I moved last month to a new apartment, and sitting here looking around I was bothered by the whiteness of the walls. They told me I could paint, but what normal college student who works full time and still manages to make High Honors in school has time to paint a whole apartment. I decided to try and locate some relatively inexpensive art. I had received a few Japanese inspired plaques, with words and kaji for happiness, love, and peace. A square clock I purchased from Target hangs above my glass bookcase but the space between is as barren as my soul feels.

There are the normal things a girl can buy, fruit in a bowl, black and white flowers,, the vintage knock offs of Van Gogh, Monet and other art greats. Those aren’t me though, I wonder sometimes if those are anyone other than say, my mom or Lee’s grandmother. There are thousands of those on the internet for sale, and in stores, some for as low at ten or twenty bucks, but something inside of me told me I did not want mass produced art, I wanted something that said something about who I was. Not that I have a problem with mass produced art, I love Van Gogh, Monet, Warhol, but they don’t speak much about me. I looked online at some of my favorite artists work, you know, normal stuff, Frida Kalho, Diego Rivera, and in my opinion, the god of all painting, Salvador Dali. While I was completely enamored by all of this art, none of it was me. None of it looked right to hang on my walls.

What was I to do, leave it blank? Is that an artistic statement or just a cry for help with my own lack of creativity. I knew a girl who painted her entire apartment black and put white hand prints on it, that was creative, what am I? Should I take my calligraphy art and write my name in Kaji on the wall? Should I glue my poetry to the wall, making every inch an artistic statement of a different type. Would the patterned words say something about me, the confusion that I feel on the inside? Maybe I should just leave the walls blank. That way the walls have room to grow and so do I.

What do you have on your walls? Let the Artists Guild know!

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