What I Learned When I Finally Took Myself to the Museum

I didn’t really want to go to the museum, which is funny because going to the museum was my idea in the first place.

Inside the Creative Faith Club, we have a yearlong journal course called Linger. Each month, I give our members a different invitation to slow down, pay attention and experience something with a little more intention. This month’s theme was Linger in Wonder, and our task was to take ourselves on a museum day.

Nothing complicated. No big assignment or research project. Just go somewhere that inspires wonder, spend some time looking around and pay attention to what you notice.

And then I proceeded to reschedule my own museum day. Twice.

I live about an hour outside of San Antonio, and every time the day came around I could think of plenty of reasons why spending two hours in the car and most of a workday wandering around a museum wasn’t the most practical use of my time. There was work to do, things at home that needed my attention and a whole list of perfectly reasonable reasons to do it “another day.” But I finally went, and I am SO glad I did.

I decided if I was driving all the way into San Antonio, I might as well make a day of it. I grabbed myself a yummy breakfast, ran a couple of FUN errands because I am very easily sidetracked, and eventually made my way to the McNay Art Museum.

Somewhere along the way, the day stopped feeling like an assignment I needed to complete for Linger and started feeling like a real refresh. By the time I left, I had a whole page of notes in my phone about things I’d noticed, ideas I wanted to explore and things the museum had made me think about in my own creative life.

Here are a few of them.

Art Makes Me Want to Be Bolder

One of the first things I wrote in my notes was bold, brave, ambitious.

There is something about standing in front of a really large or complicated piece of art that makes you think about what it must have taken to even begin. Someone looked at that giant blank canvas and thought, Yep, I’m going to fill that. Someone committed to that much paint, that much time and that much work without knowing exactly how it would turn out.

I think sometimes we get very safe in our own creativity. We use the supplies we know, work at the size that feels comfortable and make things we are pretty confident we can pull off. Seeing some of these pieces made me want to be a little more ambitious with my own art. Not necessarily better or bigger, just braver.

I Really, Really Wanted to Touch Things

Obviously, I did not touch the art. I do know how museums work. But I wanted to!

I wanted to feel the texture of the paint and see what things were made of. I found myself getting really close to pieces, looking at the layers and individual marks, and then backing way up to see the whole thing again. What you see from six inches away can be completely different from what you see from six feet away.

Up close, you notice texture, materials, brushstrokes and imperfections. When you back up, all of those individual little decisions become one complete piece.

I think there is probably a life lesson buried in there somewhere too. Sometimes we need to get really close and pay attention to the details, and sometimes we desperately need to back up and see the whole picture.

Looking at Lots of Art Helps You Figure Out What You Actually Like

This was probably one of my biggest takeaways from the day.

When you walk through room after room filled with completely different kinds of art, you start noticing patterns in what catches your attention. I realized pretty quickly that color palettes draw me in first. I also kept gravitating toward oils, graphite, high contrast, mixed media and collage.

Some things made me want to go home and try the technique myself. Some I would happily hang in my house. Some made me curious about how they were created, and others I could appreciate without having any desire whatsoever to make something similar. All of that is useful information.

We talk a lot as artists about “finding your style,” as if we’re supposed to sit alone at our art table and somehow invent a completely original style out of thin air. But looking at art is part of discovering who you are creatively too. The more you see, the more you begin to recognize what you are naturally drawn toward, what you want to create, what you want to learn and even what you simply want to appreciate.

It actually got me thinking about the whole conversation around inspiration versus copying, because there is a difference, and I think studying other people’s art can be incredibly helpful in developing your own style. That’s probably an entire blog post by itself, so I’m saving that one for another day!

Some of the Art Looked Perfect. Some Looked Like Mud.

There were pieces that looked so beautifully finished that I couldn’t imagine changing a single thing, and then there were others that, to me, looked like mud. And guess what? They were ALL hanging on the museum wall.

I loved that realization because it was such a good reminder that art doesn’t have to appeal to everyone to have value. Something I would walk right past might be the piece someone else stands in front of for twenty minutes. Something I absolutely love might do nothing for the person standing next to me.

There is so much freedom in remembering that when we make our own art. Not everyone has to like it. In fact, they won’t. We don’t all like the same art hanging in a museum, so why in the world would we expect everyone to like what comes out of our own little art room?

Monet Practiced Too!

This may have been my favorite discovery of the entire day.

I came across a small Monet painting, probably around 5 x 7 feet, and discovered that it was a preliminary study. A practice piece!

I stood there thinking about how often we sit down with a little piece of paper, try something for the first time, don’t love the result and immediately decide we’re no good at it. Meanwhile, MONET was making gisant preliminary studies before he made the “real” thing. Of course he was.

The artists whose work hangs in museums spent enormous amounts of time studying, sketching, practicing, experimenting and trying things that probably didn’t work. We just don’t usually get to see that part. We see the beautiful finished piece hanging on the wall with a little plaque beside it.

Seeing that large Monet study made me want to give myself a whole lot more permission to practice. Maybe the practice isn’t separate from the real work at all. Maybe it IS the work that eventually gets us where we want to go.

