Art is Resurfacing

Where’s Hope Been? That’s a jolly good question. I’ve been here, there and everywhere. Mostly, to tap into that concept, I’ve been diving into the arts.

It all began when I was in elementary school. I was chubby, wore glasses and got braces; those latter two happened in the same year.

I was a good student. Why? It was expected and I was capable. There were no big monetary awards, no big vacations or promises from my parents.

So how did I get good grades? I studied and studied some more. I worked at it. Honestly, I didn’t mind reading books, doing homework, and that sort of stuff that was commonplace in the ‘70s.

What I did mind was being teased. So to retreat, I found art and art found me. The art teacher, Mrs. B. Farina was and still is a petite woman with blonde hair. She would show us the project and we’d put on our smocks and get to it. There were guidelines, but I don’t recall any unbreakable rules. Time passed too quickly during art class.

In elementary school, it wasn’t about talent, at least not for me. Art class was about creating, making something that didn’t require notes, didn’t require reading, didn’t require a test.

Then, into middle school. Slowly, although I enjoyed the art classes with Ms. Dietch and Mr. Lutz, things became more about the outcome and the talent. During the summers, I would eagerly ask my mom to sign me up for summer school. Wait, what’s a good student doing in summer school? Back then, Bergenfield Public Schools offered summer art classes for fun, for enrichment.

A few years later, it was time for high school. Talent became important; at least to me it did. What was once fun and my place to retreat, became a bit less fun with each passing year. Yet, did I stop taking those art electives? Absolutely not. That didn’t happen until college.

In college, there was no time for art. It was all about required coursework and required assignments and required exams. I filled up many of those blue books with my handwritten responses.

Finally, graduation with my first of what would be three degrees. Was there time for creativity and curiosity? It trickled into my career. I became an elementary school teacher. The students and I did projects, sometimes together. I so enjoyed creating the prototypes, the examples. I was one of the teachers who enjoyed putting in the time and hours to craft bulletin boards and showcase displays. The secret was in using the opaque projector. Shhh….

Fast forward to today, to the past six months. I took myself back, I gave myself permission to play. I gave myself time to touch a multitude of materials. I even put on my big girl pants and submitted some of my work to an exhibition. Not only were two poems and sculptures displayed in a local museum, four more pieces were used in the set of a local play.

So where’s Hope? Here I am, coming out and going about the community with a smile and some pieces of curiosity driven artwork.

In the creating mode