I’ve spent the past three weeks applying for a small grant through a local Artist NGO. As you can imagine, finding the right words to convince a third part to fund my artistic goals was (still is) a challenge. So…I prompted an AI generator with “Applying for a grant” and it popped out the following:

Well….duh! I didn’t find this particularly helpful. I’ve written any number of budgets, proposals, and “looking forward” summaries during my prior lives in banking, accounting, and restaurant management. I was hoping that the 21st c. version of a p.a. would give me something more. Nope.

Thankfully, the ORG I was applying through broke the process down into neatly managed sections—each clearly identified with specific instructions as to what to include. I mean this in the best way possible when I say…they led me along like an adult teaching a child to ride a bicycle. My disabilities affect my concentration over and above any physical constraints; therefore, anything that helps me to focus on a specific manageable task is very welcome.

Even so, it took me three weeks to finish something that I once would have been able to do in three days back in my working lives. I had already researched available vendors, drafted a proto-budget, established a workable timeline, and did (what I thought) everything possible to prepare for this application. I hadn’t accounted for one teeny-tiny detail…

The one skill I’ve never had in any abundance—and I have a love / hate relationship with in others—is “salesmanship”. I come by my distrust of it honestly. Combine my innate tendency to being brutally honest with myself and others, being raised in a home where dishonesty ran amok, and Marm’s career in the accounting dept of a car dealership, and I would either have become the best or worst possible salesman. I hadn’t realized (read: made the connection obvious to others) that I’d have to sell my project in order to convince the ORG to fund it. I can’t express how difficult it was (is) to describe my work in a meaningful way without allowing myself to become “that guy” who can go on for days discussing the most minute details of DUNE. It’s very difficult to objectively describe what I hope a viewer will take from a specific piece while, at the same time, conveying the passion that I have for said piece.

I have to wonder whether this is common for artists / creatives?

I used to have the mindset that “my art should speak for itself”…until I realized any viewer still needs a frame-of-reference in order to react to my work. Even when I did “traditional” landscapes—during my university studio days—I found that painting “what I saw” just wasn’t terribly interesting to me. Why paint (realism was a HUGE thing back then) when I could just take a photo, manipulate and edit it, and then submit that? It’s only now that I’m firmly in the camp of illustrating concepts rather than actual landscapes that I realize my art very rarely “spoke for itself”; I was often required to interpret it for the viewer.

I guess that’s what all art comes down to. The artist creates something from a subjective space, that is presented to be objectively pleasing / reactive, in the hopes that the viewer has a subjective positive reaction to it.

I hadn’t realized until applying for this grant that I had (previously) been relying on physically being near my art to provide “interpretation”. Sometimes…I don’t make connections 😉.

Now, I have to believe that my art is sufficiently interesting that I’ll get the grant (I have to remind myself of this daily). I have to follow my own advice and let the Universe do what it will.

Happy thoughts, Gentle Reader. For you and me both!