(above photo by Floor de Jong)
Dear you,
I wrote my last letter eight months ago. That same time I lived at my previous address, which puts the move counter at five since graduation. You could say that little has happened since the last letter; life is still hectic, with being an artist I am still quite content, and across the board I am tired of the multitude of things that seem to roll over me in a succession. Only when I zoom in do I see that something has indeed changed: that my makership has gone through all the seasons since the last letter, and that although we are back to the same season, we are also a year on.
In the eight months that have passed I have been able to root myself more deeply in Breda, the city where I grew up, studied, and now build my artistry around. It feels on the one hand like an act, and on the other hand like an honest answer to myself as to where I want to live and work in the coming years, and that that answer is a place not in the Randstad.
Sometimes you throw a ball up and hope to catch it again when it comes back down, and sometimes a ball is thrown at you and it is up to you to react to it or not. It seems that there are more and more reasons to stay in Breda, because all the little balls also end up back in Breda. From the vegetable garden that I get to manage together with my friend Jetske Apollonia and Floor de Jong, to the subsidy application with the municipality that has been granted and my brand new membership in the art committee of Breda art initiative IDFX.
Also, in the new school year, I started teaching at a neighborhood elementary school. About every month I teach an art class in which I give four classes a making assignment based on the theme they are working on that period. Period one had the theme ‘Everyone is of the World,’ and I taught the children to make their own doll out of paper that they had to control in threes using the Japanese ‘Bonraku’ technique (or at least attempt to). The lessons are incredibly exhausting, and after spending a day there I also have to take a day to recover, but at the same time the children and the way they each create little works of art in their own way give enormous energy.
Sometimes you throw a ball up and hope to catch it again when it comes back down, and sometimes a ball is thrown at you and it's up to you to respond to it or not
Through teaching, the kitchen garden and the art committee, I feel confident about my abilities to connect people and perform organizational tasks. And that's nice! At the same time, I can still feel uncertain about my technical qualities when it comes to making new sculptures from wood, clay or stone in my studio. I still struggle with that real making sometimes. This is where I miss art school the most, where workshops and people with expertise were never far away. I can get organized, but I don't know where to turn with my technical questions about working wood with gouges, or making large ceramic sculptures without everything collapsing. Besides continuing to work on the beautiful projects that I have been a part of this year, that is one of the big goals for this year: to further expand the network of people with expertise in wood and clay and stone so that I can also feel more confident in my studio.
My question to readers: what kind of art class would you have liked to have received when you were a child in elementary (or junior) school?
Love,
Sam
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