowing He made me and has a plan for my life, that He gifted me and loves me very much has made the greatest difference for me. It helps me every day to do the things I do as a reflection of His goodness, His beauty, His love. With this perspective, even the smallest things will take on an eternal significance, as even Jesus Himself said that if I gave a cup of water in His name it would be remembered in heaven. The thing is to keep this clearly in mind as I go through each day, and not to get so easily sidetracked into the heavily breathed rush of a too-busy life. I need to know the true value of the things I do, and not allow myself to get bated into things that are meaningless. What are the things that have true value, and what are those that are essentially meaningless? Ah...well, that is the beauty of coming to know God. He gives you His value system. He doesn't want His children running around in a fog. God wants to tell us how to live this life, and He wants us to experience what this life can be His way, it is an abundant life with fullness of joy.
The second thought that occurs to me is something I wouldn't have understood a few years ago. But now, having spent a great deal of time studying many of the greatest artists down through the centuries, I understand more what IT is all about. I understand the artist in me as I have come to relate with it in others. I couldn't stop painting if I wanted to, when I think about it. How about the birds? They are always singing. What's that all about, anyway? Why do they sing all their lives through? Nobody writes their melodies or gets them published. There is never a standing ovation. Nobody ever gives them a record label. If they could speak I think they would say they were doing what God created them to do, and they couldn't help but to keep singing. God made them that way. God made me the way I am, and there is a glory in knowing its okay to do everyday, the thing I was created to do. I am not saving lives in an emergency room; I am not a college professor; I am not a mover and a shaker. But in my own way I will glorify God by embracing what He has for me, my own quiet destiny.
