Thoughts on art as a method of spiritual expression

For this post, I wanted to express and regard my sentiments regarding what art means to me as well as share my journey with art.

This is a painting done by me. The colors are inspired from Flower Crowns you'd find at Fiesta here in San Antonio. I remember there being a few years in a row where I was super excited to get my yearly paper flower crown with the ribbons in the back. I had a growing collection of them back at my old house. The choice to paint daisies was to symbolize a bit more the realistic choice, a choice to live in reality as it is now, and to not be so drawn on nostalgia. I originally painted it in the typical colors of daisies, but the flower crown idea reminded me of my childhood, which I reflected on previously. A more innocent and time i felt more connected to my surroundings, which I'd like to discover the connection between.

My own journey with art is fleeting. I of course did little crafts they'd make us do as small children, but I didn't develop an emotion within my art until around middle school. I loved to draw my favorite game characters and would doodle a lot in class. It was sort of an escape from whatever was going on, my world when I got home was my favorite place to be. So I couldn't help but try to bring that world with me everywhere. I still have my drawings from then, thankfully. I did as much as I could with an iPad mini and a finger. Though, I wouldn't revisit such a hobby until high school. I don't know why. I had a desire to continue but it's so easy to compare yourself to others, especially growing up in such an online way as I have. I saw so many talented artists and felt like oh, I'm 12, and that 11-year-old can already draw anatomy until I kept getting older and my skills weaker. My high school art class reawakened my love and comfort in it. While I vividly remember my classmates being really annoying and making my teacher upset back then, the moments when she'd make an example of me or say I did well were really my motivation and my reminder of how much I had enjoyed just having my hands move. I discovered my love for charcoal as a medium, and that's the brush I went for in my painting displayed here.

Art means a lot to me, not because I want to be good at it, but because it allows me to relax and to express myself and my journey. And since I'm a writer, I can find double meanings in just about anything.