a journey back to canvas

“It is so fine yet so terrible to stand in front of a blank canvas.”  Cezanne

So here I stand. After years of continental drift, I have returned to a part of me that is home and foreign soil in the same footprint. I am not sure what I have lost or gained or grown in my time away, but I finally have the faith (and fear) to pick up my brush again with serious intent. I’ve never written about my artist’s heart until now. The language is difficult to put into words, but I will try.

Talent you have or you don’t. Skill you learn, use or lose. But a gift is something that has been given for a purpose, even if that purpose is solely between the recipient and the giver. The talent I had was recognized early on. I was encouraged to pursue art and I trained for a sharp skill set. But no one seemed to understand, least of all me, that I desperately needed to be taught how to steward the gift I had been given.

My heart has been full of colour and sound and words since I was a little girl. Always drawing, always singing, little poems written down here and there…that was me. I am still me. But for a long time much seemed lost or muffled or hidden away. I didn’t know how to treasure the gift. I didn’t realize that it is supposed to have a place of honour in my life. I slowly closed a door inside myself and sealed it with excuses. The barriers were reinforced by time and doubt and dust. But I was not forgotten and the very thing I thought to be lost was held in place by the Giver. To quote a precious encourager -

“It (the gift) was still growing while it slept.”

 

So now I find myself on a returning path to places I have not yet been.  I see colours within myself and colours beyond my mortal reach. How can I express this? I am on a journey to find out. Why? Because these gifts are not momentary or seasonal or merely convenient. They are meant to be a continual expression in and through and throughout our lives.