CONTENTMENT, RATHER THAN fame and fortune, is probably the true path to happiness. At least that is the prescription offered by the great spiritual traditions: Judaism’s adherence to the Torah, Christianity’s grace, and Buddhism’s detachment. Serious painters, however, may never be contented for three rather worldly reasons.
First of all, the artists is rarely satisfied with the finished work. I’ve heard it said that, by nature, painters are unhappy—they can’t simply enjoy the beauty of Nature and the world. They are impelled to capture, or imitate, that reality. Inevitably, the imitation is never quite up to the original. One famous painter, old and infirm, was asked, “What is your best painting?” He answered, “I haven’t painted it yet.”
Second is that the artworks are judged by others. Typically, they are rejected by jurors in art contests. Even more frequently, people who view the artworks rarely buy them, even though they are typically up for sale.
And finally, no matter how good or mediocre a painter may be, there is always someone ahead who is “better” and more successful. They are ahead often because they have been doing it longer, enjoyed special training, are endowed with single-minded tenacity, or were reared in a family of artists and had a running start. This is not always true, but mostly it is so.
I’ve heard artists offer various remedies for such obstacles to contentment. One fine painter told me, “I paint for myself.” She is definitely on to something. Creative work is definitely a kind of therapy that improves the emotions and mental health. Similarly, professors of art, I have found, often tell their students that the art vocation is “about the process, not the product.”
Ironically, though, many of these process advocates put $1,000 price tags on their artworks, despite their downplaying of “product.” Still, there is great merit to the process argument. Daily life is about curiosity, motivation, and the satisfaction of work well done. The creative process can indeed encompass all of these—even if the end product is tossed in the trash bin.
The spiritual virtuosi of old have warned us: the search for contentment can be a struggle, and often the struggle itself destroys the very contentment being pursued. During the Protestant Reformation, the struggling German theologians offered one way out, calling it gelassenheit, a kind of tranquil submission to life as it is.
In 2017, the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation, one Martin Luther expert argued that the German reformer’s cardinal concern was “certainty”—certainty of salvation, that is. By analogy, the painter would do well to seek certainty, namely, confidence that, despite public indifference, the creative act is a kind of salvation. We might call this the “fideism”—that is, “faithism”—of the serious painter.
This is also where gelassenheit comes in. Mere tranquil acceptance of public indifference may not generate strong motivation in a painter. Yet it’s probably preferred to that other famous German notion, schadenfreude: The pleasure one feels at someone else’s misfortune, such as the discontent of other unheralded painters, a group that is legion.
If there were a God of painting, we’d hope that when our brushes are finally set down, a loving admonition from on high would be: “Well done, good and faithful servant.” That might be the allusive contentment.
larrywithamfineart@gmail.com