Day 20. On a High Horse: Why Making Art Requires Risk

I’ve had this idea for a high horse painting for quite some time, and I finally got around to it. The trouble with art—and creative practice in general—is that once you put an idea down on paper or canvas, all the millions of ways it could have turned out collapse into precisely the one way it did turn out. In your head, it can be anything. On the surface, it is only what it is.

That narrowing is a kind of loss. And so often we’d rather skip it altogether and let the potential remain glorious, untouched, without ever giving it a body to live in.

Despite wanting to be, I’m really not all that brave or adventurous in my regular life. The first time I went snow skiing, I spent at least half the trip in the lodge faking a sickness. I only attempted to surf on a trip to Costa Rica because I didn’t want my husband to think I was boring—or, God forbid, unathletic.

But in art, I find myself willing to do risky things—namely, to try.

And I’ll get on my high horse about it all day, every day: everyone should make art in one form or another from time to time. The incarnation of an idea into a painting, a sound, a sentence, or a movement involves loss, yes—but it also brings a joy you simply can’t experience if the work never leaves your head.

This small acrylic horse painting is about that risk: elevation, imbalance, confidence, and maybe a little stubbornness too. In my head, the horse had even longer legs and stood even higher. I guess I ran out of room.

I’d love to know what you think about this piece—or about the last time you took a creative risk and let an idea become real.