I was wide awake at 5:am this morning, previously my mother-n-law artist and former art teacher who is 92 years old and living with us, decided to exercise her teacher-tude on me. I had showed her my sketchbooks which I had scanned into my PC and my digital art. She insisted I go through some exercises she learned in some prestigious art school (try it her way). In her effort was all the stuff I rejected of the academic art world. She totally ignored my body of work, strongly suggested and criticized. I almost stopped drawing altogether and forever! She and her husband sabotaged each other's work to the point of divorce. He ran off to run an antique shop, she jumped into teaching art to kids. She stopped doing her own work. That fell upon me, I awoke at 5:am this morning, sat on the edge of my bed, coughed up another huge history pill. Her intrusion via instruction is rejected, my art efforts continue.I am an outsider, please don't ask me to come in on your terms. I've been out here too long, my ways must be respected. She says I am narrow, limited, I smile and agree, that is the secret of my power. Art involves science but is not a science else it ceases to be art. Schools that canned methods and design art to fit psychological profiles of likability or the Golden Mean of Pythagorean Perfection so they can collect fees and give a document that says I have been taught to do this even if it's crap.Meanwhile in the African bush somewhere a solitary craftsman gets interviewed by a curious researching academic. She asks probing, awkward inquiries and gets in return the same unsatisfying answer, "all my life I just wanted to make beautiful things, so I do!" I do this with no regard for what you termed "art". I have great respect for him.
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