I just don't get it..

In all honesty, my kindergarten drawing of a plate setting should really be highlighted in all Art Museums in the country.

Since Kindergarten, when I received my first award in art (for a simple drawing of a plate setting) I have loved sketching, painting, doodling, anything really that had to with art. As I grew older I became really good at it, and I found myself always doing sketching during class and when it came to art assignments, I would put my all into them; spending hours on just a single sketch or outline, making it perfect and precise. But I never was interested in the art world that concentrated on what “art” is defined to really be. So Picasso was not somebody I admired, nor was Leonardo Divinci, or anybody that was only known for their pieces of artwork; I simply was never impressed or in awe with what they created and even at eighteen years old, I just don’t get it.

Why do I spend hours on end blending my charcoal to make a sketch look realistic? Or why do I even waste my time on making the perfect tint of blue to paint a beautiful skyline? Knowing nothing of mine will be considered as artwork and “museum ready” because it does not compare to what meets my eye as a three year olds drawing, but what the world sees as astonishing pieces of art!

As I walked through the Institute yesterday afternoon, I couldn’t help but feel like clawing my eyes out. I just get so frustrated because I do not understand how such pitiful drawings get a spot on that wall like it’s the greatest thing in the world. I took a good five minutes yesterday, just to stare at this piece that was framed and hung on the wall with a descriptive plaque to the side of it. I wanted to see for my own eyes why this is here; all I attained from every second of that five long minutes was uneven lines, scribbles for hair, colored circles for the eyes; nothing was showing a single bit of art. In fact, my seven year old cousin could draw something better than some of the pieces in there, with his eyes closed! It just really makes the statement that we all see things differently, and in our own way. Maybe it portrays a story—maybe, but why is it considered art? Not only that, but why is it that good that it can be set in an amazing Art Institute, where my canvas paintings and charcoaled portraits that I spend days on, will probably never see a museum wall?

So is what the world considers art, really just too simple to call anything else? Simplicity seems to be the definer to what is a piece of art; but regardless of how simple or how unreal I make my “artwork” it will never be famous. Originality, and outrageousness is what finds artists; but that seriously doesn’t matter because regardless of how whatever artist made it to an Art Museum— I will never be able to walk through one without shaking my head or thinking ‘how on earth is this art?’