watching the creation of art

It’s not often that I get to watch people create art.

On Sunday I went to the NY Renaissance Faire. I brought my 9 year old sister and my best friend. The weather was kind of iffy, it looked like the rain clouds were going to destroy the afternoon. We went anyways and it turned out to be beautiful. If you’ve never been, the faire is excellent. Everyone is dressed up and they have games for children, shows, food & vendors.

I’ve been many times over the years, so I was surprised to see two artists/vendors that completely mesmerized me.

The first one was a man who was a candle maker. He was making decorative candles, that you could re-use over and over again. He was doing demonstrations and made it look so easy. When you lit the candles, the light would shine through the openings. Absolutely beautiful.

The next artist I watched was a glass-blower. It was amazing how she made vases and bowls with vibrant colors all out of powder and a blob of glass. I must’ve sat and watched her for half an hour.

Here was art being created right in front of me. My sister and friend got bored very quickly, but I wanted to stay and watch. I’m not very artistic, so maybe that is why I was entranced by it. Whenever you are in an art gallery, museum or shop, you never realize how much work goes into something, and how it is done. We always see the finished product. I was amazed.

When I was a little girl, I loved watching Mr. Rogers Neighborhood on the PBS channel. I always liked the segments where he would go into factories and see how things were being made. Now as I’m older, there is a program on the Food Network where they show you how different food and candy is produced. I could sit for hours and watch things like that.