The Freedom to Create Waste

(I wrote this piece for The Creative mama in November and I wanted to share it here as well)

Art is Expensive.

The creation of art is expensive.

The process of learning to make art is expensive.

And it is a luxury that so many are never afforded the opportunity to experience.

 

I didn't grow up having a lot of things. There wasn't much in the way of art supplies. When I did get to experience using them, it was when I went to Grandma's house. But her things were... expensive.    Fragile.    To be revered. To be careful with.     To make perfect finished projects with.      Used with supervision.    You did not waste. 

I believe some of that was due to her having grown up on mountain farmland in the years following The Great Depression. You were frugal. It wasn't a choice or a decision - it was what you did, who you were. You didn't waste. Anything. Period.  

This was passed to me probably both as a philosophy and out of necessity. If you didn't get a lot of supplies then you were very careful with what you did have, and you saved scraps. All scraps. You used both sides of things. As an adult today, to throw something away because I don't have an immediate use for it feels like I'm defying a natural law of the universe. 

It is wise to be frugal, except for when you consider art.  The freedom to create, use, experiment, manipulate, and play with artistic mediums without the fear of repercussions for generating mistakes or waste is a luxury that many in this world don't ever hope to experience.  I was struck by this several weeks ago while watching my daughter happily create with abandon at her art table.  How many children would be just as wildly creative as she if they only had free access to the materials?  For those of us who do have this luxury, are we denying our children the opportunity and the creative breakthrough that comes with the access and freedom to waste?

 

We converted our formal living room into a large office a couple years ago. For my daughter's fifth birthday, we added two inexpensive Ikea tabletops butted up against each other and my existing computer desk.  We placed the entire large work surface into the middle of the room.  All the art and craft supplies were placed in pretty containers she could access herself without my intervention.  White Paper. Glue. Markers. Crayons. Colored Pencils. Stickers. Fancy scissors. Craft Foam. Beads. Colored paper.  Pipe cleaners. Popsicle sticks. Pompoms. Paper punches. Paints and quality paint brushes. Oil Pastels. You name it.  We now call it The Art Room.

As I wrote in my piece about allowing my daughter to choose how she dresses each day, I'm learning a lot about control in my life. I vividly remember watching the toddler-her draw scribbles on one small part of a sheet of paper. Declaring her masterpiece finished, she flung it aside to begin another. Internally I felt immense tension.  

WASTE!  Look at all the rest of that paper she hasn't used!!! And there's the whole back side of the sheet!  You can't let her WASTE paper like that!  You're teaching her that wasting is acceptable!!!!  You must stop her!  You must control this!  You are being an irresponsible mother if you allow this!

Yet, if I spoke to that wastefulness....

You'd be stifling her creativity!  You are communicating to her that the art she's created isn't beautiful and of value to you, the way she wanted it to be seen.  You are taking the joy out of the free play by enacting demands and requirements on how art should be created. You are stepping in and controlling something that isn't yours to control. 

That day I decided I'd indulge the waste. I would not step in and make her use the full page for her scribbles. I would not enact the both sides of the sheet rule. I would allow her to make her own art her own way. I would let go of that control and accept the waste that comes with learning to create beautiful things. 

I still feel the waste-monster rise up inside when they request 27 acrylic paint colors for the palette that I know won't get fully used. I force myself to let her glue a whole package of pompoms to one poster, knowing I now need to replenish the supply for a piece of art I likely won't save.  I stifle the urge to rush in and save her from making mistakes and learning the dos and don'ts of different mediums on her own.  

At six years old, she is so creative and innovative with amazing ideas. I cannot help but believe that the permission to waste has played a role in that.  She has taught me that we learn to make better art with the freedom to fail. 

It may feel like you are throwing money down the drain to allow unlimited access to art supplies, but you are not.  You are making an investment in the artist she will become in the future. 

January 2nd - ordinary life

2 of 365 : early morning art table








I shot these with my Nikon D800 , Sigma 35mm f1.4 , Nikon 85mm f1.8, Nikon 50mm 1.4D

January 1, 2015 - our ordinary, everyday life

I am attempting a Project 365.  We shall see how it goes.  I enjoyed the 100 days of Summer so much, but I was kind of 'over it' by the end.  I hope I can keep up this motivation for the entire year.  I also hope to use this as an opportunity to practice new techniques while simultaneously documenting our family's life.

Here was our New Year's Day, the first image being 1 of 365.

















She went downstairs without us and wrote thank you notes to EVERYONE who gave her gifts over Christmas.  It was ADORABLE.


I shot these with my Nikon D800 , Sigma 35mm f1.4 

of rice bags and remnants and real - on The Creative Mama

I shared my third piece today on The Creative Mama blog.  I'd love for you to read it and share with me your thoughts.

