Artists and their mess

Today I want to write about something different, something that probably bothers a lot of us.
This entry is a message to the Artists, as sub-title I would like to add:
"Don't be ashamed of your mess!"

Why did it come to my mind?
Because recently I had to visit a neighbour, she said, before that I enter her home, "please, don't look the mess all around, I had no time to tidy"...
And my answer came automatically "oh, don't worry, it's ok here, my home is more messy"...

But then, I started to feel ashamed... People are apologizing for their "mess", that actually and honestly is: 1 bottle, 1 spoon and magazines on the table, maybe a coat on the sofa. That's it.
Yes, then, I started to feel bad and was thinking that nobody should come to my home.

But well, I started thinking more deeply about the situation.
Then remembering the home of different persons I alrready visited. Some are messy, some are not.
Why? Some are simply messy, but this category is not the purpose of this entry.

There are 2 important points to remember:
Those people apologizing for "their mess" are 1) not working at home, and 2) most of all are not artists.

1) Working at home means that all the stuffs that are usually outside of your house is in your house. Many of us don't have extra space for that, so yes, the place is full of many things.

2) Artist: it can apply to many artists, painters, musicians, writers, etc. And believe me, it's not only here in Belgium, Europe, etc... It's worldwide! Even in Japan ;)

I'm a painter so I will speak about what I know ;)

Of course, I would like to get a nice place, with empty rooms... but my home is really small, I don't have much space to store my paintings, frames, papers, books etc etc.
If I had a room dedicated only for the painting, my mess would be there.
Yes, indeed, my mess would still be somewhere anyway.

Why? Because creativity cannot be scheduled.
Exactly, your creativity is not something that you can fix in your agenda, it comes many times when you don't expect it.

It happened often that I tidy all, put everything back in boxes and shelves and guess what happened?
The time to bring everything back on the table, some inspiration and motivation started to evaporate.
And... most annoying is: WHERE IS THIS PEN, WHERE IS THIS COLOR???
Yeah, you have to search what you exactly need at that moment. It's frustrating and it might happen that you start doing suddenly something else because you focus on something different than painting.

From now, I decided to stop being ashamed of my artistic mess.
As long as your home is clean, who cares? 

My tiny flat is full of stuffs, but it's full of life.
Having art supply & artworks a bit everywhere keeps my creativity awake.

Emptiness is not what motivates me. It's surely different for many of us, so this blog is only for those who are feeling like me.
As conclusion, I would say:
Our artistic mess represents our creativity.

So, I hope that this entry will help some of you feeling better.
After writing this thought, I will go back to my mess as creativity is calling me ^_^