ARTIST OF THE WEEK #28
Jacqui Beck
Seattle, Washington
What is the most challenging aspect of your work and the most rewarding?
The most challenging and rewarding aspects of my creative process are that I want more from my painting yet I sense myself reining back, pulling my punches. I get the most from my painting when I really jump in, but often I don’t go deeply enough into my artistic expression.
I believe this is because I’m both afraid of what’s there and what’s not there. What if I go as deeply as I think I can, and I don’t find anything? And that can happen. It is disappointing and frustrating. But here’s what’s interesting and wonderful: I sometimes do find something, especially when I really let myself go.
This fear isn’t new. I’ve struggled with it for years. What I know is that I need to just keep going, keep dancing with the dragon, even when I’m afraid. I can’t count on art to always be a wonderful, intense, and personal experience — it’s not dependable. It’s a dragon, and you can’t tame a dragon. That is the risk and beauty of creativity.
I would like to take some classes with really creative teachers. I’d be happy to travel to do that, in fact I love taking workshops in beautiful places. I’m interested in working with teachers who explore the deeper parts of the creative process as well as showing interesting ways of applying paint. I paint in acrylic and mixed media. I’m not interested in other mediums (oil/ watercolor/ encaustic, etc.) at this time. Have you taken any great acrylic painting workshops lately?
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