I get inspiration from everywhere but the places I seem to study the most are people in restaurants and since I eat out every night I find my self looking… no, staring, yea, I freaking will stare at someone and take in all the little mannerisms they do and put them in my drawings. This one was a woman eating with her friend and she was defiantly telling her something secretive and so damn seductive it was killing me, she caught me more that once staring and I think it was freaking her out.. ha, I felt like telling her “hey, I’m not a stalker I’m a artist” then I remembered most artists are stalkers.
-Todd White
I like this quote even though or maybe because I think that Mr. White is a shitty painter and an even shittier artist. I was listening to his radio interview on NPR yesterday and he was blathering on and on about “having arrived” and the “importance of production.” People who speak this way about their art strike me as entrepreneurs trying to maximize on an idea for a buck. Don’t get me wrong, I’d rather see folks paint for money that drill in Alaska, but for god’s sake, there needs to be some internal admission: I am 1) a business person and 2) an artist.
Maybe I’m an an asshole. Maybe I’m looking to slam those super-producing freaks that I will never be. Well, I definitely am. But here is my thing -
Todd White unitentionally hits the nail on the head with this quote. Shitty artists LOOK for inspiration. They oogle. They stare. Somewhere in their art is reflected that dull, stupid, uninspired searching. Did Van Gogh search for inspiration in country scenes? Even without having a seance, I feel pretty confident that the answer is no. He just WAS inspired. He didn’t have to look – he didn’t search it out. He wasn’t a toolbox.
