I was tagged by Adrienne to make a list of five strengths that I possess as a writer/artist. She says, it’s not really bragging, it’s an honest assessment (forced upon me by this darn meme).
I am to resist the urge to enumerate weaknesses, or even mention them in contrast to each strong point I list. Below my list, I'll tag four other writers or artists whom I want to share their strengths. These will be writers/artists who have blogs, or who will comment on this one...or who will let me post their response on this one.
As I'm just dipping back into my art, my writing, photography, pulling my head out of the sand that is producing and distributing JOB, this exercise was a good one for me.
What are my strengths? I think they are:
1. When it's hard for me, I don't back down. A drawing teacher once told me that I have a "no bullshit" painting style. At the time, I didn't have a style at all, I was in my very first art class ever in a humid, too-warm basement in the Ballard neighborhood of Seattle. I really wanted to be in a photography class, but I had a cheap little camera and no money and my grandfather hadn't yet bequeathed me his AE-1. So instead, I was in a figure drawing class where a beautiful man with skin the color of dark chocolate posed while all the other students seemed to be happily and artfully drawing him with smooth, confident strokes of their charcoal pencils. I felt like crying, at times I wanted to run out of the room, then, when I stopped trying so hard, I started to see the white space, negative space, and shadows and I got to work.
2. I'm brave. I'll talk to anyone. Anyone. I've followed my documentary subjects to back alleys in crack neighborhoods, to homeless camps in the woods, to seedy hotel rooms with damp carpet. I shot discarded dogs being euthanized, cruelty cases and I've been in some scary situations. I did all of this because it didn't feel honest to me to skirt around the edges and just show what was easy to get at. When my friend Joseph grabbed a dented spam can to nail his painting of the last supper, a beautiful painting created with discount oil paints on a discarded banquet tablecloth, to the wall of the now demolished St. Elmo hotel, I completely forgot about the scary man lurking outside.
3. I am patient and people trust me. When I'm shooting someone, I can wait for the moment when their eyes light up or they think of something or someone they love or when they remember.
4. I love to tie ideas together in to a bigger idea. I start writing without an outline or a clear direction. As I meander and trail around and amble through a story, I'll find the way back to where I started and I understand why I picked that story instead of another one and I figure out what it's really about and then I really get to work honing and pruning and culling which is often my favorite part of the process.
5. I'm curious (though some might call it "nosey"). I love to hear people's stories and I consider it a privilege when someone trusts me and tells me one of theirs. I love to try to understand what brought them where they are and what keeps them there. I like to figure out what keeps people "in the room", literally and figuratively. I could spend my days with a camera, video camera or notepad just listening to people's stories and I would be a happy girl.
I'm tagging
Debbie Smith,
David Edelstein ,
Karen Browning,
John Anglim and Margaret Allyson (who isn't really online yet).
And in profile...
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