Balance in the life of an artist

[Denise Racine]

For years I have been carrying around in my wallet this quote I picked up while reading the biography of Georgia O'Keefe...

"One works (paints) because I suppose it is the most interesting thing one knows how to do. The days one works (paints) are the best days. On the other days one is hurrying through the other things one imagines one has to do to keep one's life going. You get the garden planted. You get the roof fixed. You take the dog to the vet. You spend a day with a friend. You learn to make a new kind of bread. You hunt up photographs for someone who thinks he needs them. You certainly have to do the shopping. You may even enjoy doing such things. You think they have to be done. You even think you have to have some visitors or take a trip to keep from getting queer living alone...(). But always, you are hurrying through these things with a certain amount of aggravation so that you can get at the painting again because that is the high spot - in a way it is what you do all the other things for...The painting is like a thread that runs through all the reasons for all the other things that make one's life."