It wasn’t so bad.
The day started with the predicted ire about other people’s rubbish, but I have come to expect it, so just got on with clearing it, before starting my own work.
I also handed out some flyers for ONE. These were met with curiosity, surprise, bewilderment, and also, satisfyingly, a few people seemed impressed. These people I work with mostly don’t see me as an artist I don’t think. That is because when I started working there I wasn’t really. My steady development as an artist over a ten year period has largely gone unnoticed. I think this has been of my own making, as I wasn’t ready to have it questioned. Now that I am, to them, it must seem like a sudden change. So I started to look back upon those ten years after work yesterday. How was I when I started?
I was grateful. I was on the verge of going mad. I had thankfully been offered this job at a point when I felt totally trapped by my teaching in FE, trapped financially, professionally backed into a corner I didn’t want to be in, but it had happened so gradually I hadn’t noticed till it was too late. When I started, I just wanted to feel I was doing something creative again – anything. Therefore, my price was low, and I wasn’t worth much to be honest. I was a bit of a liability, emotionally fragile.
The first two years were therapy. I did as I was told, followed the scheme I was given – occasionally with misgivings, but followed it anyway. I got stronger, and having been given a creative lifeline, wanted more. The Artist Teacher Scheme was a life saver the first time I did it. I signed up a second time, and it changed my life. Again, I don’t really know if anyone noticed. I saw a different me emerge. A me that probably hadn’t been around for 20 years or so. I recognised this person, not new, but awakened. A gradually building confidence allowed me to finish my degree… thanks to the also therapeutic, supportive nature of the Open University. (It is so sad their costs have sky-rocketed, as what was available to me then, would now be totally unreachable). The ATS awards masters level points… it took me quite a while to convince myself I could do it. So having had my brain changed by the ATS, the MA hauled me up by my ankles, slapped me, shook me by the shoulders, told me to pull myself together. It filled me full of the tools to carry on. It gave me reading to do; art to look at; gave me people to talk to, work with, and those people told me when I was talking rubbish, unafraid! They told me when the work wasn’t good enough, or didn’t work how I was wanting it to. They did also tell me when it was getting there. They asked the right questions. And in some cases, laughed at me and took the p*ss. In this, made sure I didn’t take myself too seriously. Far from putting me down, this process built me. Because when the week before your final show, when the person who has been telling you the work isn’t quite there, isn’t quite hitting the spot, suddenly says “Yep. Pretty good.” You feel like you can fly.
There is, of course, the inevitable post-MA slump. A year on, I now see it for what it is and am moving out of it… if you have been reading this blog a while you’ve probably seen it for yourself.
So I no longer feel I can fly, but I’m skipping along quite nicely, thanks. I feel good about the work, and feel good about where it is taking me. I am no longer emotionally fragile. I have challenged much of the teaching I started with. I do things differently now. I do things as an artist now. I’m worth more now.
