Opinions Are Like...

[waitingman]

... Erm... armpits!!! Everybody has one... or two, in this case.

Anyway, my Father was over the other night & happened to see this photo of mine, which I'm currently using as my desktop background:~



And he was curious enough to ask what it was. I told him it started life as a picture of a sunset, taken on the balcony, but then I'd done some work in P'Shop & begun to 'see' a head in the clouds, so worked to emphasise it.

His sniffy reply... "Well... I'd stick to taking pictures of sunsets if I were you."

My father is a sculptor, draftsman, painter & mould-modeller ~ pretty much an across-the-board artist who was disappointed in me when, at an early age, I displayed no talent whatsoever for drawing, nor for any of the related disciplines. My nascent musical ability was no consolation, as he placed no real value in it. At least he let up on me a little when my younger sister proved to have all the ability I'd missed out on. Not even the ARIA award I won in 1995 (complete with an acceptance speech by a bandmember that was as rock'n'roll as electronic music gets) cut much grass with him, apart from a token "Well done"

So, in the traditional, clichéd, conventional way of Sons & Fathers, I've always looked to him for approval in my creative endeavours &, when I found some international 'fans' of my photographs via Flickr, I gained some confidence... enough to allow me to have my work on display for him to see when he was here.

Honestly... I'm 44 years old... When will I step free of that shadow??!!??!!

Comments

[thebellman.livejournal.com]

meh. everyone's got one. I for one like the picture.

[aquandrian.livejournal.com]

Oh argh, it's parents like that who make me very angry on behalf of all creative people. My ex-best friend's parents were like that when she started painting and it took her years to work up the guts to start! When she told me what they said about her first painting, I pretty much exploded on the phone.

Grr. Do they not realise how important their words are to us? How can they be so cruel?! God, I'm so glad I don't have parents. I don't even know how I would react if my mum turned her nose up at my writing. I like to think it would make me even more defiant and prolly quite wild and rebellious ... but I don't know, do I? :)

For my part, I bloody adored that pic before I read that you'd tweaked it in P'Shop. :p I was like "ooh, is it beeeerrrr? Is it honey? Oh I don't care, it's so lovely ..." Heh.

You know, I'm the only person in my family who can't sing and can't play an instrument. I'm also the only writer. Make of that what you will. *winks*

[lederhosen.livejournal.com]

I really like it, FWIW.

[velvetink.livejournal.com]

Nice I thought it was beer! At least well your father had some creative expectations of you even if they were not the one you had. My father honestly can barely read and has never seen the point of any creative exploit. What good does that do you? Can you get a job doing that? are the things he's still saying.