So I’m sitting here trying to think of what to write because I’ve never done one of these things. Ridiculous…I know.
Being an artist is hard work. Recently I’ve been struggling with going in a new direction with my own artwork. Partly because some teachers have pushed me towards it and partly because I know I need to. That’s what this is all about right? How boring would it be to do the same painting your whole life!?! I’m realizing how important connections and experiences are to my own work. People connecting with other people, and mainly me connecting with other people (I’m trying to stop being such a painfully shy person). Since I started interning at Diverseworks I've been able to define the new direction I want to take in my artwork easier. A performance by a group called SO Percussion at Diverseworks really brought this idea home for me. See how Diverseworks has already helped in my crusade against shyness! The performance brought me to tears. Seriously!
I guess you could call it their closing piece; it involved one of the four members Josh Quillen making connections with certain audience members. It’s hard to explain but Quillen ran to these certain audience members and politely asked them to yell “I Love You Jason” as loud as possible to try and get Jason Treuting (another SO Percussion member) attention. While said audience members were trying to profess their love the other three members (Jason Treuting, Adam Sliwinski, and Eric Beach) were only paying attention to the piece they were playing that gradually got louder and louder and louder. So if you can imagine an audience yelling at the top of their lungs (which did happen because Quillen eventually recruited the whole audience) at one performer “I Love You Jason”, it was kind of an epiphany for me. How often do I ignore possible connections? So thank you Diverseworks and SO Percussion!
Abi Semtner is a graduate student, studying painting and drawing at the University of Houston.
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