Am I from planet Mars?

Just finished a challenging course outdoors, my first with an all-American adult audience. Challenging not quite because of the material covered, but because I had to fight lots of my own demons. I realized that after some twenty plus years living in the US - I still felt inadequate in communicating in English. I felt again like a newly arrived immigrant from planet Mars. Why? Are we forever plagued with self-doubt if there's no land to call one's own?

It's the little cultural differences that struck me and wouldn't let me move beyond them. Participants not wanting to be close together, seeking solitary time instead. People not wanting my communal blanket, my tables and paint tubes brought to share, my Dale Carnegie inspired chitter-chatter about their everyday lives.

When indoors with a Russian-speaking group it's all about wanting to have good company, sharing some therapeutic insights into our lives and the world outside, taking my lead into exploring how our creative outcomes tell us something about things needing attention in real life.

Or is this just two sides of my own personality wanting to fight it out, clashing in their goals? Part of me wants a great tight group of friends to share in the experience of finding myself. Yet, another part wants some alone time, to reflect and come to my own conclusions, without someone's five cents in the process. Was this experience merely a mirror into how we all struggle to find our true self?

What I won't do...or bylaws for my teaching proposition

When I was 5, I started to get into drawing. I found napkins of all kinds and drew little dolls on them in various costumes. My grandfather would make up where those costumes would be from, as in - this is the customary dress of the Georgians, or - that one is from the Republic of Congo, etc. I was ecstatic and wanted nothing less than to one day become a fashion designer.

Then, at the age of 15, seeing how my dream was so persistent, my mom found me an art teacher. He, probably self-interestedly or unknowingly, declared that in order to be a fashion designer, I need to learn how to paint everything - from still lives to portraits to landscapes, and so I did. And when the day came for portfolio reviews, I was welcomed with all kinds of scholarships and bells and whistles to different art schools, but none of the fashion design schools,. Apparently for that I needed to learn how to sew and actually present dresses, etc. What about the factories where that actually gets done? But whatever...

And so I had no choice but to become an artist. My official art schooling began. It was incessant figure and gesture drawings and anatomical studies interspersed with occasional self portraits, close copying of the Renaissance masters (no wonder I hate the Renaissance), and chiaroscuro based on photographs. Only once in my 4 years in undergrad were we given an assignment to paint the stunning Ithaca landscape, and only one course introduced me to various painting media. And of course not a word about the contemporary art market, or art careers, or what the hell you're supposed to do with your life once you get out. And I hated art school with all my heart - it just seemed so irrelevant, and dated, and exclusive. It simply pretended that all great art was somewhere in the books and slides and not all around us...

And then I did my Master studies and it was even more dissapointing. It was a degree in Arts Administration, but it pretended that only part of the art world existed, the one where everyone is poor and in dire need of fundraising and it made sure that the real art market wasn't touched upon. As if there're no auction houses, or art insurance or art fairs and successful galleries and artists. Meanwhile, I was managing a thriving art gallery.

So I volunteered in a community arts complex just to get back to the roots, teaching kids art - and yet again - arts and crafts galore: making Valentine's Day cards, and teachers sculpting pretty little things for the kids so that parents think their kids talents are advancing.

Well, enough complaining. Here's my proposition. How about we combine it all? Not just a museum school where students walk with sketch books and pretend to be the next Van Gogh, and not just boring academic still life, or fat nude models, or long stories about how this genius reached his peak of creativity? But a program where every class gives you a sense that everything is connected? That the world around us is forever changing and it's stunning in all its seasons and moods? That Picasso stole from the Africans, and that we can paint like the Egyptians if we wanted to, or like the Japanese with their screens and no three point perspectives, or the Indians with their stunning gold illuminated manuscripts? What if we could create new designs through learning about ornaments on mosques? What if students would see local galleries and art fairs in addition to walks through dark museums? What if they designed costumes for the next Nutcracker like Chagall and Dali did for current plays? What if they practice grafiti art? Somehow, especially now, when we become more and more removed from the natural world, sitting behind our computer desks and residing in virtual realities...our kids need to get back to the roots...

Art Basel Miami for kids

I just returned from our annual trip to Miami. First week of December is the week of Art Basel Miami, the largest art fair in the country, and a time for art craziness, inspiration galore and an opportunity to somehow connect in my head everything that I am and would like to contribute to the art world. Earlier in the fall I launched a website for Plein Air Art Academy, and am now promoting it and waiting on enrollment. Therefore, this time Miami wasn't just a research on dealers and their offerings, or new talent discovery, or pure art appreciation for personal inspiration. It was also an opportunity to view a child's reaction to contemporary art. It's certainly an overwhelming affair but while the attention span was still there, sculpture was incredibly captivating to my four year old, much more so than two-dimensional art. Discussions were very engaging and some incredible interpretations were offered by him that I could not have arrived at on my own. Though absolutely spent in two and a half hours, he demanded on our way home that we return year after year, as he enjoyed this activity of art watching and discussing so much.That of course was pure music to my ears.This statement is also very much in line with his stage of development where imaginative play is at its height. It is quite fascinating though to let his creative mind roam and I'm thrilled we could be on the same page while engaging in my favorite activity.