I clearly have a lot of time on my hand, due to being quarantined in my house for another 12 days, so let’s deconstruct a few newspaper items I found particularly irritating today. Indulge me, if you will.

Apparently ‘artist’ is the most none essential job in the UK, and, if asked a similar question in every other developed country, the results would be pretty much the same. So let’s have a quick look at some of our favourite lock-down activities that DON’T involve any kind of artist input:

🤔
Ok, sex and walking the dog. Anything else?

Here are a few things that DO involve artist participation:

– any kind of TV program, film, documentaries or anything else you see on the screen. Binge watching Star Trek on Netflix? Hey, presto. Catching up on Eastenders? Yep, written, performed and directed by artists.

– books, magazines, children’s books, picture books, sticker books for your kids, board games. Falling listlessly onto your sofa with a bottle of beer at 5 pm while your kids are being entertained by some rainbow-coloured menace on the telly? Say ‘Thank You’ to the nice artists who are going to take over the babysitting duties for the next couple of hours.

– what about music? Do you really want to live in a world without Kylie Minogue? Your favourite songs, albums, tv jingles, memories of gigs when you were young, a long time ago ( yes, me too ) , children’s lullabies for getting the little sh…. I mean darlings, to sleep.

– your car, bike, scooter. All designed by a very talented artist.

– furniture, home furnishings, the Ikea prints on the wall, photographs of your wedding.

– that birthday card you sent to your aunt two weeks to late? Designed by an artist, you will be shocked to read.

– anything that involves design and architecture like your favourite shops, supermarket, the garden centre, and I’m sure we’re all looking forward to visiting our favourite pub, whose comfy ambience, created by an interior designer, is the reason you spend way too much time there.

– enjoying blog posts? Meet the writing community.

– miss your hairdresser? Well, I’m sure she misses her regular income and practicing her art of making you look like a functioning human adult rather than a wet dog who just enjoys jumping into muddy puddles, too.

– that T-shirt you wear that says ‘Sassy Bitch’ or something similarly inappropriate: yep, designed by an artist. There is no accounting for taste.

– your funky Father’s Day socks, pants, ties, bras ( I’m addressing everybody here, don’t worry), belts, scarves, hats……..see what I’m getting at?

Creating a garden? Art.

Matching your wall colour to your cushions? Art.

Your kids’ finger painting on the kitchen wall? Art.

A little disclosure here: as someone who can happily spend hours staring at a particularly beautiful piece of art, thinks The Lark Ascending is sublime and owns a considerable amount of poetry books, I realise, of course, that most people will be shrugging their shoulders and wonder what the big deal about art is. I think the problem is, we have come to define art as something ‘elite’, something only rich people spend money on, but art is our entire life, it is everywhere we go and everything we do. So give art a break. Our lives would be a barren, concrete desert without it.

Let me know if you can think of more examples, I’m sure there is an endless supply.

Love & Light,

Claudia x

Photo credit: Michael Hall @mhall_viola on Twitter