Young Artists

I've always said my kids were my masterpiece.

As a former director of the Arts & Crafts program at a summer sleep-away camp, I have been teaching and engaging kids in art for the past twelve years.  That's a long time -- diapers to acne long.  Enough time to see my own kids, who started camp at six,  grow muscle and go off to college long.  This summer, with an empty nest, I decided to leave my comfort zone, to remove my teacher's hat and to get selfish: to unleash my muse and to set free, for a while at least, that blood-sucking need to please.

My goal is to create:  to write, to paint, to plant, to cook, to breath, for myself.

So, I thought it would be a good idea to enroll in a writing workshop.

Ironically, it started with a session entitled "Writing Though Art."  (My yoga teachers tell me the universe provides, and I guess this is just what I needed, right now.) We were asked to observe a painting and then write a letter to the artist.  There were several choices posted around the room, but I was drawn to Carol Sideman's oil painting entitled, "Young Artists."

This is what it generated:

“YOUNG ARTISTS”

Dear Ms. Sideman,

May I call you Carol?

 I, too, dream of painting!

Your young artists in oil have brought me back

to my own creative beginnings …

Crayola days, peeling back soft paper,

scraping up waxy bits of rainbow

under pudgy fingernails.

Scratch and sniff

Blueberries, buttercups, watermelon jolly ranchers.

I never liked green.

For me, it was always red or purple or blue.

Sometimes brown was ok too.

It reminded me of chocolate pudding.

And you, Carol,

Are you the painter or painted in this piece?

Are you observing? Or reflecting

your own childhood memories?

Mirroring messy smocks and baby blocks,

building towers and landscapes with watercolors and finger paints,

and food coloring dripped on folded wet napkins.

Staining , unraveling, revealing abstract Rorschachs

Of butterflies or monsters.

What are the children painting, Carol?

Imaginary castles and dragons and spires?

In battle they face-off  at a  two-sided easel, 

A rampart dividing their imaginary worlds.

Did you want me to guess?

Or did you mean to bring me back to my own

brushstroke-big-bang?

Young at art. Brash, unaffected, bold.

Fueled by the distinct smell of Playdough

and taste of white school paste –

the kind with the dipstick for easy eating.

You have me peeling back layers

Like dried Elmer’s glue

Lifted from grimy fingerprints.

Whatever your intent, I want to thank you

for that walk down memory lane.

You have reopened my creative school box.

                                                         - Stacey Reisman Steig

                                                                                                

My kids ARE my masterpiece. They always will be.  They are lollipop sticks and rainbows and Oreo cookies, unscrewed, and scraped and dunked. A lot of time went into every delicious part of creating them. Now, reflecting and moving forward, I am confirmed.  There is more treasure to seek and for anyone hunting, like me, allow someone to guide you.  Thank you writing workshop.  It was a good idea to leave my comfort-zone after all.