By: Priscilla Wainwright
When an
artist paints, she often has two related things on her mind.
First,
what’s inside me that I want to bring out?
What feelings do I want to express?
What mood do I want to create?
What statement do I want to make?
Second, how
do I want my work to be seen? What’s
the ultimate message I want the viewer to “get”?
Sometimes
these questions are thought through before the work is started. Sometimes they evolve as the artist is in
the process of creation. Occasionally,
they don’t come up at all.
Then the
artist considers colors, shading, lighting, and a whole host of “technical”
issues involved in the actual production, so that the desired outcome is
achieved.
A few days
ago, I got my Simply Be catalog in the mail.
I LOVE Simply Be. I drift slowly thru its pages. SOOOO many beautiful dresses, outfits and
accessories and since they run sizes 10-28, I know that my 16-off-the-rack
frame will be fit by any item I’d choose.
(I adore a
lot of what I see there. I’m like a
kid in a candy store. My pocketbook
wants to barf!)
But, do I
BUY all I see that I think would look good?
No Way! (My pocketbook breathes
a sigh of relief.)
Simply Be
is a girl’s and young women’s catalog.
One of my
dear friends reminded me once that as we age, mature women tend to be more
conservative, wear their hair shorter, etc.
Am I going to dress my age? (Let’s just say that for me, menopause is a
thing of the past.)
Hell,
no! But I’m not going to dress like a
kid either. As a professional woman, I
need to dress the part, but I’m also a bit edgy, and like a hint of drama in my
outfits. And, of course, there are
times when I just want to kick up my fashion heels and have fun.
My body is
my artist’s canvas. I approach my
closet like an artist approaches her easel.
I ask myself the artist’s questions – what do I want to express? How do I want to be seen? Since I have already consciously determined
and defined my style, those answers are automatic these days. And, of course, the occasion I’m dressing
for is an ultimate determiner of the basics – I’m not wearing my orange ball
gown to my neighbor’s bull roast. But
even at the bull roast, I can be stylish, and a bit edgy – yes, even at my age.
Also, the
question of “How do I want to be seen?” is not at all about “fitting in”. I’m too independent to worry about
that. Rather, it’s a question of
self-respect.
It’s so
true, girlfriends. Clothes do have a voice of their own. And, with certain types of clothes, that
voice will shout louder than we can, and can type-cast us in the minds of
others, creating impressions that are hard to shake.
So, what’s
the bottom line?
Doesn’t
matter necessarily how you answer the artist’s questions. What counts for the empowered woman is that
she asks them. That she respects
herself enough to be truly intentional in how she presents to the world,
whether dressy or casual. That way
she controls her look and image, does
not give mixed messages, and doesn’t end up with a closet full of stuff she
never wears (and her pocketbook is happy as well!).
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