Tag: rejection

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Thanking God for unanswered prayers

Camden Harbor from Curtis Island, oil on canvas, $2782 unframed includes shipping and handling in continental United States.

Monday morning I got a text from one of my students that read, “I was at the Maine Art Gallery in Wiscasset yesterday and saw so many of your wonderful students’ work on the walls.”

I was very happy to hear this, having had a pretty dismal week. I responded, “And you should be there too,” to which she answered, “I’ve been there all summer!” Oops.

Sunset over Cadillac Mountain, oil on archival canvasboard, $869 includes shipping and handling.

Rejection

There’s a high-profile event I was in for a long time until suddenly I wasn’t. There are lots of reasons this can happen, including that I might be sending them bad selections, the current juror might not care for my work, or they simply have too many other artists in the same category (media or geographical). I try to not take rejection personally but it can be an emotional and financial hit. I’ll still apply every year because in the deeply mysterious way of jurying they might suddenly decide I’m the flavor of the week again.

Since high school, we’ve all found ourselves on one or the other side of rejection—we’ve been the ones consoling our peers or we’ve been the ones consoled. When we’re the recipient of rejection, all the comforting phrases fall flat. (My new favorite, which gets right to the heart of the matter, is, “that’s some bulls-t!”) Despite all evidence to the contrary, we know in our bones that it’s really something we did, or some way we fell short. And it’s easy to extrapolate from “I wasn’t good enough for that show” to “I’m not good enough for anything.”

Daylilies and lace-cap hydrangea, 11X14, $869 includes shipping and handling in continental US.

I was as philosophical as I could be when I got that rejection, but let’s be real: I was still cranky. However, since the start of summer my life has been in an uproar. I’ve had COVID, unanticipated abdominal surgery, and now my husband’s illness. I’m not getting into the details, but his situation is and was very serious.

Having experienced real loss, I’m now wise enough to know that this is not truly an annus horribilis. However, neither has it been fun or conducive to getting any work done. What is clear to me is that the earlier rejection I thought was a curse has turned out to be a blessing; I could never have done that event, let alone done it well. If I’d known in February what my summer would be like, I’d never have applied at all, but we mere mortals aren’t really blessed with Second Sight. (And thank God for that; who really wants to know the future?)

Brigantine Swift in Camden Harbor, 24X30, oil on canvas, framed, $3478 includes shipping and handling in continental US.

The blessing of unanswered prayer

The Bible is full of examples of unanswered prayer, starting with Jesus asking, “My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me.” But like any sane person, I’d rather pass on the tough times. Extreme challenge may help our resilience but it can also break us.

I really hate the poem Invictus; almost every line of it is idiotic, indeed almost psychopathic. We’re not the masters of our own fate; instead, we survive our struggles only with the help of others. Sometimes, as in the case of that show at Maine Art Gallery, it’s a student jarring me out of my bleak thoughts. Two weeks ago, it was two saints who helped when a workshop student was injured. This summer has been a reminder that I’m surrounded by great human beings—my family, friends, church family, students, dog-walking buddies and more. Thank you all.

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Seven Protocols for Successful Oil Painters

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Your daily rejection

In Control (Grace and her Unicorn), 24X30, $3,478, oil on canvas.

Eric Jacobsen sent me a cartoon. A little boy is drawing on the kitchen floor. “Thank you for your submission,” it reads. “We regret to inform you that your work was not selected for the fridge.”

The late great real estate columnist Edith Lank was eulogized in her hometown newspaper yesterday. “She understood that the way to get to 100 newspapers was to write to 500,” said her son, Avrum Lank. “She wrote letters and letters and letters. Her father told her to paper her the walls of her bedroom with her rejection letters.”

We hate rejection, but it’s a fact of life in the arts. The disappointment varies. I don’t have much emotional investment in most national shows (except that the entry fees chip away at my bottom line). But when I was rejected last year from a local event I’ve done many years running, my distress was brutal.

Michelle Reading, oil on linen, 24X30, $3478

Process your emotions

‘It happens to all of us’ or ‘jurying is subjective’ wasn’t that helpful at that moment. What I needed was my utterly loyal pal who said, “They must be total idiots.” We both know that isn’t true, but there was time later for self-analysis.

I once received an incredibly nasty newspaper review. In retrospect, I wish I’d saved it. It is so rare for an individual artist to be trashed in a group show that I must have hit a nerve somehow.

At the time, though, I was in a slough of despair. I called my friend Toby and cried on her shoulder. That’s the normal human reaction to rejection. What’s important is what we do after that.

Rejection is a part of life

Some artists reject the hurly-burly of the marketplace entirely. That may be less scary now, but ultimately it means no growth. We experience rejection when we push limits.

Best Buds, 11X14, oil on canvasboard, $1087 framed

Don’t get wrapped up in your disappointment

We’ve all heard the expression, “Get back on the horse that threw you.” The longer we dwell on a failure, the bigger that failure looms. There’s a national show I coveted. I was rejected the first year, when a friend was the juror. After that, I applied every year, knowing the odds were stacked against me. Imagine my surprise when I was accepted.

Healthy habits help us surf over bad times. After I was done crying at Toby, I took my daily walk, fed the kids and sent them off to school, and went back to my studio. The rhythm of my day had a soothing effect.

Pinkie, pastel, ~6X8, $435 framed.

Rejection doesn’t define you

The art market is huge. There are times I look at work and wonder, “who on earth would buy that?” And yet, almost every idea has a corresponding following. If that show or gallery doesn’t love you, someone else does.

Learn from the experience

I recently kvetched at Colin Page that the last time I painted something I liked was in 1990. This is the season where we’re applying to upcoming shows and suddenly nothing in our portfolio pleases us.

Later, sorting paintings in my studio, I realized this throwaway comment was a red flag to myself. In 1990, I was shooting pictures of my work with an SLR. Today I use my cell phone. What I don’t like now is the bad quality of my photos, not the work itself.

Registration is now open for workshops in 2026! Reserve your spot:

Can’t commit to a full workshop? Work online at your own pace:

Seven Protocols for Successful Oil Painters