Battles

My sketch book is often my best friend. Christians have the 'good book', I have my black book. Maybe it doesn't bring me closer to God, but it brings me closer to myself. Sharing your art with people is like having a therapist record your session and then play it on the radio, you're really putting yourself out there. Creating your art live in front of people is even crazier, it's like showering in public. So I agreed to do the Toronto version of art battle (nyc version: www.artbattles.com , toronto version www.artbatteto.com). I had always admired the people who did the battles in NYC, and always wanted to try it, so when I got the chance in Toronto, I jumped on it.

Above is my creation. We had 20 minutes to create and finish a painting and she was the result. She wasn't perfect, but she was mine. It's kind of like going through labor: it doesn't matter if you're doing it for 5 minutes, or one of the women who is in labor for hours, at the end, you gave birth to a child that is entirely yours. You thought of it, created it, and then gave birth to it, and you could only hope others will love it the same.

Above this text is the other painting, the woman I was competing against. When I saw it, I almost blew a sigh of relief. My round, was the destruction round, the audience would decide whose painting should be destryoed and whose should survive. I knew mine would be well received, so I did not worry.

So there we stood, the two of us, facing an angry mob of people (well, not angry, but somewhat intoxicated) hell bent on the destruction of a painting. The hosts asked us if we were ok with the losing painting to be destroyed, I said no, the other artist said yes. After the audience decided that they wanted blood, the MC's announced that a painting would indeed be destroyed for the first time at art battles, and they said it was to be mine.


I watched them pour paint all over her. Saw my own creation be murdered in front of my eyes, a woman beside me asked "Turn away! You shouldn't be watching this!" One of the organizers then came up to me and said "You can still go up there and try and save your painting if you really want!" And then the other organizer told me that his niece was crying when they destroyed my painting because it was her favorite. Other audience members came up to me and offered their condolensces and then their guilt for ordering it to be destroyed "we thought the other painting was going to lose!" they said, but ultimately it didn't matter. That night I learned something: people will always try and destroy what you built for their own entertainment. The only thing you can do is rebuild; stronger, and better for the next time.