making a statement

part of being a working artist is an expectation on the part of others that one will have an "artist's statement." It is sort of a credo, a two-paragraph explanation of Who I Am and What I Am Doing. How hard could that be, right?

I'll tell you: Real hard.

There is a tendency toward the colloquial in my life and demeanor. Part of me would like to just say "Aww, hell. Ah jes' make stuff, an' Ah lahk wood and cawper and old stuff an' thaings lahk that," and leave it there. I am a maker, after all, not a writer. My work should speak for itself.

But not really.

Because if Lane Myer is right (and I think he might be), and all art and design is about communication, doesn't it mean that is is even more important for me to be articulate about my work in whatever medium presents itself? Very probably. It is probably pretty important for me to be eloquent and direct on paper as well as with a chisel.

Crap.

So I have been working and crafting away at this thing, and am maybe a little closer, but it is a daunting task. The words all sound either too casual (and therefore inappropriate) or too grandiose (and therefore painful and irrelevant). I actually at one point used the word "unknowable." Jesus.

Why is it, after all this time, that the hardest thing in the world is to be honest, direct, and to just say what is needed without a bunch of florid filler? Nothing harder. But that is the job at hand.

So. No more "unknowable." No more "continuum." No more meaningless ornament. "Oh it offends me to the soul to hear a robustious periwig-pated fellow tear a passion to totters, to very rags, to spleet the ears of the groundlings..." Hamlet tells the players. I couldn't agree more.