Art Scars from Childhood

Many of us have them

If you’ve ever listened or read anything from Brené Brown, you’ll know about art scars.

Brené writes and talks about vulnerability, shame, being imperfect and how important creativity is.

It’s the creativity part that helps us discover our art scars.

When I was at school I was a pretty good student. Of my graduating class only seven people went to university (as distinct from those who went to a TAFE college or teachers school) and of those seven, six were boys, the seventh was me.

But throughout my high school years, over and over again, a recurring theme emerged from my report cards.

I would get mostly As and some Bs but in Art the highest grade I ever got was a ‘C’.

Many a report comment from the head master or deputy was ‘Michelle has done well this term, but she should try to lift her grade in art’.

My parents would laugh and say ‘well don’t worry about that, we know you’re not good at art’ (in a very loving and kind way).

I’m not sure when it started, but I’ve always ‘known’ I was terrible at art.

I can remember drawing a pig or a hippopotamus in my junior school years, maybe six or seven and when I showed my sport obsessed my dad, he said “wow that’s a great football”.

I yelled out in anger at how he didn’t recognise my clearly perfect looking animal and cried.

He meant well.

Fast forward to high school and I carried my primary school art scars with me.

After a year or two the kind teacher would just pat my shoulder and say, ‘keep trying Michelle’ or ‘I can see you’re trying but look at Jenny’s one to see where you can improve’.

Of course Jenny’s was bloody perfect wasn’t it?

One look at it and I knew I would NEVER get that good so why try?

So how important is doing well in art?

Well I’m in my mid 50s now and in my memorabilia box at home is a piece of art I did that I got an ‘A-’ for.

My one and only EVER ‘A’ in art.

I’m ignoring the minus bit ok?

It was an ‘A’ and I’m sticking to it!

It was a full page of grids with graded shading in colours. A row for each colour.

So not exactly in competition with the Impressionists!

But 40 years later, I still have that piece of work!

Brené talks about people having art scars so deep that it changed the way they learnt, and how they saw themselves and their creativity, forever.

After high school, I didn’t pursue anything creative.

‘Oh that’s just not me’ I’d say, ‘I’m no good at art’.

And of course by art I meant absolutely everything creative.

So no pottery, painting, drawing etc for me.

I danced when I was younger and that’s as creative as I got.

Fast forward 25 years and I met a woman who is an amazing artist and she was going to hold a charcoals workshop and invited me to come along.

Oh I laughed and laughed!

‘You are wasting your time with me Auli’ I said, ‘I can’t draw to save my life’.

At this point in my art ‘career’, I had just started scrapbooking (my first attempts were not that fabulous) but that was it.

I used to say that if I was kidnapped and they said draw something or we’ll shoot you, I’d have to say, ‘Well shoot me now, cause anything over a stick figure, I’m not capable of’.

Clearly I had some DEEP art scars.

But Auli encouraged me.

A whole group of people I knew were going, so my husband and I set off for our art weekend, where Auli assured me she could help me do something.

I wasn’t convinced.

We were asked to bring along something we wanted to paint.

I mean, lol, I wasn’t going to make this easy for her.

After all I did a kickass hippopotamus in Grade 2 why couldn’t I now paint like the Impressionists?

So this is the picture I selected.

Renoir’s ‘Luncheon of the Boating Party’.

I have had a print hanging on the wall in every house I’ve lived in. I love it.

Should be easy right?

I laughed all the way on the drive there, never believing I could paint anything remotely like this.

There was about eight of us, for the weekend.

The others were fabulous artists in my eyes, including my husband who discovered that he had received his mother’s artistic gifts and painted this amazing version of Van Gogh’s ‘Sunflowers’.

I framed it and gave it to him for Christmas that year and it’s been hanging in our houses ever since.

Wisely, Auli advised that I pic one character from the scene to start on, rather than attempt the entire work at my first sitting!

So I chose Louise-Alponsine Fournaise - the daughter of the owner of the restaurant at Maison Fournaise.

After Day 1 this is where I got to.

Not too bad.

I was encouraged!

You have to remember that up until this point I had literally drawn nothing more complex than stick figures for decades.

While I didn’t finish the whole thing by the end of the weekend (and sadly some 10 years later haven’t been back to finish it entirely), this was my progress.

I was pretty proud of myself. I posted this comment next to it on Facebook.

Art scars are real.

Art scars hurt and can do long term serious damage.

After the encouragement of this, I started scrapbooking properly and now use it for my creative endeavours.

I don’t really enjoy drawing that much because the gremlins inside my head still try to tell me I’m not good enough, but I have since done pottery and colouring and decoupage but I love scrapping the most.

Brené says that unused creatively metastasises in us.

It results in anger, depression, grumpiness, foreboding.

All things that are not ideal to lead a happy life.

That’s not how we should want to live.

What art scars do you have hidden that are holding you back?

Now could be a good time to drag them out and kick them to the curb.

Good Luck!

As we seek excellence in all we do, I want to share with you what I’m up to each week. It will keep me accountable to you, my readers and it will also help me to reflect on what I’ve done over the previous week. I’d love to get your feedback on whether you think this is a good idea or not.

?? This Week’s Progress

This week was the start of school holiday’s and my son is studying for his GCSE exams that start early May. These holidays are vital to get in as much revision as possible. So while progressing my work, I’ve been supervising and assisting our youngest to make as much progress as he can during this period.

?? This Week’s Reading

I am currently reading an ‘author’s advance copy’ of a colab book project I am involved in. It will launch on April 9th, so more on that in next week’s edition, but it is very exciting!

?? This Week’s Viewing

I’ve been rewatching (for the 20th+ time! lol) Downton Abbey. It’s one of my comfort shows. My husband flew to Australia this week for work and will be gone for over 5 weeks, so I needed a little cheering up.

?? - Last Week’s Traveling Through History Newsletter

Issue 42: Oxford Colleges - Mansfield, New College, Worcester and Keble.

???- Tilt Your Business Podcast - This Week’s Episode

???- Business on the Bloc Podcast - This Week’s Episode

Ep 73: Google My Wallet

Michelle is a Writer, Marketer, Content Entrepreneur, Historian (Mst Oxon) and mother of 3 boys.

After 25 years in business and as the ‘Content Marketing Queen’ for over 13 years, she has helped countless small businesses understand and develop their content strategies and focus on a customer first approach.

On International Women’s Day in March 2024, Michelle hung up her crown so that she could be a Queen Maker to inspire and assist women over 40, rise up to be the Queens they were born to be.

At Excellence Takes Courage we will navigate together what it takes to achieve excellence, with courage.

Follow me on these social media platforms:

Instagram

Facebook

Twitter/X

LinkedIn

Website - incoming…. stay tuned!

Please help me build my list by sharing this newsletter with your friends.

If you love history and traveling then you might like to follow my weekly Substack newsletter on History Travel -?Traveling Through History.