Wish List

Yesterday morning I was browsing a bit through the blog. Sometimes I enjoy doing that… just looking back to earlier times, seeing where I was, reading about how my art experience has evolved. I smiled a lot when I came across a post from January, 2019. It was about cleaning up my kitchen art area, organizing my paints and other supplies, and wistfully thinking about the art studio I would love to have.

Here’s what I wrote:

It would be nice to have a dedicated art studio. If I could, I’d have a huge room with lots of north light. It would be warm — but not too warm. I would have several different easels, a place to store canvas panels, and a place to keep finished paintings as they were drying. I would have a table with all my paints and brushes close at hand. I’d have a sink for clean-up. And since I’ve become so accustomed to painting in my kitchen, I’d probably want a small stove and refrigerator for snacking!

I smiled, of course, because I now have almost everything I wrote about. I have a dedicated art studio — and it’s a huge room. It’s comfortably warm — and comfortably cool in the summer. I still have only one easel, but I’m planning to buy another soon. I have lots of storage space for canvas panels, and my husband turned one wall into a huge drying rack for my paintings. He built me a table, too, so, yes, my paints and brushes are close at hand while I’m working. A sink? It’s huge, and it’s wonderful! And there’s also a small refrigerator, a microwave, a table, and chairs. I don’t eat downstairs though. I always head upstairs to the kitchen for lunchtime.

My studio doesn’t have north light, but other than that — and the new easel I have yet to buy — it’s astounding to see that where I am now almost perfectly matches my vision of the ideal art studio!

So, what more could I wish for? Very little, actually.

There’s that new easel, of course, and I’m wanting to buy a larger gansai set with more colors. Now that I’m exploring mixed media, there are lots of different art goodies I’d love to try — stamps, embossing powders, distress inks and crayons — but mostly it seems all my art wishes have come true.

I suppose I could wish to become a better artist, and I do hope to improve, of course, but that comes not from wishing but from doing, from drawing and painting every day, from learning about color and design, from getting out those art supplies and practicing new techniques.

As we move toward the end of the year, gift-giving season will be upon us, so maybe this is a good time to think about our wish lists. What’s on yours?