All Children Are Artists

I’ve read this in several books – it’s not always attributed to Picasso.

If you watch kids, maybe up to age 10 or 12, they aren’t all that self-conscious about making art. If you put them in close proximity to art materials they will naturally make art – not worrying about perfection, or what others think about their work. They make it simply for the joy of making, because they simply cannot not make art.

But if you watch teen-aged children in the same situation, you can already see the beginnings of
“I’m not an artist…”
“I can’t make art…”
“I can’t even draw a straight line…”

And by the time they are finished with high school most of them are firmly on the not-an-artist path…

But we’re all creative. It’s part of our humanity, but it gets beaten out of us pretty damn early. We all need to find the strength to let ourselves make some sort of art, to do some sort of creative endeavor…

I had to relearn that I am an artist. I had to convince myself that making art was a valid, useful, appropriate thing for me to be doing. I had to give myself permission to do it. I had to recognize that making art was a significant part of what makes me, me…

Making art is one of the things that make life worth living.