Easy isn't bad

New painting (detail)

"It’s easy to romanticize struggling, to think that something must be difficult to be of quality" 

"Yes, this is so important! I think a lot of visual artists and other creatives fall into this mind-f&%k where they believe EVERYTHING must be a struggle and the harder it is to make, the better it is, when that is absolutely not always the case. I've had to make room to be ok with making something that was "easy, so I really understand what you're saying. Just because it's not causing you to have a mental breakdown doesn't mean that you shouldn't do it or that it's not good. If it brings you some joy or spark of some kind, then it's good."

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     The above quote and response comes from my reply to a friend's IG post about making things that are "easy" and still of quality. I've had my battles with the way of thinking that can infect creative people across disciplines. The myth that "all great art is the result of struggle" is just that, a myth. A way of thinking that follows from the idea that life is hard and when you struggle to gain status or other social/financial reward, then that reward carries even more merit somehow. With artists, it's perceived that struggles with mental illness or other neural divergent behavior is somehow responsible for their art rather than that person being able to make their in spite of their mental illnesses, not because of them. 

    I've not had any issues with mental illness in my life, thankfully, and that has never been a barrier to making good art. I'm not in the position of determining if any of my work is "great" or not, but I can say that not having a mental illness or addiction problem hasn't stopped me from making what I consider some very strong, worthwhile art work. Now, I do struggle with aspects of my work all of the time, but that doesn't equate to the work being better than something that was "easy". All I'm getting at is that artists need to reject the notion that they have to have a bad life or bad experiences to produce good work. It's complete nonsense. 

    I've struggled with making and/or appreciating work that I considered "easy", where the solution came so easily that I questioned the work's worth. Over time, I've gotten better with this and now find myself embracing a much wider range of thought surrounding what makes my work good or not in my eyes. The easy stuff should be embraced and enjoyed as much as the more difficult work. It's ok to make "easy" work and to enjoy it. There's nothing wrong with liking your easy work. If it brings you joy, why not? Something that you work on for days or months doesn't necessarily mean that it's any better than something that you made in a half-hour. Your worth as an artist isn't tied to how long or how hard something was to bring into existence, your worth as an artist is what you make of it. Nothing else.