Out of the Gutter Art

Category: Confidence!

  • A CLEAN SLATE

    A CLEAN SLATE

    oh so WHITE AND SHINY…

    Waiting for my pen, for my brush. I just cant stand the barrenness of it, stretching of into the infinite distance, saying nothing.

    I cant sit in silence either, in a social setting. I would be awful in an interrogation, babbling mindlessly- wait… not mindlessly. I do get chatty, but I always have something to say. The word “mindless” comes from tapes of a past life, a life that included words like “stupid”, “silly”, “crazy” and “dumb”. I am none of those things.

    It is 26 years now since I was physically with my last abuser, 24 years since my last drink, my last drug. I have worked tirelessly these past two and one half decades to become the real person I am today. It is truly a beautiful thing to be alive and in this space.

    I could wax poetic about my own marvelousness, (after all I am pretty cool…) but I would rather talk about you. You, my fellow human, out there wishing and wanting. I know it’s hard being you. I know you have reasons for not trying. put that aside for one moment, and give yourself a chance to succeed.

    I had someone tell me once, I think it was a person in AA, “Do the next right thing”

    THE NEXT RIGHT THING

    It will be the thing that raises your head up. The thing that makes you wipe your tears away. The thing that you do to believe in goodness again, the goodness inside you. You have not wasted time on this journey, that is not possible, because it took everything that came before to be right here, right now.

    I am really surprised that I feel as good as I do. Years upon years of hating myself, hating my life, hating society. I was angry and hard, and reveled in the pain. It was such a lonely place, even though I was surrounded my all kinds of angry people just like me. We all roared and growled together in our ugliness. I never saw myself surviving, never saw a way out. So I never tried. I believed all the lies I was told, I was a loser, a basket case, a burn out.

    I thought I loved my abuser, my “friends”, my family. I thought I was loved in return. But in reality, I had no concept of love. I thought it was possession, ownership. I had so many misconceptions, and they kept me in chains.

    So what changed, what happened that let me get out of that life? A series of events I never saw coming. A prayer answered that I thought I could no longer utter. A forgiveness so vast and profound that I finally felt the love and acceptance I was looking for my entire life. I allowed my God in. I told him how broken I was. and I asked him to lead me thru the maze.

    That was all I knew to ask. I was lost in a jungle and needed someone to lead me out, into the light.

    That was many years ago, and I have lived thru many heartaches, lost my loved ones, suffered major life upheavals and felt unimaginable pain. Just like we all have. But I don’t hate myself anymore. I am not desolate and lost anymore. I feel the joy of true friendship, and I have learned how to be a true friend.

    Please, my friend, keep pushing on. You will find the light. You matter. You are loved even though you may not believe it yet. There is always a reason to live, just do the next right thing. If you picked that needle up again, put it down again. I cant tell you how many times I tried and failed. But somehow I found a way to try again. You really are worth every effort.

    I would always tell myself , “KEEP PUSHING ON.”

    Please do.

  • Round One: Let the Game Begin!

    Round One: Let the Game Begin!

    I Will find the WILL!!

    My Founding Artist painting: The first of my works to be placed in The Ryan Licht Sang Bipolar Foundation’s Permanent Collection!

    Fittingly titled “Crossing the Deleware, Well Aware” it shows my journey from despair and being held back by my past to shedding the overcoat of depression and walking into the sunlight of my artistic future! I based this title on the little “George Washington” Dude lurking down in the bottom center of the painting…See his funny hat?

    My “Doubting Suzie” Ways

    Ok, friends, here’s the deal: I quit working as Frank Strunk III’s intern last week. Why, when I was enjoying learning from him so much? Why, when my mind was blooming open to all kinds of brilliant metal working techniques, and my mind was being blown by his artistic vision?

    “Why in the world would you do that Susan Todd?”, Susan Todd asked Susan Todd.

    I figured out the answer to that yesterday, although the reasons I gave Frank were that

    A. I need to focus on my work I already do, cause it’s what I do. (Huh?)

    B. I am doing a piece about my Dad and I’m an emotional landmine.(Hmmmm….What?)

    C. I have been invited to a big event and need to focus.(Nope.)

    D. Too many scattered efforts make Suzie nuts. (Now THAT makes sense)

    Did I do the right thing? I wasn’t sure, because I really want to make metal art. I’m frequently making impulsive decisions and regretting them. He was generous with his time, his tools, opening his shop, his art and heart to help an emerging artist. And I bailed, just when I was really digging in.