There Is So Much Time We Never See

That big ole Monet also made me think about time. So. Much. Time.

Every piece hanging in that museum represented hours of work, but also years of work that came before it. We don’t see the paintings that didn’t turn out, the skills learned years earlier, the supplies that didn’t cooperate, the ideas that were abandoned, the sketches and studies or the hundreds of other pieces that artist made before creating the one hanging in front of us. We see the finished product.

I want to remember that the next time I’m tempted to compare something half-finished on my art table with someone else’s beautiful finished work. There is always a whole lot we don’t see.

Apparently I Need Art to Have a Name

Here’s another thing I discovered about myself: unnamed artwork bothers me.

I like to walk up to a piece and decide what I think is happening before I read anything about it. I make up a little story in my head about what it feels like, what I think the artist was trying to communicate or what I think the piece might be called, and then I read the title to see if I was even remotely close. It’s like a little guessing game I apparently play by myself at museums.

When something is untitled, I feel a little cheated! I completely understand the idea of leaving a piece open-ended so the viewer can bring their own imagination and experience to it, but there is a part of my brain that wants the artist to TELL ME. What did you mean? What were you thinking? Give me something here!

Apparently that is useful information about myself too.

Art Really Doesn’t Have Boundaries

I noticed the people in the museum almost as much as I noticed the art. There were all different ages, styles and types of people wandering through the same rooms, stopping in front of the same paintings and appreciating completely different things.

Art doesn’t require you to fit into a certain category. You don’t even have to be an artist to appreciate it. You don’t need an art degree or an understanding of art history, and you certainly don’t have to “get” everything you’re looking at.

You can simply look and wonder. I think sometimes we make art feel more exclusive than it needs to be. Museums are actually a wonderful reminder that art is for everybody.

Museums Give Art Room to Breathe

I also found myself paying attention to the museum itself.

It was quiet, cool, serene and peaceful. The surroundings were settled so the art could speak. There was space between pieces, room to step back and look, and nothing seemed to be fighting too hard for your attention. Even the gardens felt like an extension of the artwork. Meanwhile, right outside were cars, roads, people and an entire city bustling around.

It felt like being inside this beautiful little bubble while the world continued swirling around outside, and I realized how rarely we intentionally put ourselves in spaces like that. Our houses have things to do. Our phones are constantly asking for our attention. Our computers have another tab open. Our schedules are full. There is almost always some kind of noise competing for our attention. Maybe part of wonder is simply giving ourselves enough room to notice.

Mostly, I Left Wanting to Make More Art

I think this surprised me.

I didn’t leave the museum discouraged because other people were better artists than me. I didn’t look at all that beautiful work and think, Well, I certainly can’t do THAT.

It actually made art feel more doable. I left hopeful about my own work and curious about things I want to try. I wanted to play with color and texture. I wanted to experiment. I wanted to make things without being so worried about whether they were going to turn out.

And apparently, I have also decided I want to learn to oil paint in my later years. I’m adding that one to the list.

So, Take Yourself to a Museum

That’s my first challenge for you.

Don’t just think, That sounds fun. I should do that sometime. Actually pick a day and put it on your calendar, especially if you are like me and will otherwise reschedule it twice.

It doesn’t have to be a giant museum either. Look for a local art museum, gallery, historic home, sculpture garden, university collection or even one of those little museums you’ve driven past a hundred times and never visited.

Make a day of it. Get yourself breakfast or lunch. Stop somewhere fun along the way. Wander without worrying about how quickly you’re getting through the exhibits. Get close enough to see the brushstrokes and then back up. Pay attention to the colors you keep noticing, the things you don’t like, the pieces that make you curious and the ones that make you want to go home and create. Take notes, take pictures if the museum allows (I did!) so you can remember and pull from your ideas and inspiration when you get back home. Because if you’re like me – you forget. Plus there is too much to take in and remember all at once!

Give yourself some time to linger in wonder.

I believe God created us to notice, wonder, make, appreciate beauty and pay attention to the world around us. Sometimes we just need to intentionally make enough room in our lives to do it.

And This Is Exactly Why I Love the Creative Faith Club

My second challenge is to find people who encourage you to make that room regularly.

That’s a big part of why I created the Creative Faith Club. Yes, we make art, and there are courses, lessons, techniques, projects and lots of creative resources inside. But I want it to be more than a library of things to watch.

I want it to regularly nudge us out of autopilot and encourage us to pay attention to our faith, our creativity and the beauty God has put all around us. I probably would not have taken this museum day when I did without our Linger challenge. I had already postponed it twice! Sometimes we need someone else saying, Put it on your calendar. Go do this. Make some room for yourself and see what God might show you while you’re there.

And it’s even better when there is a whole community of women doing it alongside you.

That’s what I want the Creative Faith Club to be: a Christian faith art resource AND a creative community that keeps encouraging you to show up, notice, learn, experiment and make room for the things that feed your faith and creativity.

If you’ve been wishing you had more of that in your life, we’d love to have you join us.

But either way, I still want you to schedule that museum day. And try not to reschedule it twice like I did.