Is the person eloquent in one language necessarily a better communicator than one who masters several? Is the person who specializes in playing the violin necessarily a better musician than one who can also play the piano and the clarinet?
Why is it, when art critics have nothing more constructive to say, they always fall back on the tired old “lack of focus” to the detriment of an artist’s body of work? And, more perplexing, why is such criticism never questioned and is so readily acceptable as inalienable truth?
If lack of focus was any kind of measure for the worth of an artist or their body of work, Leonardo Da Vinci would not make the cut. Neither would Michelangelo, Rafael, Beethoven, or Mozart. Edward Weston gets an “F” for photographing everything from nudes through bell peppers to dead pelicans. Ansel Adams should be relegated to amateur status for photographing just about anything with interesting tonality, not to mention being a pianist to boot.
When a critic tells you your work lacks focus, he is really telling you one of two things: A) he has a financial interest in selling art (collectors prize consistency, not always personal expression), or B) he didn’t take the time to understand the roots of your art.
The former is pretty straightforward, so let me elaborate on the latter. Consider the “body of work” metaphor: your fingers, your eyes, and your hair are parts of the same body, but appear completely different. The commonality is not in the shape, size, color, or any other immediately-discernible characteristic. Yet, they are all the product of the same genetic blueprint - the same DNA that makes them parts of one unique whole body. It is thus with art: the common roots of an artistic body of work are the sensibilities of the artist. The same artist can produce a color image of one subject, a B&W image of another, a wood carving, and a poem describing their morning walk, and still have all of them be one consistent body of work - consistent in the sense that all are coming from the same place, emanating from the same creative nucleus, and representing the same vision and ideas. Anyone who fails to see the focus is simply not looking hard enough.
A sad consequence of such narrow-minded criticism is that many would-be multi-talented artists end up crippling their own creative avenues under the dictum that they need “more focus”.
Can you imagine Beethoven avoiding symphonies because he was “just a concerto composer” or because he needed to focus on string quartets? How about Michelangelo refusing to paint the Sistine Chapel because he was focusing on sculptures, or Picasso never becoming a Cubist because he was forever focused and stuck in his Blue Period?
Come on, critics, do you honestly want to limit the growth of artists and to lock them into a repetitive, narrowly-focused churn for the rest of their careers? Give up this silly notion of looking for obvious similarities and dig deeper: look for the soul of an artist, not for their sales potential! Don’t be in the way of artists evolving and exploring and discovering! It’s time to let go of the old “lack of focus” crutch. It is not self-evident truth and, more often than not, is neither helpful to the artist nor to the art. How many artists came home depressed and defeated from a review after hearing such a blunt missive? How many of those may end up giving up on experimentation and discovering their true calling because of it? If there is even one such person - you are guilty; guilty of not giving them due consideration, and maybe guilty of hindering their growth or even the growth of art itself. Can you say with confidence that it wasn’t you who failed to see the proverbial DNA underlying a true and diverse body of work? Have you truly and honestly looked hard enough before dismissing a portfolio with a failsafe excuse?
Artists - look inside yourselves, pick whatever form of expression feels right. As long as you’re true to your own calling, your work - whatever it is, and in whatever media - will never lack focus. The focal point is YOU.
Guy
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