    An Emotional piece about my Dad…Work in Progress. “Dead Men Tell No Tales”©STMartin2022 (started last week!)

    I hate how my Bipolar Disorder makes me run Soooo Hot and then drops me on my doubtful butt. But it did, and here I am. Have I done what I said I was going to do? Well, yes. Yes I have. So that is good, I really have benefited from focusing on less! I have finished one of the pieces for the new INSIGHTS V call and started 2 more. I entered the Art of Possibilities Show in Missouri with 3 works, and finished 2 Grant applications plus am working on a third. And this third one is a doozy.

    THE IMAGES ABOVE are of ‘THE DREAMING FOREST’ ©STMartin2022 (A New Work!)

    I didn’t get the last three I applied for, but I’m getting better all the time at writing them. This new one I am having trouble writing, but that is ok. I AM REACHING OUT!! Oh, and I finished my Art Business course that the St Pete Arts Alliance gave me a scholarship for!

    So, have I been working, and trying and FIGHTING for myself?

    Yes! YES!! YES!!!! Making connections and forging ahead, breaking new ground in new and exciting directions. Learning new marketing skills and remembering old ones I had forgotten. Benefiting from taking little risks and meeting new artists.

    Now that I have written this I am astounded at all I have accomplished in the past 2 months. I really am a creative Powerhouse! Cutting thru the choppy waters like a PRO! Go Suzie, Go Suzie!

    There is NO limit on my creative potential! I can SOAR! Look at me go!!

    one of my commissions from 2021
  • An Artist’s Realization:

    An Artist’s Realization:

    Stepping Off

    What did I dream of then ? The freedom to create new art, better art than anyone had done before. I dreamt of sculpture, glorious-creamy-marble-gleamy sculpture. Human form expressed in visions of living flesh to make one weep.

    Pushing the limits of what had gone before, finessing my gift to a razor fine point that would etch images so tantalizing that Albrecht Durer would be green with envy. I had no doubt in my teenage grandiosity that these goals were within my reach, I knew I was “that good”. All the tools were laid before me, I believed they would always be freely given by a grateful world, an appreciative audience who would grease my path to slide into the role of a modern day Michelangelo, only in female form.

    KODAK Digital Still Camera

    Perhaps I dreamed a bit large, but how wonderful to entertain such beliefs! With no guardrails to hem in my imagination my art soared, with no thought to the cost of materials or the the limiting exhaustion that real world work brings.

    Well, guess what? I am making those dreams a reality today. I found someone who is willing to give me a chance, an opportunity to learn from his experience. I gathered my courage and kept asking, even when it seemed like I was getting nowhere. After following up on a suggestion a local CAD artist made to seek out this artist (thank you Alex!); I am proud to say I am learning from metal artist Frank Strunk III.

    My dreams are NOT dead, I AM following my passion. I have the drive and vision, now with a little funding I will be soaring again! Soaring! On riveted metal wings, in welded metal carriages, in sculpted hot-air balloons and on the backs of giant imaginary sea creatures! Watch me soar, man!!!

  • Painting My Heart Out

    Painting My Heart Out

    Woo Hoo ! I am an artist WHIRLWIND again! Hang on, cause art is flowing out of me in a torrent, and I need more hands. I am happy to be out of “funk town” for a while! I entered six shows in the past month and now have 5 paintings accepted into these shows . Four of the five shows. I can’t believe how things snowball. The piece above is a Work in Progress, one of my Surrealist pieces, with a working title of Angry Birds, a little pun on the silly game people play on their devices. I’m rethinking that right now, I may put people off by that. But who cares if I like it, right? Naming Art is the Artist’s privelege. Kind of like children; you made it, you name it! And here’s a fun little twist…how many Birds do you see?

    I painted what I believe to be my best piece as far as figurative art, it’s an acrylic mixed media piece which is a statement piece about justice and human trafficking…It is named “Stuck in Traffic (Framed) and I will post it, and the one mentioned above as soon as I sign them in a few minutes here… Be patient, I had to lie down for a minute. I decided a while back that I must sign my work before I post it online… Silly, really, you can’t stop the thievery no matter what you do, if you decide to post your art online. I recently read a piece considering the benefit vs risk of putting your art online. If you decide not to you are missing out on reaching millions of people, perhaps billions. If you want to sell your art, and/or share it with an audience, then the risk is one you must take. Unless of course you are going to let it spead just by word of mouth. Then it would take 100 years telling 5 people a day to reach 182,500 people, if they did not tell anyone else. If each one told 5 others then… wait a minute, you get the idea. It would take a long time.

