If you ever feel stuck or lost or confused about your work (and who doesn't!), how do you handle it?

In the past, I used to try and power through. I'd keep showing up in my studio, even when I had no inspiration. I followed the adage that "the muse has to find you working." And sometimes it worked - just by showing up each day and making things, I'd generate an idea or get myself moving again.

But in recent years, that hasn't worked as well for me. I've discovered that I do best when I pause and check in with myself. I've found I do best when I have an intention.

aybe I want to explore new colour palettes or expand my mark-making. Maybe I want to express a feeling or experiment with a new medium. Having a hook like this means I don't get stuck.

Or at least it did. 

I wrote last week about how I recently experienced a block and I shared how I found my way back by following the joy. I started making things that felt good and that got things moving again.

But there's another piece to this that I haven't yet fully resolved.

It's a question I think all artists have to answer at some point if they want to keep making work that they find personally satisfying.

The question is: what kind of artist do I want to be?

This week I spoke to another artist for her podcast and she brought this up. I'm paraphrasing but she said something like "if I could choose between my art hanging in MOMA or being on every mug in America, I would choose to be on every mug."

As soon as she said that, I felt my gut response in a flash: "I would want to be on the wall at MOMA."

Now of course, those are not the only two choices - there are many different ways to be an artist and many different dreams we can harbour. 

When I started out, my goal was simple. I wanted to be the kind of artist who sold beautiful paintings at a fair price to people who appreciated them. 

Now I can say that I have achieved that, but I find that beauty no longer feels as important to me as it once did. I'm now questioning what will drive the next phase of my work. I'm not pushing for an answer because I think these things come when the time is right, but I am spending time reflecting, journaling, and reading art books. 

I'm building up a collection of words and images that excite me - these are the breadcrumbs I can follow. I find it helps to write things down, or to stick images in a sketchbook or a pinboard. Making my thoughts physical in this way seems to pin them down and make them real. Otherwise, it's too easy for ideas to swirl in and out of my head without making sense. I want to build a picture - in the same way that interior designers build mood boards. I want to get very clear on what matters most.

This doesn't mean I'll know what the paintings will look like - finding that out will be the exciting part. It just means I'll have a clear idea of what I'm pursuing and why. 

I meet a lot of different artists and I can say with confidence that they have many, many different aims. Some want to make art that they love and can hang on their walls at home.  Some want to be in local galleries,. Some want to be in group shows. Some want to sell their work directly. Some want to make beauty and others want to express emotion and some want to make a political statement. Some want to paint in colour, others want to draw.

All of it is equally valid in my opinion. No-one gets to tell you what you should want. But I do think you need to know what you want. It saves so much angst and confusion. 

I have met many artists who have mo desire to sell their work; they just want to make it for the joy of making it and then give it away to friends and family. But some of these same artists find themselves sucked into making a website and posting on Instagram because they think they should.

I have met artists who want their art to hang in museums, but who have become hyper-focused on making saleable paintings, and having stands at art fairs.

These people are doing things they don't enjoy and that actually pull them further away from what they want - all because they haven't taken the time to question what they're doing and why. Or because their goals have changed over time and they haven't stopped to check in with themselves.

Once we can answer the question "what kind of artist do I want to be?' we can start to explore next steps. The person who wants to make work for fun can stop worrying about social media. The person who wants to be in museums can start taking different steps towards that goal. And the one who wants to be on mugs can start learning about licensing.

Not only can we start doing things, we can also drop certain things. Te mug artist can stop worrying about what "the art world thinks." The museum artist might stop booking art fairs or might reassess the importance of beauty in her work.

We can shed so much once we're clear on who we want to be and why.

So my question to you this week is simple: what kind of artist do you want to be?