Sum it Up! Ten Minutes of Life Painting in Rome

Sum it Up! Ten Minutes of Life Painting in Rome

I am absolutely thrilled to share this with you. Below is a video interview given by Moshe Mikanovsky asking me about what I do, why and how. Not easy to answer, but a lot of fun and a great opportunity.After giving the interview, I was thinking a lot about one of his questions: “What is success?” Good question!While I stick by my answer given in the interview, I wanted to elaborate, as it is one of the most important questions an artist can ask themselves. Success doesn’t always have to look like loads of money (although that would be awesome too!), but it’s something, an experience that we have of ourselves in relation to our work; a confidence or knowing that I have conveyed what I set out to communicate. And it’s compltely personal. One of the hardest parts about answering the question “what is success” is to honestly listen to my voice alone and to not be influenced by other opinions or standards. One of my ultimate goals is to really move, touch and inspire people with my work; to create paintings that unite us in our common experience of being human visually. A painting can inspire and evoke the entire range of human emotions and leave the viewer more in touch with what it means to be human. It can also express more profoundly what we aren’t always able to say with words (well, only because I’m not a poet..)This is no small feat, there must be a hundred if not a thousand or million baby steps in between before I can reach my goal. In fact I don’t know that I ever will, but I’m willing to go for it. The first step though is learning to master my craft so that I can use it to express my idea fully. Then there is having an idea, but an idea that becomes an exploration and a journey, one that will evolve and take us places. I’m still in the first stage, learning my craft, how to paint, so I don’t even know when or how I will get to the next stage, but I am looking forward to embracing whatever may come next.Click here to watch the video on youtube

4 Comments
  • Anonymous

    December 5, 2011 at 7:11 pm

    Really enjoyed this one!! I can relate so much!!
    -Barney

  • Susan Roux

    December 12, 2011 at 12:45 pm

    Hello, I’m Susan. Nice to meet you. Living and painting in Rome? AAhhhhhh… Life is good.

    Lovely work. Please take a moment and come visit my blog. I’ll be back here for certain!

  • Kelly Medford

    December 14, 2011 at 9:17 am

    Hi Barney and thanks for taking the time to check out the interview- would love to hear more about your thoughts on success.. (otherwise I feel like I’m talking to myself here!)

    Thanks for taking the time to stop by Susan and I look forward to reading your blog.

    Kelly

  • Anonymous

    December 19, 2011 at 12:29 pm

    It is a nice interview and funny to know I have so much in common with someone, I too am living in Rome originally from the northern Va. area-majored in art. Hope to catch you painting around town one day. You do beautiful work.