Have you let your art lead?

Have you ever made paintings based on how you see things? It feels amazing to get it out on the canvas. Sometimes people might even resonate with what you’re putting down. They’re your people.

“The purpose of art is to lay bare the questions that have been concealed by the answers.” – James Baldwin

A good portion of my early career was spent creating art that was an expression of how I felt. I’m sure to a great extent the art I create now is the same, but the emphasis has shifted along the way. I am more interested in inviting others into the process. I’d rather know how you feel when you look at a painting. I want my painting to provide a dialogue instead of a monologue.

When I was younger, I was appalled by how few people understood what was going on in this world. Now I know that I am included in this lack of understanding. It helps with my cynicism. Most of my early answers came from assumptions I had made about how things work and who people are. Relying on this cognitive bias to navigate life kept me stuck in familiar patterns and safe loops. It made my world small.

Good and bad were easy to define, and this kind of binary thinking made life a bit simpler to navigate. But it didn’t help my art. People could appreciate my clarity, but there was no room in the work for them to engage. No place for them to get lost, or meditate on what could be.

Reflection in Blue – 18″x18″ – mixed media on panel – Gabriel Mark Lipper

My assumptions about the shapes of things, the colors of things, and the nature of things were closing down the artistic conversation. Then, I began breaking edges, leaving parts of the painting unfinished, or allowing other parts of my process to show through. My art began to ask questions instead of giving answers. It asks me questions.

Good art leaves the door open for new ideas, replacing the pursuit of mastery with the love of wonder. I am in love with the process of learning to see. And learning what my art has to teach me.

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Does your art make statements?

Does your art ask you questions?

Have you let your art lead?