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Confidence and strength of character are required to repeatedly submit your artwork into the public forum for a formal critique. A critique is a meticulous evaluation or review by a knowledgeable professional that could both hurt and help advance your artistic career. This gives the art critic, whether he's an art professor responsible for allowing an artist to further his/hers study, an appointed jurist responsible for selecting exhibit entrants, or an art collector looking to expand a collection a lot of power and influence in the art field but not all of it.
Criticism is no fun especially when baring your heart and soul to the public for critical judgement. Anxiety creeps in waiting for the final review both good and bad. Elation comes with approval or acceptance and revaluation comes with rejection. Yet we artists continue, wouldn't want it any other way, and actually require criticism to grow.

Finals week in college was my first real exposure to the potential power of art critics in the form of my professors. Every semester seemed to be a 'weed out' process with fewer and fewer students allowed to continue and we all knew what the stakes were. If you got a grade of a C you better start looking at alternative classes or even an entire career change as it was not encouraged to continue in that line of study. I started with a group of 60 students and graduated with a group of 12. I learned never to miss lectures in my other classes because during finals week I had no extra time to study other than a quick review since I pretty much lived in the fine arts building readying for the final critique which would actually determine my career path. The semester between my junior and senior years was one such defining point. I felt lost in my junior year being taught by two TAs instead of a professor, two TAs with different approaches, and two TAs with increasingly questionable purposeless projects or lessons. My final critique had me wearing a bandana to cover my unwashed hair, my latest artwork hung around the room while my critics entered, examined, and verbally critiqued in my presence. One TA was negative, one was neutral, and before my professor chimed in I took a turn and started critiquing back. Seems lack of sleep and a semester of undefined directions had given me an uncharacteristic voice that I could not stop once I started. I stated my prospective of what I had not learned, what impractical nonsense had been taught, and what valuable time had been lost with only one year left in my artistic education. I didn't regret this reaction of mine, probably enhanced from lack of sleep, but if I was going down I felt it important to defend my hard work that reflecting exactly what I had been taught. I now believe my career was saved at that moment because the immediate reaction of my unsuspecting critique back was an affirmative nod and laughter both from one TA and my professor. The other TA walked out and the remaining critique time was spent discussing the curriculum, future changes, and alternatives. I got a B- for that 'lost' semester but I got to continue and know that I did make a small difference going forward because I gave voice to the criticism and one critic.

Criticism never gets easier to take but you always learn from it whether it's being made aware of artistic weaknesses to work on or the awareness of weak ones making the critique. I know the job of a critic is not easy either since they must defend their decisions as well. Either way each time I enter the public forum for a critique by a critic I still brace for the criticism or rejection. Elation, revaluation, and continuation in the program remain the important issues so the real critic is me. That doesn't mean that I don't still do the happy dance when the criticism is complimentary, or I have been selected to be a part of an exhibition, or the likes, comments, and hearts pile up on social media, or a collector proudly displays my artwork in their environment. Take a look and like what you see,

I do!

Thanks for reading,

Pamela Clements