Taking Up Space

…and the fear of being perceived

(Taking Up Space 5’ x 3’ mixed media)

I have been making art since I was a child and hid a drawing of what I felt was the perfect horse head in my parents record collection at age 6. I remember that moment of feeling like an artist.

Then, I was taught, over and over, that artist is a title you earn, by studying, and confirming, and listening to the voices that are strongest and loudest about who gets to make art and who gets to say they are an artist, and what is actually art.

Those voices got into my head. And though I’ve been creating, and painting, and drawing and felting and making my whole life…I have often shirked the title of artist. Because the gates were too heavy. Because the people on the other side of them were poised and ready to judge.

…so instead I took the part of art appreciation. I started commissioning my friends with my allowance to create pictures of dragons and unicorns as early as ten years old. I used to adorn my walls with the art of my peers, knowing that by paying them, they could call themselves artists. Knowing that by appreciating their work, they would know what it was to be appreciated.

I have spent my life making music, writing poetry, writing stories, writing plays, and dreaming up movies. I have always known I was a writer. I write every day. I went to school and studied writing, and literature, and film and theatre, and communications. I have a teaching degree with a focus on theatre and holistic education.

But even without all that. I would be a writer. Because I write.

I have, over the years, tried to say the word artist, without shirking from it. I have found community with other outsider artists whose art I adore.

Last year I began volunteering for a gallery that I believed held a belief that all people were capable of making art. I thought it an inclusive space. But recently I have felt that the reasons it felt inclusive were because of the people I was meeting. The artists I was attracted to.

…but above all that, there were still the gatekeepers.

Recently I met a kindred spirit. And she and I bonded over a deep love of art and a drive to make space for people to make art. To provide the tools and supplies that they might not have access to. To remind them of those days when they were a child, unafraid that someone might come along and judge their art as not being worthy.

I remember how I chose, intentionally, not to belittle my art skills when drawing with my children. So they wouldn’t learn that fear early on. I knew they would eventually encounter it…but when they heard a voice in their head I wanted it to be a gentle encouraging one. I wanted to give them a foundation of believing that they could make art. Could write. Could create. That creating things was something anyone could do.

My eldest still loves drawing. He and his friends trade OCs (original characters) and draw for each other. His love of art meant the friends he makes tend to also love art.

(One of his original characters drawn using procreate on his tablet)

My youngest still loves to write and draw. He still makes music.

(A drawing by my youngest from when he was 10 years old of his favourite characters, his stuffies)

(In 2020 my youngest wrote one of my favourite books of all time. The Sheep Birds. This year he recreated a version for me.)

It is not hyperbole for me to say that my children are some of my favourite artists.

Am I biased. Heck yeah I am. But my belief and love for their work has not held them back. Creating a space that has allowed them the freedom to create without fear…and joyfully…I know that is part of their solid foundation. That being able to make mistakes and love their art anyway is something I wanted to instill. That art and mistakes are beautiful. That perfection is unattainable, and unnecessary. That beauty comes from the humanness of error, and learning.

All this to say, is that tomorrow I’m taking my giant ghost painting to the gallery. It will share space with so many friends I’ve made through being a part of that gallery. It’s possible that I might eventually get kicked out for being a gentle-hearted rabble rouser. But I’m okay with that.

Once a young friend of mine was commissioned by a cis-het man to draw an image for a shirt he intended to sell at his shop for Pride month.

My friend drew this powerful image of a culturally diverse, gender-diverse, intergenerational, disability-inclusive group of people holding up pride flags.

The person who commissioned it asked my friend, a trans-queer-autistic youth with Tourette’s…to tone it down. To make it “more parade and less protest”.

My friend came to the shop to vent his anger. I told him that he was right and the man was wrong. I paid him for the art. He did not fix his commission.

Pride is a protest. It is a celebration of all the people who’ve come before us, a tribute to those who survived and a remembrance of those who did not.

I am outwardly queer on a daily basis. When my partner and I are out in public, there is no hiding what we are. Sometimes it is scary. But I know that existing the way we do is a right. A human right. To be who we are. The fact that it is painted as a privilege to be given and taken again is terrifying. I’m not sure I’ll ever really understand the urge of societies and groups and individuals to control how queer people love, or express themselves…especially if we aren’t hurting anyone.

It’s nearly 4am and I’ve been up thinking and writing since 2am, and I have a long beautiful day ahead of me.

But I wanted to say, happy Pride month to those who celebrate it.

(I’ll put the tiny book here later today)

Heart,

Wake

Some of my former ghost paintings for Older and wider

Ghosts across my art

And day 15 of 42 of posting the ocean for Big Hearted Boadicea

(From October 2023, when we’d just moved here to the east coast of Canada)