When the Work Meets You
Last Thursday night, “Seasons of Water” was no longer just a collection of paintings hanging on the walls.
The room filled with people. Conversations began. Stories were shared. People stood in front of the work and found their own meanings in colors, textures, and moments that began with something entirely different in me.
I think that may be one of my favorite parts of being an artist.
So much of creating happens alone. A painting begins quietly in the studio, often before I fully understand what it is trying to say. I follow it, layer by layer, trusting that eventually its meaning will reveal itself.
But then it leaves my hands.
And suddenly, the work belongs to the conversation.
“Seasons of Water” grew from years of living beside the Great Lakes and paying attention to what water has taught me about change. Water moves and rests. It releases and returns. It can be turbulent one day and almost impossibly still the next.
Thursday night reminded me that we do much the same.
As I talked with people about the paintings, I heard stories of grief, transition, hope, new beginnings, and seasons of life I could never have known when I was standing alone in my studio making the work.
Maybe that is part of what art can do. It gives us a place to recognize something of ourselves in one another.
I’m deeply grateful to everyone who came and spent the evening with me, and to Jessica Kooiman Parker and Maggie Pavão of K/P Cultural and the DELAMAR Traverse City team for creating a space where this kind of connection could happen.
And congratulations again to Jenny Wery Gallinat, who went home with an original painting and basket.
“Seasons of Water” will remain on view at DELAMAR Traverse City through October 25, so Thursday was only the beginning.
If you weren’t able to join us for the reception, I would still love to share the collection with you. Let me know when you’d like to see it, and I’ll meet you there.
And perhaps that’s the question I’m carrying with me after the show:
What changes when something we’ve experienced alone is finally shared with someone else?
