Making the work you want to make means finding nourishment within the work itself. Making the work you want to make means setting aside these doubts so that you may see clearly what you have done, and thereby see where to go next. Making art now means working in the face of uncertainty it means living with doubt and contradiction, doing something no one much cares whether you do, and for which there may be neither audience nor reward. More often, though, fears rise in those entirely appropriate (and frequently recurring) moments when vision races ahead of execution.

Making art precipitates self-doubt, stirring deep waters that lay between what you know you should be, and what you fear you might be. Making art can feel dangerous and revealing. Making art is dangerous and revealing. Life is short, art long, opportunity fleeting, experience treacherous, judgment difficult. - Hippocrates (460-400 B.C.)

Their insights and observations, drawn from personal experience, provide an incisive view into the world of art as it is experienced by artmakers themselves.

Art & Fear is a book written by artists, for artists – it’s about what it feels like when artists sit down at their easel or keyboard, in their studio or performance space, trying to do the work they need to do. Here are but a few reasons (ahem, excuses) why I don't produce art: distraction procrastination hunger fear of failure fear of taking risks fear of facing a blank canvas laziness holding back emotionally After some self reflection (read more procrastination) I thought I would create an ART MANIFESTO ( see above image) I want to share it with you too as a gentle reminder to go easy on your sensitive self, give yourself time to find inspiration, permission to process, permission to fail and maybe even fall in love with what you're doing.In Art & Fear: Observations on the Perils (and Rewards) of Artmaking, Artists David Bayles & Ted Orland explores the way art gets made, the reasons it often doesn’t get made, and the nature of the difficulties that cause so many artists to give up along the way. Other than that, it is my own self that gets in the way. To be honest, the biggest and perhaps single outside factor that truly keeps me from creating art is time. As an artist, I face my own set of obstacles as well. As an art instructor I've seen many, many people get discouraged with their art and art making. be careful, it's messy in there! It's simple, very readable format also easily applies to other genres and disciplines and the creative process in general. It's a wonderful, humorous look inside the artist brain. ART & FEAR by David Bayles and Ted Orland discusses the way and the why art gets made, and the (mostly self induced) reasons why it doesn't. I have been reading a wonderful book that considers and verbalizes many obstacles that artists encounter and faces them head on.

David bayles and ted orland