My Eyes are Bigger Than My Portfolio

Today was a very bad day. Today was a day that will set me back months of confidence building, self-esteem, determination, and motivation. Today was the day that we had portfolio review and yet again I was not named in the top of the class for performance.

Let me recap for you my journey to date:
101 - Top of the class, 4.0, no end of session contest
102 - Top of the class, 4.0, third place in the end of session contest judged by peers
103 - Second in class, 4.0, no end of session contest
200 - Top of the class, 3.7, no end of session contest
201 - Top of the class, 4.0, not in the top four in the end of session contest judged by peers
202 - Top of the class, 4.0, no end of session contest
253 - Top of the class, 4.0, no end of session contest
203 - Second in class, most likely 3.7, possibly 4.0 (but unlikely), not in the top three for portfolios judged by industry professionals, not in the top four promos judged by industry professionals.

As far as I can tell, I am an academic alone. There is no creative future for me, but perhaps one of an academic nature. I am subpar with my shooting, even when I invest my entire heart and soul, not to mention my entire financial aid check, into striving to achieve perfection, which is apparently not good enough. I am not the best. I am not even in the small cluster of people surrounding the best. I am, for the first time in my life, unable to achieve top status at something that I am actually trying to thrive at with all of my attention and vigor.

It is the most devastating feeling I have ever had. I feels like betrayal. I feel as though I have been lying to myself, that my inner artist is cheating on me and laughing behind my back while making me a cuckold fool. I am actually going through a grief cycle and doing everything in my power to keep from dropping out of Brooks tomorrow. I am not exaggerating here. I honestly feel like quitting here and now, on the spot. Why continue if your work, your actual representation of potential and of a future in your chosen path, is so terrible? Going into this critique I had a 4.0 with extra credit tagged on, a 99.5% on the first year cumulative exam, and confidence that I was most definitely going to be in the top three portfolios, and even enough gumption to think I might take the whole cake.

Now I would sooner rip up every single one of my prints than ever show them to another living soul. I AM NOT LOOKING FOR SYMPATHY OR A PICK ME UP OR COMMENTS OF ANY KIND! I am merely cathartically explaining what it is like to fail in an artistic endeavor. It is one of the most heart wrenching experiences of my life and I am not sure I can recover. This was the one that mattered! Other reviews were popularity contests or ill-informed determinations. This one was the one that really meant something. This was real professionals telling us what they thought. And what they thought was that they loathed my work. One of them actually said "this is terrible, I don't want to be negative, but that is the truth."

I was told that I have no control over lighting, no concept of how to use a wide angle lens, no creativity or diversity, that I can't retouch, have bad models, and no sense of place. I have never before questioned my abilities behind the lens, only the financing and diversification of locations and professional models. Now I question everything. Now I question my very purpose in life. My choices, my ridiculous fantasies.

And so, rather than stewing in my depressive and thoroughly contaminating mood, I scheduled a shoot for tomorrow and went to bocce night.

Bocce cures everything.

A little bit of this, a little bit of that.

I can't really, truthfully, put into words what true inspiration feels like. Not an "Oh My Gosh" moment, or a creative flicker, I am talking about one person truly motivating and inspiring another. I can't express the electric, tangible exchange of fire that happens when you can step outside your shell and turn to see what you might actually be. Not what you have convinced yourself you are, or have to be, but that mysterious potential existence that can only be revealed by lifting the curtain that is self-doubt, fear, and the evil presence of naysayers and dream catchers.

My current instructor stepped beyond the curriculum today, out into a vast blackness that he lit up for us with the glow of potential. We were critiqued, corrected, taught, and adjusted until we began to grasp concepts that haven't been appropriately delivered up unto this point. I can see how clearly I have been undermining my own work, my own potential. I can see how my beautiful, analytical mind has been choking and smothering my creative in an attempt at academic perfection without true consideration of my creative existence. It is the cause of the greatest fear that I have. I know, unequivocally, that acing every class, garnering all my A's, means nothing in the "real world." Part of me wants to stay in academia forever because it is safer. It means a steady paycheck, four secure walls, and the chance to do something that I am good at that is very, very close to what I love. My creative mind, pushing up sprouts through layers of ice and snow, understands, also unequivocally, that I want to be a shooter. I want to be a photographer for the rest of my life. I want to be respected for my art. That is terrifying. It is something that is impossible to describe to someone who has never pursued an artistic career, and something that needs no explanation to those who have.

Today was a day of great inspiration. Today I lined up four models, three make-up artists, and the first two of four shoots for the week ahead. I located backdrops, wardrobe, and an appropriate studio. I finally did the things I have been needing to do for the last two weeks. Why? I was inspired to look beyond my fear and be active instead. I may not be perfect. I may not have an effortless transition from concept to print, but I am that much closer. Hundreds of miles closer. I am not explaining this well. I am not even touching on how wonderful my instructor was today, how motivating. I have tried to explain it already on the phone and it was not right, not full of the breath and life that the scenario actually has. I can't impress upon this luminescent screen the change, the fluttering wing emerging from the cocoon of sheltered education and academic achievement and tasting the clean, fresh air of possibility.

I hope to take away a few things from this remarkable day. First, I will not live a life in fear. Second, I will not let my wonderful analytical self dissuade my equally wonderful creative self. And Third, I will balance out the fearless with the pragmatic, the bold with the discreet, and the careless with the careful. But I swear upon my honor that I will fight to my very last breath to preserve the honesty and unique self that is my artist.