I need to be honest about this dress. I hate it.
When I saw there was an Ian Davenport exhibition opening at
Paul Kasmin Gallery, I knew I had to make a dress for it. I was so excited. I found a white dress and got to planning – I
would tape off the stripes so I could paint each different color, and freehand
the swirls at the hem. It would be
FUN. I got to work.
Hours and days into the project, and I began to hate
it. I toiled away, struggling with
bleeding paint, fabric that was too thin, running out of supplies, and on and on. At some
point along the way, I started to HATE the dress. I didn’t want to look at it anymore. It came to represent all of the challenges
and frustrations of every project.
I couldn’t give up on it, not after I had invested so many
hours. So I finished the dress, but I
knew I hadn’t captured the essence of Ian Davenport’s painting. I didn’t want to wear it. But the invested time forced me to put it on and go to the gallery. At the gallery, the photos weren’t
working. The lighting was difficult and
the dress had gotten wrinkled, and everything was just WRONG.
I was so frustrated.
I wasn’t going to post the photo.
I needed a break from this whole thing.
Art is hard. Replicating art is
harder. Making art when you have a
full-time job is nearly impossible.
And then I realized that the struggles and trials of making
something are a part of the experience.
If it were easy, then everyone would do it. But they don’t, because it’s hard. Learning how to work with new mediums and
styles and brushes and tape and paint is, actually, one of the best parts of making
things. When something doesn’t turn out
the way I want or expect it to, I need to embrace it. What else can you do? You can start from scratch or you can ROCK the
thing that you made and let it speak for itself, telling the story of all of
the things you learned from it.
So here it is, in all of its glory, the dress that gave me
hell. But in the process, it also forced
me to solve problems and embrace challenges, so maybe it was worth it. Maybe.
Photo by Kathy Paciello.
