Sarah Croft Nightingale Art: 2013

Pablo Picasso once said, “Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up.”

Because I love to talk about crayons, let me continue by saying as a little girl, I was an artist, I was little-girl-artist at the kitchen table with just a box of Crayons. Maybe I still am? Anyway . . . I have grand visions of myself graduating and really “becoming” that artist I want to be.

As I view art and read about art, I often find myself asking questions that I must answer again and again. The first being, why do I make art?: Why do I make art when there is a worldwide need for doctors, lawyers, engineers, tradesmen, etc.? Why make art when the world already has “the greats” and masters? Why make art when there are artists all around, aspiring and successfully seasoned alike? These questions, I believe if answered honestly is what keeps a child an artist--they keep an adult an artist.

My honest answer? I make art because I have a constant inescapable vision of something new I must create. I loved what artist James J. Mapes said of vision. It struck a chord deep inside of me. He said, “a vision is like a lighthouse which illuminates rather than limits, gives direction rather than destination . . . a positive, meaningful vision of the future supported by compelling goals provides purpose and direction for the future.” That’s exactly it. My vision to create art, even though at times it is trying, slow, and even . . . lonesome? It is always a light in my life. It is something I know I can do, that I can have. It is a light in my life that compels me to think deeper into myself and who I want to be. It is a light that makes me think larger than life, even to think of our Heavenly Father who has given me that vision, that light, and this talent.

I believe firmly that if a person has been entrusted with “talents,” artistic talents particularly, they have a purpose to fulfill according to our Heavenly Father’s will for them, for He is our great “Creator.” President Packer said, “that’s been encouraged from the very beginning,” and I believe it is creativity, that creativity or the act of being creative has been encourage from the very beginning.

Similarly, I think there is a need for “new” art, art that keeps history moving. Art that people living now can relate instantly to, even if the art itself is of historical or imaginary context. Even at that, it is new art that I, myself, see that makes me wonder about “old” art and go searching for it. It’s really a spinning sphere. Like Mary Pipher said, “Everyone has a story to tell . . . we need new stories . . . We all can make a difference by simply sharing our own stories with real people in real times and places . . . good stories have the power to save us.”

I make art because I know that’s what I’m supposed to do because it’s simply what I want to do. I want to make art that will become history for others to search out, find and continue spinning that sphere. Art teaches me things I wouldn’t understand otherwise; art teaches me things both of a spiritual and temporal nature.

I feel blessed to say that I think that I am still that little girl sitting at the kitchen table, only now I am grown up, facing the real world, all while still holding onto those crayons.