"Art washes from the soul the dust of everyday life." -- Picasso

WaterLeaves
Rosa Cobos

Last month Kim Ritter posted this question:

Does my artistic voice match my inner voice?

The answer she wrote for herself here, got me thinking about how one actually recognizes the true inner voice. For example, Kim writes that her art tells her that she is a stronger, more positive person than the way she sometimes feels inside:

When I look at my work, I realize I am a much more positive and optimistic person than I think I am, when I explore my darker sadder side in my head.

What I like about Kim's post and find interesting, is that she takes the resilient and optimistic voice that is expressed in her quilts, to be as as true about herself as the darker, perhaps stronger voice that is expressed in feelings of anger and sadness. She allows her work to inform her about the nature of her inner voice and therefore, about her own humanity.

When I apply this way of listening to my own inner voice, I notice that what seems to want to come out in my quilts is intense colour, depth of field and light. I have an early and vivid memory of sunlight dancing on the surface of water. I think it registered in my memory in stark contrast with the darker feelings that I sometimes experienced as a child. I believe that working creatively helps me to be in touch with an aspect of my inner voice that often gets occluded, and is sometimes difficult to hear. It is a lighter and more carefree voice than the heavier one that can come up in the course of everyday life as feelings of exhaustion, sadness, anger or despair. Perhaps we have many inner voices, and making art allows us to choose those we most wish to embrace.