Making Meaningful Connections In Art

Art as a mirror for reflection

Unmoored; Art and Assemblage by Crystal Marie

I have a confession to make. Sometimes, when I have been sitting in silence too long, I talk to myself.

Out loud.

I don’t mean sitting in meditative silence, which indicates a decision to be in that frame of mind. I mean in the kind of silence that comes from not conversing with other humans for a stretch of time, in the kind of meaning filled conversation or small moments of connection that feel like fuel for the day. I break that silence with the sound of my own voice. I speak out loud and then I respond.

Sometimes it hits me how silly I must sound, but in the moment, I am compelled. It’s one of the hazards of having your living quarters and your working space in the same home, where leaving the premises is a choice most of the time. In the dead cold of January, it’s easy to choose not to step foot outside the front door anymore than necessary.

Of course, working in a studio outside my home didn’t completely remedy this situation either. Even when I worked in a studio building that housed over 60 other artist’s studios, I had to deliberately seek out meaningful connections.

Isn’t that the case for most of us? We may interact with family and coworkers for the better part of our day, but when it comes to spending any time in creative connections and communities, we have to be intentional. It’s easy to push aside our creative longings in favor of tending to the more practical side of life. And yet it is our creativity and deeper connections that fuel us, feed us at the soul level, bring us a sense of equilibrium and perspective during times of uncertainty, filling us with a sense of purpose and belonging.

Making Meaningful Connections In Art

Making meaningful Connections; We make them with each other as humans, seeking out communities with those who share our interests, our beliefs, our family line. And we make them as artists, within the scope of our work.

As an artist who considers what I create to be a form of visual storytelling, I look for meaningful connections within the objects and mediums I bring to the table.
Or, ahem, tables, buckets, bins, boxes spilling out onto the studio floor. . .

I don’t know exactly what I’m going to do with these things. I simply can’t help but bring them home, where I will sort and arrange and ponder possible compositions until something inside clicks.

My work table is covered in these elements. Along with scribbles and random notes of what I’m sensing, possible titles that relate in some way. It’s the same thing whether I’m working in collage or assemblage. And regardless of whether I’m working with found materials or handcrafted fodder.

Somewhere along the way, I get a sense of the deeper meaning in these connections. A story of some kind the work is trying to tell. It’s a feeling, a vibe, a season in my own life, or some event happening in the world, usually without any cognitive awareness until I see the work developing in front of me.

That is the way of deeper knowing, the artists intuition, if you will. The art becomes a mirror for reflection, without overt words or direction, allowing both the viewer and the artist to participate in the conversation. Connecting across time, space, cultural barriers, and maybe, for just a moment in time, to understand one another.

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Human life itself may be almost pure chaos, but the work of the artist is to take these handfuls of confusion and disparate things, things that seem to be irreconcilable, and put them together in a frame to give them some kind of shape and meaning.
~Katherine Anne Porter

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I’m excited to share that my first on location workshop has just opened for registration!

Art and Assemblage is a comprehensive workshop that will guide you through the process of elevating your artwork, collections, found objects, and salvaged materials into beautiful assemblages and fine artworks.

Join me for this three-day experience, including a partial day outing to hunt and gather materials on the sidewalks of the urban neighborhood around the studio, local resale shops, and salvaging discards from the wood shop next door.

→ Learn to find meaningful connections between the objects you gravitate to and your own artwork.

→ Receive objective critique and guidance as you compose and arrange the materials you’ve gathered into abstract works of art.

→ Elevate your unfinished artworks into complete works worthy of exhibiting and selling.

→ Learn simple deconstruction and construction techniques in assemblage that don’t require complicated tools or carpentry skills.

→ Learn to attach objects without relying on glue for long lasting integrity in your work.

→ Create patinas to distress and age the surface of new wood.

→ Create unique frames for your work from salvaged materials.

→ Feature found objects and collected memorabilia.

→ Compose objects with a nod to Joseph Cornell and Hannelore Baron’s box assemblages.

→ Learn to think outside the box, and in it, when it comes to the art, materials, and objects you gravitate to!

This class is already filling, but there is still plenty of room in the studio for you!