MAKING IT (A Journey of Changes and Small Revolutions.)
Dianne Roberts"You build up a head of steam. If
you're four days out of the studio,
on the fifth day you really crash in
there. You will kill anybody who
disturbs you on that fifth day,
when you desperately need it."-----Susan Rothenberg
I come home from work on Friday, mind and body soaked in a terrible tension, the lumps of broken lives lodged like glass in my shoulders. That evening, and the following one, bring sleep bothered by the faces of those I am paid to caretake. Faces that appear and reappear, traveling through my dreams like salt. I spend Saturday fantasizing about living the life of an artist. I plan my excursions to the Caribbean, sketching on the beach, dressed in brilliant whites, meeting other artists over iced cappuccinos discussing light and the color green. Everyone congratulates me on pushing apart the columns of restraint in the controlled chaos of my work. I soar like a bright yellow balloon released in a cerulean sky. It is a divine experience, I tilt my mind against space and fan out like a long robe. Then I remember, I have to clean the house, and I am already thinking about dreary Monday and my stifling job. I fall to earth, not like a bright, burning star, but with the plop of a yellow water balloon tossed out of a cerulean sky. Over laundry I decide to revolt, survey the barren terrain of my stale, ordinary life and plan my first assault. By Sunday I am ready to enter my studio where my true work waits, temporarily letting go of the familiar structure of society. Transformation begins.
As I open the garage door, the figures leap out at me from the canvas as if I interrupted them at the still point of some frantic dance on the picture plane. My heart leaps in response, pounding a little as if I had been a part of the frenzy. It always startles, and embarrasses me a little, when I see the intensity of the art I make, like catching myself naked in the mirror. Yet it seems to welcome me, inviting me into its long arms. Yes, it says, you are a woman who makes marks on paper and canvas.
I spend time looking at my various projects, the watercolor sketches, the pastel pinned to the wall, the two paintings. I feel content. The warm smell of turpentine and oil paint, a smell I first became acquainted with at age nine, enfolds me and takes me to that place I feel I belong. It is my own geography and I swim in it. Here I engage in my small revolution in some larger more inclusive reality.
The brushes wait. The pallet full of buttery color waits. I turn on the music, fill my first brush with paint, and begin to create the map I navigate with. I chase my vision, which is both my adversary and ally. My brush and I run down alleys, fly over mountains, burrow under
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