Sometimes I feel off-beat in the midst of a crowd. I run on a different metronome. I let my ideas run my schedule. Tortured, I am, but not all for naught. Melancholy is welcome on a rainy day. I let it seep in and flow through me until I find the emotion I need to create. As a lover, I’m tragic. Lost and hopeful, and innocent like a child- but raised with wolves.

The best things can come from turmoil. My weather has hardened me to some things of the world. I will never fit in. I will probably try to every once in a while, but there’s no point. Why fit in? What is there to be excited about when everyone is the same? Beauty is in standing out, strength is in standing alone. Courage is in standing for something. I stand for creativity, openness, curiosity, passion, hidden knowledge, and ticking to a different clock. Camouflage is how I float by, but on my own, I am fierce, powerful, a surge of creative energy. How do I expose my artist superhero in front of the normal? I don’t. I remain tortured, I remain an artist.

I was sitting in my central lecture this morning, and my professor showed us a video by Marina Abramovic (Artist Manifesto). I’m watching it again right now. I highly recommend it:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ldw488zpw7U

The most beautiful part that grabbed my full attention is within the first 20 minutes or so.

It is an amazing, beautifully honest piece of work, and it touched my heart. I would compare it to poetry, but it’s more than that. She only showed us a few minutes of it and not the full hour, but after a little while, I felt my eyes get wet. It is so powerful– it touched me more than any religious speech than I’ve heard before.

I think part of my experience here on art exchange will be for me to open up and be more comfortable with being curious. I think I am a potter at heart, but that’s not the only thing I am. I plan to explore other directions while I’m here. I am print making, bronze casting, and doing some sculpture this semester. There is no limit to creativity here, no judgment for trying something too outside of the box (within moral and scientific reason). I am free to make things besides pots here without getting a harsh critique– in fact, it might be the opposite here. They aren’t accustomed to having potters in the studio. They probably won’t understand why I have the compulsive need to make things functional, but I will do it anyway. It’s in my nature.