This post follows previous posts in this series:
The Backstory
I first took the twelve-week Creative Visionary Programme in 2022 and you can read my review of the pros and cons here. I did a lot of research before I invested in it including asking artist who had taken it previously what their experiences where. I noticed that many people went back in as alumni, and I couldn’t figure out why. If the course was good, didn’t you learn everything you needed to know the first-time round? Now I am planning to be one of those alumni in 2023. Let me explain why.
The course was hugely impactful on me and I sold art I made in the course just a few weeks later even though I had never painted before (I was a textile artist). However, it is fast and intensive (although you get the material for twelve months.) I took copious notes and screenshots, and you can download audio or transcripts to keep. I don’t feel that I am missing information or need to go through it again because I didn’t grasp things the first time.
However, I do feel that the first time the energy of working on the material communally was helpful to me. I met some great people on different continents who I am still in touch with and talking to via Zoom on a regular basis, even painting together via the Internet. The chance to be back in that environment has been a big influence on my decision. I am eager to give back the support to new students that alumni gave to me.
The first time I went through the material I was a newbie painter although I had made art in different mediums for many years. the exercises are ‘contentless’ in that the subject of what you produce is entirely up to you. That’s a good thing but I came to the course without any particular series in mind – although ones certainly emerged as a result of the course. Doing the exercises resulted in saleable work and that makes me wonder what I could achieve by going through the course at the level I was when I finished it. I am not the same person or artist as a result of the course, and I am intrigued to see how it would influence and improve my work if I come at it at a different starting point. I know the course is set up to make it valuable to alumni. Of course, I could just reread my notes and repeat the material from last year. However, each year the coaching and live calls are different and as I said the community support is also something valuable to me.
I should also say that the returning alumni get a big discount on the cost of repeating the course. That means you can feel free to concentrate in more depth on the parts you know from last year will be most impactful on your work this year. In 2022 I entered CVP just open to seeing what surprises it held and hoping to learn the basics about painting and art making in general I didn’t know.
This year's intentions
This year I am entering CVP with four specific intentions:
- I have a series in mind that is personal and challenging to me and I intend to use that subject matter in all the exercises to help me explore it in depth and then afterwards to create art for sale.
- I want to connect personally with as many new students as I can, to be an active part of the community support for them and to make more new artists friends to help me feel a sense of belonging in the wider art world and to be able to give that to others.
- The last twelve months have thrown huge challenges at my family. I have held to a creative practice, but I am intending to use CVP to jack it up another level and to rejuvenate myself after a wearying year.
- I am also a writer and I want to write more contemporaneous and contemplative pieces about my experience. (If you want to read what I come up with the best way to get them is to sign up for my newsletter below.)
CVP 2022 taught me that I could paint and sell my work and 2023 is about taking that confidence and knowledge and actually starting to make the work in my head. More it is about starting to live a more deeply creative life using the improved self-belief and self-knowledge that CVP 2022 gave me.
