When did you start making art?

I’ve always made art. I grew up in an angry house, but I was always left alone when I was making things. It started out as coloring, etc. My grandmother was a crafts teacher, so when I was old enough, I was given projects like making gifts for family and friends.

I still remember the time in grade school in Wisconsin when I was first encouraged to really look. What a valuable lesson! I had drawn a tree the way most kinds do, like a lolly pop. The teacher took me to the window and asked if trees really look like that. I’ve been in love with trees and that deeper way of seeing ever since.

Did you study art in school?

Yes. My first great art teacher was in high school. She really lit a fire in me. I remember drawing cones and balls in charcoal for hours and hours. Everything about it fascinated me. The way the charcoal blended on the news print, the way the light hit the objects, the way she taught me to describe those objects without visible lines. The next year I was allowed to take a college level course or high school credit. The instructor didn’t think I could do it, but I held my own with the adults.

When I got to college, I majored in art, but it didn’t ignite that internal fire. I lost touch with art for a time when I became an accountant to pay the bills although I still expressed my creativity in other ways. I found it difficult to hold space for both work and a consistent art practice.

After about 10 years accounting burned me out and I returned to art, doing some graduate work in Arizona, but again, I only found a hint of that burning curiosity and inspiration I’d found in that wonderful high school art room.

I moved to New Hampshire and found a wonderful, active art community. It was then the flame began to grow. The winters were rough though, and we moved a couple more times, finally finding a middle ground climate wise, in Tennessee. This is where I finally found that fire again. It was deep within the whole time! I started trusting myself more and more and that trust began to show in my work.

Why do you make art?

Possibly one of the reasons I couldn’t find the spark after high school was the reason I was making art. I thought it made me cool and interesting. LOL. It did neither and it showed in my work.

Now I make art to please myself. I always love it when others enjoy what I make, but that’s not the why. The why is how making art makes me feel. If no-one ever bought another piece or ‘liked’ another post, I’d still keep doing what I’m doing because it makes me happy, he’s me to process my experience, and makes me a better human.

When did you start focusing on abstraction?

My work has become increasingly abstract over the years. Totally non-objective work started showing up in New Hampshire about 10 years ago, but my current obsession with expressing myself abstractly has really taken root in the last couple years.

I think before that I didn’t fully understand what abstract art was about or what made it good. I suppose I was still worried about what others might think.

I’ve been blessed with several wonderful online teachers. I think I’ve learned more from them in the last few years that all those years in college!

What inspires you?

Absolutely everything. Maybe something creates an emotional reaction, or maybe I just allow what happens to happen.

My focus as an abstract expressionist painter is my inner experience. Art helps me to process my experience, both the difficult and the joyous. So I have an experience, like the spring that was exploding all around me as I filmed my lessons for Make Create Express. I may choose colors based on what I see or the colors I associate with the emotions that arise in me. I choose mark making tools spontaneously, trusting that what ever pops into my mind or catches my eye is part of that inner experience that I’m expressing. I apply paint in the same way. I just keep going until it feels like I’m done. Sometimes I don’t know exactly what I’m saying until later, and that’s ok too. The subconscious can be mysterious.

What makes you want to teach?

The women in my family have been teachers for generations. I’ve always loved to share information and experience with others. Teaching art is an exceptionally rich way to do both. I know that art is a worthwhile journey, even though it is sometimes a bumpy and circuitous way. I’ve been there, and I continue along that same road. We can help each other along the way. I suspect I learn as much or more from my students than I teach.

In truth, I consider myself more of a facilitator. I offer info, give gentle nudges, allow space for each participant to express themselves, and cheer them on. They do all the hard work.

Talking with Artists- Robin Sturis

Galia Alena