I have not been great with keeping up with my blog posts and for that I apologise. Maybe it is time to explain a little about myself and you may understand a little more.
First things first, I am a 52 year old mum of 2 grown up awesome children. My biggest and best achievements in life. I came to art education very late in life. Graduating from my degree in Fine Art in 2018, taking a year out to find employment, before graduating from my MA in September last year. I never dreamt I would go to university, but it was the best thing I ever did.
In 2006 I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia, and I will admit, that I let that diagnosis take over my life and control everything I did and thought about. I hadn’t returned to work after my son was born and I wallowed in self pity. I wasn’t living, I was existing.
There’s nothing like turning 40 to focus the mind and take stock of your life and I reached the conclusion that I needed to do something to change my life. Nobody was going to do that for me. I had to do something to take my focus off my health.
I have always loved art but stopped doing any of it when I got married. Work, marriage and children became my focus. My husband had never seen what I was capable of.
I decided it was time to get back into it. In 2008 I began a 32 week art course with Harlech College. By the end of the course I had reignited the fire and love for art, that had been forgotten about for so long. I wanted more.
In 2009, I joined my local art group and they introduced me to Lifelong Learning at Aberystwyth University. I decided I wanted to learn to paint watercolours as it was something I couldn’t do very well. I did 2 watercolour courses and absolutely loved the learning environment. Before I knew it I had signed up to do a Certificate of Higher Education in Art & Design.
The Certificate was an ideal beginning for me. Two or three short courses in a year were enough to cope with while dealing with my health issues. I hadn’t planned on a house fire putting a spanner in the works but that’s another story. But it did mean it took me an extra year to complete the certificate. But the sense of achievement at the end of it was an amazing feeling. I have never had much self belief so this gave me a huge boost.
At the end of the certificate I found out that it was equal to the first year of a degree and it gave me the opportunity to study for a degree in Fine Art. Something I never thought would happen because I never did A levels.
I decided to study full-time as the funding available meant I could afford to do my degree. Something I will be forever grateful for. Sadly during this time my marriage ended. But it was the catalyst to push me to create a new life for myself. It has to be one of the scariest things I have ever done.
To pack my entire life up and move to Aberystwyth to study full-time, battling ill health, whilst also going through a divorce, was an epic undertaking to say the least! But at the end of it, I graduated with a 2:1. The perfectionist in me wanted a first, but I think I may have pushed my body too far to achieve that. However it taught me that I didn’t have to be perfect all the time.
I cannot express enough how much I enjoyed both my BA and MA. I don’t ever want to stop learning when it comes to my art career. But it wasn’t just the academic teaching that I learned from. It was my own personal self confidence. My self belief in my work began to grow. I finally accepted that I was good at what I do.
To achieve everything I have has been a constant uphill battle and it probably will always be that way. Battling every day to not let fibromyalgia define my life, but it inevitably has an impact on my day to day life.
Working a part-time job while living with fibromyalgia is a constant battle. But my biggest battle is in my own head. I am a self sabotager. I battle with imposter syndrome every day. That little voice inside my head that tells me I will never amount to anything. That nobody will want to buy my work, so why waste time trying. It has stopped me creating for the past year. The same happened the year after I graduated with my BA. I couldn’t paint outside of the university environment. Almost like the university was my security blanket. I had to be capable to have got a place at university right? But once out on my own, the little devil on my shoulder began making his voice heard again.
“You’re never going to make a living from your art” “Nobody is going to want your work on their walls” “You’re always going to be poor”. Your business is not going to succeed because you’re disabled” “You’re too old to start a business now”. All these voices are inside my head every day and it can be exhausting keeping them at bay. So now I am accepting they are there, but trying desperately not to let them over take me.
Yes my road in life will always be difficult, but I refuse to let fibromyalgia stop me from achieving my ambitions.
So now we come to today. Almost a year since I finished my MA and now I am embarking on a new challenge. To set up my professional art business, whilst still working part-time and battling with fibromyalgia trying to take over my life.
The pandemic taught me one thing. Money isn’t the measure of achievement. How much you give back to your community is much more of a measure of success.
Over the coming weeks, possibly months, I will be creating a brand new website and this blog and website will, hopefully, be transferred over once the website is complete.
I have a solo exhibition next year to prepare for, and an art project in the pipeline. It is going to take hard work to get where I want to go. But I am ready for it. Hopefully, I will be able to create more blog posts and update you all on the work I am doing currently in the coming months.
Please bear with me. Fibromyalgia doesn’t like plans being made, so things take me longer to do than I would like. But I am determined to keep pushing and get to where I want to be.
Thank you for staying with me on this journey. Your support means a lot. Here’s to new beginnings and self belief. I can do this!
#art #artistonistagram #AberystwythUniversity #graduate #impostersyndrome #selfbelief #selffulfillment #newbeginnings
Tracy J Hughes Art 