Beauty Heals

Welcome to 2025 everyone. :)

I’ve had a couple of experiences recently revolving around Beauty (the kind with a capital “B”!), and why I think it matters, and I wanted to share about them here with folks, because they set me to thinking and exploring deeper into the subject.

I’ve actually written on this subject before (Why Beauty Matters), but back in October, I had a reader (Jenny) contact me and ask me to elaborate on why I think “Beauty Heals”-- I had it up on the banner for the website at the time. It’s an important subject to me, and as is the case with many things when they’re important to us… I had been tentative about sharing it in the first place. Probably out of fear of judgment. So I really appreciated someone reaching out to me about it. I sat with it for a week or so, pondering, mulling it some. I think there’s real value in trying to get to the root of what motivates oneself, and I didn’t want to give a pat answer.

These short, darker, wet days of winter can sometimes be a slog for me. I’m sure they are for many people. But the response I gave her has lingered with me these last few months, and led to even greater thinking on the subject. And so, I wanted to share it here with you too.

“Repeatedly in my life, when I’ve sort of been swept about by difficult times, I’ve had the experience of art-making rejuvenate me-- but more importantly making the time to really sit and engage in and soak up beauty as I’m making a painting. I think, when I am hurting or when things seem like they don’t make sense, finding beauty and really giving it the time needed to let it sink into me, to not just commodify it… finding that beauty has sort of centered me. Given me a ballast.

It’s been very healing to recognize that there are things out there that outlast pain, that outlast us, that are beautiful and ephemeral and regenerative and ongoing. Forests, mountains, oceans, the cast shadow of a tree across a path. It’s been an amazing thing to me to participate (through painting) in the beauty of a certain place and to feel, without prompting, that out of the randomness of existence here was something that was almost custom made to make me respond with joy. So that I became almost like a flower rotating to the sun in response to it.

Tapping into that when I paint is very healing and affirming. The creative process is a powerful way to get outside of yourself. And also sometimes to pay homage.

And then, when I’ve finished, I have an artifact-- the painting. And if I’ve done my job right, letting myself act as a kind of funnel or conduit, then the beauty I was privy to comes through and remains… as if by a natural process, like the sediment from waves left behind on the beach. For others to experience too.”

And what was so interesting to me is that, after the election, when I was feeling down, I wrote this post about Beauty, without even realizing how well it fit into this. It was like an accidental proof of concept! :)

“This is a little story about beauty.

I drug myself out to the studio yesterday. My feet were heavy.

It was not a day full of joy for me. But I made a commitment to myself last month to begin focusing again on my own art more and to set aside teaching. I’ve been scheduling hours in my studio first, and building my schedule around it to the best of my ability.

So I went out to paint yesterday afternoon, like a good boy. I did not want to go. I was angry and sad. A lot of sighs yesterday. But I’ve been working at keeping a painting schedule for 3 or 4 weeks now, and that little habit I’ve been building helped carry me, like a little magic carpet, out to my studio.

I spent an hour cleaning up. I didn’t really think I was going to paint. I was going to cheat and just prep “for next time” to meet my artistic commitments for the day.

This last weekend was the last of my zoom classes for the year, and I don’t know hwen I’ll be doing them again. I’m ready to drill down into myself and find out what’s there. So I put away things, cameras and such. I washed my brushes, swept and took the garbage out. I refilled my wells.

And then I thought I’d paint a little something. The memory of just experimenting and trying things out came to me. Something without judgment.

So I grabbed a quirk stiff little flat brush I had. I never paint with it. I don’t really know why I even have it. But I do. So I gave it a go. To see what I could do with it.

I did about 95% of the piece with it. Trying to get washes. Using its stiff bristles to lift. Using the corner to dab and create. And surprise- yes, painting gave me some joy. Some focus. Made me return to myself and be in my body.

There’s a reason we make art. Beauty heals.”