The Myth of Gift...

One of the often given comments about not just my art, but of so many others, is that the ability of being an artist is a 'gift'... it is nothing of the kind... tho meant, am sure, as a compliment, it is actually a putting down of the efforts and intensity of each and every artist to pursue that endeavor to the best of abilities - and it is the same with ANY endeavoring that produces quality and innovative results... a human being is, properly, an integrated being, and one of such complexity that, among all other aspects of life, choices have to be made to be able to exist as that integrated being - and among these choices is the one of what endeavoring one is to concentrate on, which purposefulness of living is to be the laser instead of the bulb diffusing light in all directions... further, it is not just that choosing, which is in many respects reflecting innate differences of the individual, but the direction of learning the 'how' to achieving that quality of endeavoring - itself containing aspects of the difference between individuals... some, for instance, are more acute in their seeing, such to be able to direct their hand to rendering with increasing skill what is visually seen... others need books to help clue this aspect of seeing, or the aspect of being able to direct the hand... still others come to prefer actually dealing with others who already possess this skill - AND SKILL IT IS, developed with whatever degree of easiness or difficulty necessary to the artist involved... however the uniqueness of the individual in particular abilities, these are natural aspect of identity of the individual, and only present, as it were, the 'starting gate' from which whatever future endeavoring results - and it is the effort of the artist in securing these results which all in all determine the quality of results, not any supposed handing down of some 'freebie'...