As much as I’m personally inspired by art (generally speaking for not all ‘art’ inspires me), to engage in creating ‘art’ myself seems lofty and impractical. Painting costs money and money is in short supply. I don’t have a PhD in art blah-blah and neither do I have a credentialed backstory of work sold or ensconced in galleries, institutions and collections (or submitted in esteemed art shows).
Yet I persist in painting stuff.
Now (for the sake of fuller disclosure) I can acknowledge that for years there has been a mostly unconscious agenda of ‘painting to get love’ scenario (it hasn’t been the primary motivator but it has been a ‘most def’ undercurrent and one which I’m not proud of admitting to).
The ‘painting to get love’ scenario is more conscious now so that’s not such a driving factor.
The impulse to ‘painting something meaningful’ scenario is also no longer a driving factor (though I do not wish to make meaningless art).
To paint ‘because it makes me happy’ is also not a driving force because it’s usually difficult (a confrontation with ‘self’ and other ‘shadow’ aspects not yet fully conscious, healed and alive).
So, why paint?
I paint because there’s excitement around creating something new.