Artist Statement

… so I have been making paintings for about ten years now and these are some of the things that I have learned.

1. Your disappointments are never as important as you believe them to be.
2. Your capacities to keep working, under all circumstances, are.
3. Honesty really matters when you are making an image.
4. That the willingness to do just a little bit can sometimes keep you moving when the doldrums set in.
5. That the work we do as artists is really the best of what we are. Our vision transcends our personalities, gratefully.
6. That friends are enormously important to the endeavor of making art; cultivating one’s place in the community of artists by giving of oneself is a wise and provident posture.
7. That the most selfish thing in the world an artist can do is to stop working.
8. Drawing from life is like exercise- it doesn’t add to the income, but it keeps you toned and balanced and more alert.
9. That there really are no short cuts when the need arises to patiently work through something to an answer.
10. That as members of the artist community we have a dangerous tendency to forget just how desperately we need one another’s compassion and support.

I can be contacted at Manzanarch@aol.com.