On Vacation, In More Ways Than One

I was gone on vacation from July 13th returning today.  That also resulted in a vacation from painting daily. Early on, I decided that I would be okay with painting or not painting, since I was going to be busy with visiting family for several days, and the rest of the time at a juggling convention.  Still, that decision did not take away all of the regret of breaking my daily habit.

The family members I visited live in Hartford CT. It was great to see them and we did a number of fun things. In the short time we were there, we went to a play, In The Heights, and went to three museums, the Mark Twain House, the Harriet Beecher Stowe House (which is the next house over from Mark Twains’s), and the Hill-Stead Museum. Each was a great experience. It was my second time going to the Mark Twain House. We mainly went to the Harriet Beecher Stowe House since it was convenient, but I am glad we did. The tour was more about the historical context of her writing Uncle Tom’s Cabin than the house and it was very interesting.

The Hill-Stead Museum was amazing. It is located in a former family home. The home is a huge Colonial Revival home lived in from 1901 to 1946 and converted to a museum in 1947. Under the terms of the trust that created the museum, the property is being maintained and shown with no differences from when it was the family’s home. Imagine an L-shaped room for lounging and entertaining which includes a Steinway piano, a number of paintings, sculpture, vases, drawings, and other decorative items. When I say paintings, I mean exquisite ones including Manet’s “The Guitar Player, Degas’ “Dancer’s In Pink, and two of Monet’s haystacks.  There was another huge painting by either Whistler or Manet, but there were so many throughout the house I already forget which ones were in which rooms. You can position yourself in this room so that you can see all of these large, major paintings at the same time and the piano. That is just one room in the house.

On Sunday night, we checked into the hotel where we were staying for the juggling convention. Since there are only limited convention activities on Monday, that left us with a day to explore. The two museums I wanted to see were closed on Monday. The concierge at the hotel recommended the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge MA. On Monday, we drove up to Northampton for a little shopping and lunch and drove the backroads to Stockbridge, which took us through part of the Berkshires. It was a beautiful drive.

This was another good museum. In the paintings by Norman Rockwell, I enjoyed the overall paintings, but found myself drawn to the small details. There also was another exhibit called “Keepers Of The Flame” which focused on and traced back painters focused on the narrative tradition like Rockwell, including Wyeth and Parrish. We also got to see Rockwell’s studio which had been moved from its original location.

While all of this was pretty nifty, the lack of daily painting plus looking at the works of famous, professional, accomplished master painters allowed doubt and insecurity to start to creep in.  I believe it’s actually one of the reasons that I do paint daily. As a habit, it becomes something that I just do and I don’t waste time pondering should I continue or not.

Wednesday at the juggling convention provided a fix. Michael Moschen was giving a talk on creativity. Michael is a juggler who won a MacArthur Foundation genius grant in 1990 and has had a deep and profound impact on juggling. He talked quite a bit about process and made it clear he was talking about his process that works for him. He talked quite a bit about not knowing and that this is both a good and important place. I took notes and one part that stuck with me was when he said that in the creative process the goals are to move, journey, embrace, open up, and hope.

How cool is that, getting to hear someone like that talk about creativity for 90 minutes?

Overall, I left feeling fine with not knowing what I am doing or where I am going. I’m fine with being a hobbyist who is serious (and happy) about her hobby.