Playfulness
From the desk of the artist Alana Clohessy, in a small corner of Paris, on the Left Bank of the Seine.
Sunday, 12th October 2025. 17°C and Sunny.
Tea in my Cup: Twinings English Breakfast Tea with milk, no sugar.
The second week of my artist residency is now over. While the first week was mired with doubt, procrastination and a battle with time (you can read about that here if you missed it) this week has seen the back of those fears. I have spent hours at my desk drawing. Picking up mediums I had not experimented with for a time. I also started using new types of paper and felting wool. It has been an abundance of creativity.
All these hours at my desk led to the second stumbling block of this residency. The ergonomics of drawing endlessly cannot be ignored or at least, ignored at your own peril. By Tuesday, I started to notice a slight twinge in my drawing hand wrist. As darkness rolled around that night and I was still drawing, the pain became insistent. No longer content to be ignored. I have never had issues with my wrists while drawing but as I mentioned last week, I have spent a lot of the last few months writing and embroidering. Drawing, like everything we do as humans, requires certain muscles to be used. Lack of use cause them to weaken.
I had visions of repetitive strain injury diagnoses, carpal tunnel syndrome along with all the other death knell sentences for artists. I took Wednesday off. I had been drawing everyday since the 1st of October. I did not pick up a pencil or brush. The pain disappeared completely.
I sat at my desk the following day and analysed how I held my brush and pencil. All was as it should be. I analysed how I typed on the computer. Ok also. I watched how I used the mouse. My hand pivoted sharply at the wrist while supporting itself against the hard wood of my desk. The pain started to return. On top of all the drawing, I was resizing my images in Photoshop. I was using the mouse when usually I would use my drawing tablet and pen. I had discovered the culprit. As you all know, I work from a very small corner in Paris and my desk real estate is limited. In a bid to save time and space by keeping the tablet off my desk, I unwittingly had my first brush with every artist’s nightmare. A Halloween tale I could have done without.
After some research online, I ordered a bean bag type mouse support, that will glide with my hand as I move the mouse around the desk. The typical static, gel supports not suitable for my work as they are locked in place. I also ordered one for the keyboard. Sure why not? Will let you know how I get on with them. If any of you use a wrist/ desk support or have a setup that you recommend please let me know.
Also this week, a very good friend sent me a reel talking about how certain, if not all artists, are continually trying new mediums or ways to create. The two of us met on a film set years ago in Vancouver. She was working in wardrobe, I was in makeup. We have been dear friends ever since. We were both artists who worked in many different areas and with many different mediums. Drawing, painting, film work, felting. You name it, we tried it. I went to her exhibit after midnight in a niteclub where they served pancakes. She came to my poetry recitals around the city.
All through this time of experimentation and creation we were told by everyone and their mother, that the only way to be an artist was to pick a path and stick to it. To be an artist you must only paint. To be a writer you must only write. To do other things was to muddy the water of your brand and message. Nobody would take us seriously. All the things we were good at, in these peoples eyes, amounted to nothing. Experimental beings who had no place in this serious world. The corporate teachings of getting in lane being outside the bounds of our existence.
The reel she sent was by Eric Edward Fishboy who is a songwriter and frontman for the indie rockband Fishboy from Denton, Texas. He spoke about “artists with side art projects” which is to say artists who are creating in ways outside what they, or society, consider their main art form. Musicians who sculpt pottery mugs. The painter who maintains a palace level garden (Monet springs to mind). The poet who makes papier-mâché masks and hangs them on their walls.
What he surmised was that all these artists, whether they realise it or not, were trying to make art fun again. In his words, “to lower the stakes of anything and play around”. When the artist gets good at the playing around activity, say painting, and people suddenly want to start buying it, the artist needs to find another low stake artistic activity. Something only for them. To the outside observer this looks like flightiness or a lack of self control. What you are witnessing is creativity in motion.
Playfulness has lost its place in our grown up world. I have a friend who has a high paid corporate job. She knits the most exquisite wool garments. As soon as she got good at it, people started to tell her she must sell them and insisted people would pay good money for them. She didn’t want to, she did it for her own enjoyment. To make it a business would ruin her time with the wool and her thoughts. Then people started to request she knit things as gifts, which she did. Suddenly knitting had an expected outcome, the stakes became high. She has now stopped all requests for knitted garments and has turned to spinning her own wool.
I am of the mind that all humans are creative beings, whether you call yourself an artist or not. How you decorate your house, to how you style your hair. The concerts and films that draw you. The retired bank manager who blows glass and carves it in his shed, gifting his family wine glasses and goblets for Christmas. The business consultant who grows dahlias in her back yard, spends hours weeding on a Saturday and displays them proudly in a vase at dinner. The lawyer who travels the world to attend music festivals. The musician who ferments cheese.
Embrace your creativity. Step out of these preconceived lanes. Make life fun again. Time in the pursuit of happiness is nothing to feel guilty about. Add peas to the mushroom soup.
Au revoir - until we meet again,
Alana x