    Impressionism is my dearest love, and I hope one day to paint like Pissaro, or maybe Gauguin… Of course I have my own style, and I concentrated more on my brushwork in this piece, and multicolored skin to show my feelings rather than accurate realism. I especially love the dramatic shadows, I tried to be brave! Like I’m not passionate enough, right? I’m proud of the results! I will list all the shows I’m in in the next few days, with their websites and dates…

  • The Hurrier I Go…

    The Hurrier I Go…

    THE BEHINDER I GET

    How true, how true that Pennsylvania Dutch saying is. I squander my art endeavors, rushing from this deadline to that, frazzled, befuddled and unsatisfied. That may be what drove Van Gogh insane, the constant turmoil to do better. I am making the presumption that perhaps the rapid cycling Bipolar Disorder that I enjoy(!) was somehow effecting him, too. Many artists share this mental illness, I know that The Ryan Licht Sang Bipolar Foundation has held Insights Art Exhibitions, to establish a permanent collection of works by artists who are effected by this disorder. I am proud to be one of the Founding Artists of that collection, and proud to know these beautiful people who have done so much to further research in the field.

    Three years, three works of my art in this collection. It blows my mind, just as my art has been blowing peoples minds since I was a child. How easy I forget, and wallow in my mire. That is part of this disease also. The dark days, when no amount of internal dialogue can push me out of bed, out of the bleak landscape in my head. Do you think Van Gogh, or Matisse, or Dali had such dark times? What about Francis Bacon, Pollock, Warhol ?

    Then why do I feel so alone in my efforts? Yes, I’m sure the worldwide pandemic has a dampening effect, on artists as well as everyone else. Perversely, I also treasure the isolation it affords me. No one can chastise my late hours, or visit to be aghast at the paint on my floor, on my walls, on me. I think I need to get out of the house more, go walk on the beach, visit a park. All things strange and alien nowadays. I know this will pass, I have been in counselling and under proffesionals care for my Bipolar Disorder and PTSD for nearly 30 years, I take my medication every single day, because I have been all the way down into the abyss and made friends with the monsters lurking there. Only to find out that they all wanted me dead. I don’t want to be dead. I can fully understand why I did, because this pain is all encompassing. I feel each cell screaming at me to give it relief.

    Not too happy, guys…

    The only thing I can do is paint myself into a painless reality, a utopia of color, a sweet dream of lavender and silk, a field of gold. When sleep won’t come I will disappear into the garden that flows out of my pen, winding its way into sweet fantasy-lands where no one is mean and there is no such thing as loneliness…

  • The Big Show

    The Big Show

    One just can’t help getting one’s hopes up when entering shows. You read the call, you think “Wow! Piece of Cake! That’s exactly the kind of art I do anyway!”

    If , on the other hand I said, “Wow! That is one tough call. I WILL REALLY HAVE TO DIG DEEP AND PUSH MY LIMITS…” Now, this would be the scenario where I could create a masterpiece.

    • FRONT VIEW ( of a sphere?!?)

    I recently entered a call where membership was a requirement… I have done this type before, but not when funds are low. Because now you have, not only the entry fee, but the membership dues as well. (It’s funny, non artists are often shocked that it ‘costs money?!?’ to enter an art show.) Well, this one seemed right up my “art alley”. I had experience, I had won shows like this before. PIECE OF CAKE! I’M A SHOO IN! (Or is it a Shoe in?) So I dove in. Headfirst. Knocked off a Statement lickety-split. Sent a sample of my work and the entry and membership fee without a backward glance, and it was just a week or so before they would notify me of my big check in the mail.

    Ah….about that big check… Not only did I not win, I did not even qualify to participate!

    Hear that hissing sound? Pffffffffffffffttttt….That’s the sound of all the air coming out of my big head. Oh, Miss Overconfidence, you not feeling so good, hmmm? Kind of sicklee?

    YOU DESERVE THE LETDOWN, YOU GOOF!!!!

    Yes, I know that now. I realize how nonchalant I was. I couldn’t even take the time to ask anyone how to send the entry in properly, so I sent the wrong sample work. Too proud to let the judges know I needed help. Such a big, fine, famous, sought-after artist like me!

    My job, now that I’m done licking my wounds, is to dust off my britches and learn everything I can from the artists who did get in the show. Be a good sport, celebrate their success and do better next time. Every setback is a stepping stone to bigger and better things!!

    (Just not too much bigger or better!)

