Why Write An Artist Statement - I

Personal Power The Andean mystics have a theory about personal power: that every being, including each blade of grass, each mountain, each human, has the life-given right to develop to its fullest potential, and that we accomplish this most easily when we recognize the blessings of our personal power as it enriches us within a living bubble of life energy. But access to our personal power depends upon our ability to be deeply hones about what we know, and what we have yet to learn. (…) The only way to expand out personal power is to embrace ourselves exactly as we are neither more nor less but as someone in a state of constantly changing grace. This is a very challenging idea in our Western culture, where power is primarily experienced as the power over, to manipulate, dominate, rule, and control others; or, conversely, as the power to be independent, isolated from, separated from, to be on one’s own. The power of isolation, of control is driven by fear. It is a power that thrives on the distance we put between others, and ourselves rather that on our own connection to the web of life, which draws us together. The power over is the power of exclusion. Personal power, on the other hand, is the power emerging from our deepest connection to life. It is the power of feeling, embacing, creating, and celebrating. It is the power that comes when we open up the connection between others, ourselves, and the life-giving energy that surrounds us all. It is the power of inclusion. The power of life. Making art is a strong way to exercise personal power. So is writing an artist statement, which is an act of self-definition where words, instead of images, draw a clearer portrait of who you wish to be". Ariane Goodwin "Writing the Artist Statement"