The Art of Letting Go

I think back to the long lost days of my primary school art education, characterised by the mandatory dress code of scratchy maroon overalls, the manic scramble to select my favourite colours from the dusty pick-and-mix of chalk pastels and the unbending briefs from a teacher that probably didn’t sign up to instruct ten year olds on how to draw a still life. Amongst this nostalgic jumble, I find a phrase that has always stuck with me; A true artist knows when to stop. 

Nostalgia is a pretty loaded word for me. One which makes me feel uneasy to say the least. So before I go any further with my soupy thoughts, I’d just like to unpack that word and how it finds itself defined in my dictionary. 

Nostalgia

/nɒˈstaldʒ(ɪ)ə/

Pertaining to the displacement of self, characterised by finding oneself yearning to be where they were when the grass seems greener on the other side. Put simply, nostalgia is a symptom of chasing what one had before. At least that's what it feels like for me.

Since graduating art school, I’ve become aware that I have a tendency to conflate nostalgia with necessity. Having let a few hasty decisions simmer away on the stove of life for a couple of months, the consequences of my actions came to the boil earlier this week. I’ve learnt some valuable lessons about myself and my artistic practice, and that swallowing my pride didn’t taste so bad after all. 

I spent four years in a shared studio space with peers from my BA. Working solo in a collaborative environment allowed me to meander through avenues and explore mediums that shaped how my art looks today. You could say my degree programme was a bit like a map, promising to lead me where I wanted to be. But it's not as straightforward as that, because there isn’t an X that marks the spot on my degree certificate. 

Knowing that I would be entering into the unknown made me more impulsive than usual. I know that I didn't want to be wandering aimlessly into the art world abyss, but I’d be lying if I said that the last few months haven't felt like I was failing miserably at navigating my surroundings. Think GeogGuessr but for post graduates trying to enter the workforce. 

So, my hasty decision took the form of a 12 month lease agreement with a local farmer. I believed that in order to be a true artist I needed to keep up appearances after graduation. I found a space to rent which would, in theory, be my own personal studio. Alas, weeks turned into months and I still had no desire to get myself down to the studio and work. In fact, the very thought of making work stifled me. I was asking myself, what am I making? Who is it for? And why? The where and when was covered, but it wasn't enough to inspire me.

For me, ‘art making’ has always been a localised activity. There has always been a time and a place carved out. In this way, making art has always seemed performative in nature. Even though I have never ventured into the realms of performance art, something about my work was beginning to appear scripted. And even I wasn't buying it, so why would anyone else? My lack of audience wasn't fostering the creativity in me. 

If I’m honest, the whole setup felt a bit lonely. It became more like a very expensive storage space. My archive; where pieces were catagorised under ‘I'll come back to it’, or ‘I'm not quite ready to let go of this yet’ and the final boss of art work hoarding, ‘I’ll finish it one day…’ 

It didn't feel right physically or fiscally for unfinished business to be taking up space. Space I couldn't afford to keep. So, I had to pull the plug and let my artistic ego deflate. I withdrew my lease early (there are some decent landlords around) and I was moving my stuff out the next day. 

Figure 1

Figure 2

Figure 3

Thinking beyond the frame, or outside of the four walls of my studio space felt like the remedy I needed. So, once I returned home with all my things, I conducted a ceremonial destruction of all the works that were taking up this simultaneously valuable and pointless space. The images above are collateral damage collages, if you will. 

It's not novice for artists to destroy their own work. Titus Kaphar’s deconstructed paintings from his shredded series are exemplary in expressing the power of screwing things up. 

Stripes, 2014 oil on canvas and nails 59 1/2 x 51 x 1 1/2 inches ©Titus Kaphar. Courtesy of the artist and Jack Shainman Gallery, New York

These paintings address racial inequalities, the control of narratives and mistaken identities. Kaphar's work can be described as the conjuring of a space in between absence and presence. They tell us that there is effectiveness in correcting things that aren’t true. 

The subject matter of Kaphar’s works are undoubtedly more complex and profound than my collateral damage collages. But formally, they exist for similar reasons. 

The purging of my abandoned paintings and cumbersome sculptures felt good. The cathartic process of removing things from my life that no longer served me allowed me to realise what I love about making art; the ephemeral. I don't thrive off of structure and a lot of the things that I create that hold true meaning to me are the things that arise serendipitously. The things that don't need to be staged and presented and therefore don't feel performative. 

Hysteresis deleted screenshot, Woven Textiles / Interface Fabric, Brushed, Laminated & Bare Cotton, Various dimensions, 2024.

A lot of love (and hate) hours were spent on my degree show piece. And now they are in the hands of the men at my local tip. 

Being open to letting go is an important tool, one which can often feel like you're taking one step forward and two steps back. But this is not a bad thing. And can actually be beneficial when you feel as if you're making art for an audience that isn't looking in your direction.   

A wise woman once said that ‘the vital force of life is charged by the poles of holding on and letting go.’ Maria Popova, I couldn't agree more. I remember the old mantra, a true artist knows when to stop. But they also know when to start again.

Links to read on:

Knaster, Mirka. “Quitting Forever or Only on Hiatus? | MIRKA KNASTER.” MIRKA KNASTER, October 25, 2022. https://www.mirkaart.com/blog/2019/11/9/quitting-forever-or-on-hiatus.

Popova, Maria. “A Heron, a Red Leaf, and a Hole in a Blue Star: Poet Jane Kenyon on the Art of Letting Go.” The Marginalian, August 29, 2025. https://www.themarginalian.org/2025/08/29/jane-kenyon-things-otherwise/.

Popova, Maria. “HOLD ON LET GO: Urns for Living and the Art of Trusting Time.” The Marginalian, August 6, 2025. https://www.themarginalian.org/2025/07/25/urns/?mc_cid=bf16b0b677&mc_eid=94caee262b.

“The Jealous Curator /// Curated Contemporary Art  /// Titus Kaphar,” March 10, 2015. https://www.thejealouscurator.com/blog/2015/03/10/titus-kaphar/.