Studio Space
Studio Space
A studio space is one of the most important place for an artist. It can take many shapes and sizes. Some artists have a small desk in the corner of their living room or use the kitchen table, some use an extra bedroom or their garage, and some have huge industrial space with tall ceilings.
A studio history is saying a lot about an artist, and the work created in these different places are influenced by the context itself.
Finding the right place to set a studio is a big deal for me. I am a picky artist when it comes to my studio space, and my needs have also changed over the years. The more I learned about myself, the more my choice of a space became specific.
Virginia Woolf wrote an iconic text about the importance of having a space of your own.
A studio space is where the magic happens; and what I call "magic" doesn't always mean "producing an artwork". A big part of creativity is what David Lynch call "day dreaming" and what I call "spacing out". Sometimes the time spent in the studio seems to be non-productive; sitting at a table or on a chair, looking at drawings from before, or shapes I like, objects I collected, colours I want to do something with... Trying to combine things together, changing my mind... stopping, reading a quote in a book... remembering an idea from 5 years ago... stopping again, looking at an unfinished painting...
All this time spent seems irrelevant, wasted.... but it is not; this is when the magic happens... it doesn't happen right then, and maybe not the next day or week... but at some point... while on the train, or while doing something totally different... things suddenly make sense... and the thread unroll itself.... like magic...
The time spent in the dark, not knowing what will happen, is the difficult but most elevating part of creativity... you know there is something, but you have no clue what it is, and what it will be or if it will ever reveal itseft to you... and in itself, it doesn't matter; what matters is that you want to keep on working in the dark and find out what will happen.
Hangzhou February 22, 2021
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