This Was NOT an Art Show(…but it really was)

There’s a message many of us absorb early — that an “art show” is flat, framed, priced, and pleasing. Art that behaves. Art that doesn’t disrupt. Art that keeps its sharp edges tucked politely behind the matting.

Oil, acrylic, watercolor. Modern, abstract, impressionistic. Aesthetic, decorative, digestible. Safe.

We grow up seeing this kind of artwork in suburban galleries, strip-mall frame shops, farmer’s markets, and coastal boardwalk booths. Art designed to fit neatly into shopping carts and living rooms. Art that says just enough — but never too much.

And so we internalize the rule:

Art = commodity. Artist = vendor. Worth = sales.

If we want to be “real” artists, we are told we must:
• Make what people will buy
• Sell it widely
• Live off the sales

And the work must remain pleasant enough to keep the consuming comfortable.

This commercial model becomes a cage — invisible, but tight.

Even museums reinforce it:
Please exit through the gift shop.
Monet mugs. Van Gogh socks. Frida T-shirts.
A genius turned product SKU.

The effect?
We learn to self-police. Self-shrink.
Mute what’s vulnerable.
Package what’s palatable.

I believed this too — until I didn’t.

Because the truth is:
Being an artist and becoming commerce are not the same thing.
One expresses life.
The other consumes it.

This collection — this show that is not an art show — is an expression of breaking that conditioning.

These works speak to the pressures and hang-ups that freeze creativity:
• The expectation to please
• The fear of not selling
• The doubt that art must justify its existence through price tags

So here, there are no frames unless the work demands one.
There are no price tags except when they are the subject.
There is no hiding of the raw, the emotional, the experimental.

This is not an art show…
in the commercial sense.

It is an experience — one that asks:
What does art become when it doesn’t have to be safe?
When it doesn’t have to sell?
When the artist is free?

And I’ll let you in on a secret:

It was an art show —
just not the kind I was taught to aspire to.

It was the kind I needed to make.
The kind that let me take up space.
The kind that transformed a tiny shoebox room into an invitation.

A launching space.
A reclamation space.
A becoming space.

To everyone who attended, who supported me through each chaotic planning session, who walked in and allowed themselves to feel something — thank you. Your presence made the art whole.

And if anyone asks?

Shhh…
This was NOT an art show. But here … judge for yourself. Enter the art show page HERE 💋