Beginning
Early on a January morning. ©Annegret Fauser
On the wall of my studio, I have a small embroidery with a line from A Fable for Critics (1848) by the nineteenth-century poet, James Russell Lowell:
“In creating, the only hard thing’s to begin…”
Whether or not there is even a kernel of truth in this sentiment, this one line was a game changer for me, both as a writer and as an artist. Creative work—Lowell intimates—only needs one thing: doing.
Like many other creatives, I found (and find) it hard to get started. Sometimes, the threshold to access my creativity feels so high that I want to hide under the covers and not come out. Sometimes, I quiver with impatience to begin, then run into my studio (or to my computer), only to come to a stop. Beginning, then, is a hard thing.
Beginning also refers to two distinct albeit interconnected forms of commencing a task: starting something new or picking up something that is already in the works. Let me start with the scarier one: beginning something new. For the scholar in me, there are two personas at work. One is the detective who can’t wait to explore all the clues left in archives, musical works, and other remnants of the past. Few things are as exciting as beginning a new project, with ideas bubbling up and clever pathways to follow in my research. Then, however, comes the second persona into play, the one who needs to weave all these findings into a cohesive narrative, and the writer often stalls at the thought of putting words onto the page. Writer’s block is a real thing. My students have struggled with it, as have I. Over the years, as I have taught writing both to myself and my students, I have come to realize three crucial things: there is no “one size fits all” approach to writing; glib promises by self-help gurus generally are for the birds; and there is nothing more helpful than to experiment with an open mind. Writers often are told to put their ideas in order, to write an outline, and then to fill in the blanks. Almost all successful writers whom I know don’t follow this recipe. I certainly do not, nor does my husband who uses the very process of writing to generate and explore ideas. Neither Tim nor I had our processes down pat with the first article or even book we wrote. Instead, trial and error—experimentation, in other words—shaped our very different approaches to writing. And as different as they are, neither approach is better than the other.
One thing that helps me to begin is lowering the threshold. When I start writing (as opposed to having fun in the archives), I have another mantra: “Stop worrying! There are only two people and dog who will be reading it anyway.” This is what my then newly-wed husband said more than a quarter of a century ago when I spiraled yet again into a “I can’t write” tantrum. He has since learned that the tantrum is part of my writing ritual, though his exasperated comment has become a godsend. To this day, I haven’t figured out which dog might be reading my work, but I can lower my anxiety when I say to myself: yes, I am good enough for these two people and the (imaginary) spaniel.
Beginning as an artist shares a lot with the processes involved in writing. There is research—exciting explorations through photography, reading, imagining, and sampling—and then there is starting to make the actual piece of art. As with writing, this is the one that is hard. Contrary to writing, I do create physical “outlines”—or rather: design sketches—when making art. I am not an improvisational artist—even when I am surprised by the final piece. It is hard to explain: I do not see a piece in my mind’s eye but I know what I will be making, before I start. To begin, then, is to work on this larger idea through sketches, notes, and samples. To begin the larger piece also means to start making it—and embracing the risk of messing up a yard of the painted and printed cloth I have created as the basis of my art. I recently destroyed a gorgeous piece of fabric through my stitching. It wasn’t a brilliant feeling, but I learned what kind of stitching does not work… And the world keeps going on just fine.
As with writing, making art is an individual process. Trial and error are crucial here, too. It took me a while to figure out that I needed to have my materials ready to go in order to start a day in the studio. Prior to leaving, then, I make sure that I can simply walk in the next morning and start making—whether it is conceptual work or sampling. I use rituals to shift into making mode: I turn on the lights in a certain order and gaze out of the window to take in today’s color and texture of the water (and sometimes, I try to render them with watercolors in my sketchbook—usually more miss than hit). In the wet studio of Chapel Hill, tying my apron around my waist signals the start of a painting or printing session. And when I write, I leave the document open so that, when I start the computer the next day, I can continue where I was.
All my strategies and rituals have one thing in common, and it is one that is right for me: I am constantly lowering the threshold, whether writing for the proverbial two people and a dog or by allowing myself to mess everything up in the studio. And when the stakes are low, then—as Lowell put it—“in creating, the only hard thing’s to begin.”
