Here it is only the 21st of April and I am already using one of NaPoWriMo’s prompts.

Why Collect?

A rather simple question:

Why?

I found myself a clodpate.

Is it love?

Survival?

I collect Chaucer,

my neighbor cars,

my brother pencil stubs.

Perhaps collecting is

a way of saying

This is who I am.

like eating hot dogs

or

prime rib.

.

.

It came from a San Luis Obispo Journal article on Studios on the Park and original art

Dec., 2014.

Why Buy Original Art?

I was given the task of answering what seems, on the surface, to be a rather

simple question: This Christmas, why should anyone buy an original painting,

watercolor, or relief print? I found myself unable to give a simple, coherent

reply. Uhhh . . . Because . . . Well . . . are certainly simple answers, but are

certainly not coherent, so I asked my fellow artists at Studios on the Park in Paso

Robles, and their responses helped me feel like I wasn’t such a clod pate after all.

Studios artists are all intelligent, thoughtful, creative people; and not one was

able to come up with a simple, elegant answer to the question. It’s as if the

concept of being surrounded by art is so deeply rooted that the not being

surrounded by original paintings or watercolors, drawings or relief prints made

from hard-wood or linoleum blocks is unthinkable to them. Certainly art not

something we need to survive like we need water or food or shelter. Perhaps

instead it is something we need like to love and to be loved. We can survive

without it, but our lives are infinitely enriched when it is part of our lives.

I collect editions of Chaucer. My neighbor collects and restores old cars. I have

friends who’s lives would be diminished if they could not enjoy dining at fine

restaurants. And for some inexplicable reason, I have a brother who collects

those little pencil stubs they give out with the score card when he plays a round

of golf.

Perhaps collecting, being surrounded by what we love is simply part of the human condition, and when we surround ourselves with things we love those things become an extension of our selves; a way of saying “This is who I am.” So maybe having an original work of art hanging on our walls instead of a poster fulfills the same need as having a fresh bouquet of flowers instead of plastic flowers from Michaels. There are places and times for buying a reproduction, but having an original is like the difference between eating a hot dog and eating prime rib.