The Value of a Community

Today I want to talk about being a part of a community. Not just any community, but an art community. I had that in college when I was surrounded by other creatives completely immersed in their work. We were strongly encouraged to articulate our ideas and have healthy debates about them. Afterwards, I slowly lost touch with that as I went off to conquer the world and my classmates did the same. Years later, I've rediscovered the importance in surrounding yourself with other creative people. Musicians do this naturally. They need others to play with (usually). Artists can be pretty solitary creatures and can get used to being alone with their ideas. That's fine for working things out, but the exchange of ideas with others often leads to new things. It can lead you where you may never have gone. I'm lucky to have found a group of very cool women to do this with at a local gallery to me, called ART (that matters).


Twice a month there is group of us that meet and share work there. We share our new work, our ideas and we give each other feedback and support. It is a community that has provided nourishment to my creative spirit. I've been working these last twenty years as a creative professional and rarely meet other artists. Sure, I've worked with other designers, painters, photographers and writers. Most of which have lost the burning desire to create that inspired them to pursue a creative career in the first place. If I had a dollar for every person who said 'I used to draw a lot, but just don't have the time...' I could buy nice kolinsky sable...What they're really saying is I've lost the desire. Life got more interesting. There's nothing wrong with that, but I don't relate. Going to my women's group I now spend time with artists that MAKE the time because they NEED to create. Just like I do. It's really not an option not to. For many years I didn't have that support and was creating in a vacuum. I see now what I was missing – that being part of an art community is inspiring and reinforces that what I'm doing is important. Now I'm not the lone wacky arty-farty. I'm just one of a bunch of wacky arty-farties. Much more comforting! So tell me, what do you do to stay inspired and what nourishes your creative spirit?