don't stop believing

To anyone reading this blog in real time, I'm sorry it's been a while since an update. I have been in my studio painting. I like the idea of tracking what it's like to go through a research-intensive MFA program, but in order to do that, I have to be making work.

I had my second round of crits today. Things went much better than they did the first round. While there were still plenty of comments about things that I could have done better, there were also comments about the successes. I think the main thing I did was show that I've been putting in studio hours and that I've been willing to experiment.

Early on in the semester, I heard people talking about a lot of conceptual aspects of their work. People stressed that content is king. While that's correct, the part I was missing is that it's better to figure out how to express your content by executing a plan and meeting limited success than it is to spend a lot of time trying to figure out the best way to express your content. Make choices for reasons, be willing to evaluate them.

I talked to a friend earlier this week. I was freaking out because I was not sure about the work I was making. He's been through an MFA, so he understood. He told me to dive in. That's what I'd done, but I was afraid it wasn't going to pan out. It doesn't matter if everything pans out. A lot of being successful is just making work and evaluating what does and doesn't work. You can't learn if you keep making the same things by the same formulas. Once you learn anything, that lesson will inform how you work from that point on.

Anyway, I know I'll be stressed again, but for right now, I feel good about the progress I'm making. I have my official progress review coming up in a few weeks. I'm positive I'll have some of the freak out about that. I'm just going to try the best I can.