It was exactly ten years ago. A Friday in late December 2004. At a mere 25, I worked my very last day in Corporate America. The tension of trying to maintain a perfect home, be a good wife, all while struggling (and failing) to be a successful chemical engineer finally broke me. I passed on all my project paperwork, removed all my personal items from the desk, and turned in my employee pass. I was no longer a career woman. I was now a rare and unusual thing: a stay at home wife, neither ready to begin a family nor desiring to rise up the corporate ladder.

That Christmas, a mentor/friend gifted all the volunteers at our church with hand made rice bags. They were soft flannel and denim pouches filled with rice, ready to be heated in the microwave. I loved mine and wanted to make them for all my family. My mentor/friend insisted they were easy to make. But I didn't sew. She extended the invitation for me to come over to her home so she could teach me. I was sure she didn't have time for that, being a stay at home mom. Yet she insisted; was quite persistent. She suggested Monday morning -- that first real day of my unemployment. December 20, 2004.

I descended upon her door that cold morning and she welcomed me in, already busy with the tasks of stay at home motherhood of a five and eight year old. The dining room table still held the remnants of their breakfast, and she had to clear that away before we could begin our work there. The children were still in warm and cozy pajamas and she never asked them to dress for the day. I remember feeling a sense of bewilderment at the lack of preparation for my arrival.  

As I stood and waited for things to get to the place where my friend could begin to show me what I'd come to learn, my meticulous, perfectionistic, judgmental self couldn't help but notice the lack of perfection in this home. Those breakfast remnants on the table. Old crumbs on the floor. Last night's dinner dishes in the kitchen sink. Piles of books and papers here and there. Dried toothpaste in the bathroom. Her home wasn't "company ready" by any stretch of the imagination. Yet here I was, as invited. I'd never been in someone else's home in a state like this. It wasn't sterile. It was real and lived in.  

I remember feeling a little bit embarrassed for my friend, that for whatever reason, she'd not managed to get things in ship shape before I came. I remember feeling that I couldn't imagine having someone over to my home without having swept, vacuumed, mopped, dusted, and sterilized. And I remember feeling this strange disconcertment about her motherhood.  

My limited exposure to motherhood at this time was with moms who were controlled, perfectionistic, diligent, dedicated to routine and structure. Everything was just so at all times. Finishing all tasks came first. Here in my friend's home it was the antithesis. It was not perfect, not controlled, not structured, not any of those things. People came first.  She had welcomed me in -- welcomed me in to the unique comings and goings of their day as if I belonged there just as much as they did.  

She fixed me a warm cup of tea. She quickly taught me how to use the sewing machine. Then she left me to try it on my own while she went about the business of being a mom to two young children at Christmastime. She wasn't going to coddle me or do it all for me. She believed in me, that I could do it. And all the while, the children were about us. They were so happy and thriving, engaged in our conversations, having "tea" and cookies with me, being part of the atmosphere of home, rather than cast away to play by themselves in a playroom. It was chaotic and messy, but so full of love and warmth and joy. 

What do I remember most about that day? 
I remember not wanting to leave. 

I came thinking I would learn how to operate a sewing machine. I left with a heart cracked open. I left with my entire understanding of what it meant to open one's home to another soul ripped to shreds. I left with my concept of how the world worked, how we relate to each other, how we choose and don't choose to be vulnerable, what motherhood meant, turned up on its head. 

All those homes I'd visited over my life time that were the magazine picture of perfection... felt cold, and empty, and reserved. Yet this home I'd been invited into, that I'd initially believed wasn't "ready" for my arrival, felt warm, soothing, and a haven I had to pry myself away from. I wanted nothing more than to stay and revel in its love. My enjoyment had absolutely nothing to do with how spic and span the house was. 

It's been a decade since that day that changed me forever.  

I recently confessed all this to my mentor/friend, and she shared that she had intentionally let me in on a 'bad day', a real day. Of her two grandmothers, one was perfectly neat and the other was more relaxed. What she learned from her relaxed grandmother was to welcome others, even when things weren't perfect. The best choice is to focus on people and their needs, instead of on shame.

It was embarrassing for her to allow me to see the mess, but she knew that the perfectionist, controlling me needed to be freed from that expectation. She knew that walking into a home that was focused on me and bringing me into their family would be a balm to my careful, meticulous soul. Five days before her only Christmas when her children were 5 and 8, she put my needs ahead of her own and sacrificed her pride. She gave me a taste of what home should feel like, while demonstrating that motherhood isn't about denying your own interests in order to have a clean home and perfectly behaved children.  

How grateful I am that I tasted a cup of hot tea at her dining room table that cold December day.

 

I shot these with my Nikon D800 , Sigma 35mm f1.4 , Nikon 85mm f1.8, Nikon 50mm 1.4D