    Sigh…ANYhoo, I finally finished the commission I have been working on since the beginning of December. (whew!) The ‘million dollar by the hour’ painting…Now there is another learning experience. I had a mentor who was a top shelf oil painter tell me to start out charging 22 bucks an hour plus materials, as this was the wages for skilled labor at that time; and “don’t feel sorry for asking for what you are worth!!!”

    Those wise words did not stick for some reason…every client is my “friend” and every “friend” wants a “deal”…So I run around making what boils down to about 4 dollars an hour and whining about being “cheated”. Nobody likes a whiner, least of all me. I’m always having to settle for cheap paint, cheap canvas, cheep cheep goes the birdee.

    I have made up my mind (again) to work on art that frees my mind and my spirit. Not beholden to any one style or genre or “ism”. Art that celebrates my vision, my unique vision. Hooray!

  • IN the Mirror

    IN the Mirror

    recognizing my BIPOLAR self image

    “A Big Beak”…by Susan T. Martin

    I’m in “Wonderland” right now. Been here for a week or so. Time seems to be inching by, my head too heavy to lift off the pillow. Not sick physically, I’m just…just…what can I tell you? I have had some unknown trigger going me headlong into a timewarp. Into a place I never ever wanted to return to…

    The Recurring Bipolarism of self image…

    Is the reflection REAL?

    My art, from it’s earliest inception, has contained 2 sided faces. Always compelled to create a smiling side juxtaposed to a moody/dark side. Even before I consciously knew the face was symbolically my own, before I had ever heard of mental illness or anyone called manic depressive illness bipolar, I was painting my double sided inner person. I have doodles and sketches from grade school where this manifested…it was a necessary act to portray my protagonist self this way. This was the girl inside of me, who would soon find ways to hide from physical reality in altered states…

    The inner struggle raged on in imagination…detail of “The Sentinel’s Prayer” by Susan T. Martin2018

    After the traumatic events of my young life had begun, my self-image became warped and twisted. My mental despair manifested itself in self harming behavior: anorexia/bulemia, punching walls, suicide attempts…to this day, nearly 50 years after the onset of the abuse, I still cannot eat without feeling ugly afterwards.

    • Susan Past ©STM2018
    • In Plain Sight/ Insane, Right? ©Susan T. Martin”The Party’s Over”
    What keeps me from total despair when the flashbacks and darkness come is knowing and believing that this WILL PASS. The excruciating pain WILL END. I place this fact very deliberately and firmly into by mind every time I recover from these spells and after years of therapy, medication and learning Faith, I have overcome total despair. To RISE AGAIN AND PAINT ANOTHER DAY!!!!! I HOPE THAT DAY IS today!!
  • It’s Just Me…

    It’s Just Me…

    Not Famous…no where near it… Glad of that, today. Happy inside my little cottage, warm and contemplating making a dessert recipe. Maybe I’ll share it with my Friend across the way, she’s a true friend.

    Thinking fuzzy thoughts about my Mother, Carol, today. Remembering her smell, her feel when I embraced her. The soft place between her breasts where I would lay my head as a child. Mummy…

    She was always hiding…her emotions, her loves, her hates. Hiding inside huge tee shirts and under handmade afghans-waiting for that rotten husband of hers to say or do something kind… Hiding because he was never kind…

    I grew up a cross between the two of them: Needy and uncertain juxtaposed by selfish and unkind. A brutal mix of warring selves, hating myself more than the world, then hating all the world and myself.

    Brittle and broken around the edges, warm and soft in the middle-like a cookie baked at too high a temperature…

    I had run hard, played hard, fought hard and burned out, the crumpled package of me still held a broken and beating heart. My God reached in and ever-so-gentle pulled me out of the fire. He helped me as the layers of the skin I had worn sloughed off, he brought me across vast deserts filled with the skeletons of my broken dreams, over pits full of the venom of self-loathing…He bandaged my broken hands that had beaten down my own hopes, and placed me gently on a bed spread with forgiveness and love. He pulled the covers over me like the wings of the Eagle and He held me fast with ropes of loving kindness…Oh how I love him now, how much his love has filled me. I don’t have to hide, because I am healed, the scars on my face have faded. The scars on my heart remind me sometimes that I have to stretch out further than some to forgive…

    When you work at a scarred and injured part of your body, you have to rub it and work it over and over, over and over to break up all the scar tissue. So when our hearts are hurt it takes working at this loving, working at this forgiveness, working at this gratitude to learn to expand our hearts again…to open our hearts wide…

    Passed On©STMartin2010