Art and the Eventual Journey of Life By Steve Sheppard

 

Art and the Eventual Journey of Life

By

Steve Sheppard

You often hear many people denying their own artistic abilities, “oh I can’t sing”, “I could never learn to play the guitar”, “I could never write like you”, “I am useless at drawing or painting”. Let’s just look at that, someone has told you that you cannot sing, everyone can to some extent or another, with application and a little training and a desire, you could play an instrument, no, you will never write like me, but try writing like you, again someone, more than likely a bad teacher or a negative friend has told you, that your art work was rubbish, more than likely because it was actually better than they could do, and they were jealous.

So when it comes to testing this, I am reminded of a story my father told me many years back, he was travelling home from work with passengers, and suddenly pulled over to look at the sunset, his work colleges made fun of him saying it was just a sunset, I mean you see them every day, my dad turned and replied “See them, do you really see them”

Think on that for a while, but my father was a good artist, he enjoyed his oil and water colour artistry, and that’s the main thing, for me I have had several instances like that throughout my life, and fortunately for me I was keen to never let them go. You see I came from a working class background in England, I loved my parents, but they did try and steer me in the only direction they knew worked, it was the mid 70’s and the open factory gates beckoned to me, like some monolith, a vampire of time, its doors opened wide and tried to swallow me up, in a bid to lead a similar existence to my father, of a 40+ years of servitude and little else..

The main problem that I had, was I had one thing that was a danger to all that was regarded to be normal at that time, I had an amazing imagination and a powerful urge to create something artistic from a very early age, sadly for me my parents sent me to a Catholic school where they literally tried to beat it out of me. Then I encountered my first angel, I felt it appropriate there to use a semi-religious term to emphasize this next statement. I was lucky enough to be taught English by a certain Mr’s Robbins, now anyone my age from England may remember the second name, if I tell you that she was the sister of Michael Robbins the actor from On the Buses, a classic TV situation comedy from the 1970’s, they were both truly wonderful people, and though she will never know this, she was the first person whom I’d met that would change the course of my destiny for good, because she, unlike the nuns who enjoyed telling me I was a waste of skin, she encouraged me to write, to use my imagination, to engage with the little artist inside me, I think I understood that, I must have done, hey, hey look at me now standing ten feet tall.

I never let those words go, now how interesting is it that when I first encountered what I now call ‘halcyon moments’, those segments in life that appear to be utter perfection in every way, I used to hurry home with an insatiable desire to write poetry, to create something that would be so good it would make someone else cry because of the emotion contained within, because of the descriptive abilities and mental perambulations I had manifested. Sadly for me, I would generally get home from a nature sojourn, with a fist full of words, and get from my then wife the two words a man, or an artist would just hated to hear, after reading with such passion, excitedly I would ask with hope “How was that”? The two words, would usually be the two words you would least want to hear, a sterile and unfeeling “It’s ok” when it would have been better to have heard, that was utter garbage, or oh my that’s so beautiful, but no I got “It’s ok”

Many a time I would take myself away into another room and simply cry, but then came 1999 and things changed faster and more quickly than even I had anticipated, as I found New Age music, interestingly enough Clouds by Kevin Kendle was my first album, and from that day onward I was entranced by an artist like Kendle, who could take a subject so close to my heart in nature, and manifest from his mind music about Spring, Autumn and life in the wilds of nature, that could have easily come from my own tormented brain, that day, the moment when I listened to Cumulus from the Clouds album, was the day the artist in me jumped out of the box, and made a run for it.

Never would I be caged into a life-style that wasn’t really me ever again. A couple of months on, I had duties as a Postman to perform, I liked that job, as it got me out on the road and sometimes into nature, it was late September, the leaves were beginning to turn and summers grip had started to loosen on the countryside, I stopped my bike and watched shards of sunlight drift down from a pastiche of fair weather clouds, and create a stunning moment of peace, beauty and calmness, something rare in my life.

I stood and watched the moment slowly unfurl, birds flapped into a dappled skyline, the sounds of the day floated around me, I now understand that for a short period of time I was completely in the moment, I had unknowingly accessed the power of now, and within my mind I could hear music, the music of Brian Eno and Harold Budd, specifically the track, an Arc Of Doves, and although I felt a familiar wetness on my cheeks, I was more happy in that moment than in many others in my life.

This happens constantly now; I stood by a pond and heard Kevin Kendle’s First Light, then on top of a hill on the Isle of Wight and his Gliders track played over and onwards, I used Eno’s Music for Airports when flying, all of these tracks have one thing in common, they kept me rooted in the now, the only real place any of us will ever be, and created a sanctuary for me away from the chaos of life’s turbulent roller coaster ride.

So knowledge gained and experienced, now some 20 years on from my postal experience I followed my own path, my true artistic path, away from the control and manipulation of others, and running hand in hand with my true spirit freely, so for my parents who wanted me to work in a factory, you had a son who is a writer, who owns a much loved online radio station, who had a successful career in media and broadcasting before that, and now a musician, who has now just recently just had his second number 1 hit single.

Life is something to be experienced; playing it safe doesn’t work as your always playing to someone else’s agenda, feel the spirit of artistic endeavour within if you if you wish to do so, and never, ever, let anyone tell you that you are not worthy, and you will never amount to anything, you are all sparks of a potential, that need to be turned into flames of undeniable desire. Go for it, you really have nothing to lose, and you will make the artist that hides inside of you so very happy.