If you put it on your plate...

"If you put it on your plate, you better eat it."


Okay, I'll admit it. My eyes are bigger than my stomach.

At least that's what my mom would say whenever she saw the ten-year-old version of me scarf down a third helping of food at dinnertime. Even if full, I would make sure to let my greedy little tongue taste every morsel on my plate. I was a fat kid and felt obligated to lick that plate clean lest my mom give me the evil eye.

Well, I'm not fat now, but I'm still greedy. Or, at least always hungry. But for what?


I don't know. But it seems like whenever I get the slightest inspiration, I pile things high upon my plate.

What started as a noble quest to start a year with aspirations for growth and new beginnings turned into a confused mutter of manifestos and a huge headache for me. I have started my first semester of grad school this year among other things I've decided to juggle, and it's all culminating into lots of rushing around, lots of different "hat" wearing, lots of swearing, and a very frazzled me. But I'm learning some stuff on the way.

The other weekend, I modeled for a portrait painting workshop at the Dunedin Fine Arts Center. Markissia, the workshop instructor, asked me to wear something bright and “island-y” for the pose, which was to remain the same for the whole 12-hour workshop. I was a Gauguin re-creation in a blue sarong and a flower in my hair. I sat with bright flowers in one hand on my lap and other hand resting lazily on the arm of a chair in front of a brightly patterned pink backdrop. Seven students set up their easels around the room facing me, and Markissia set hers closer to me to enable her students to watch her process of laying down my image in oil paint on her canvas.

On a break during day one of the workshop, I walked out into the gallery of the arts center and stood in front of a painting Markissia was exhibiting called “Renaissance Man.” It is a painting of a man costumed in renaissance attire holding a palette and paint brush, looking heroically towards a spot of light up into the far left hand corner. What that spot of light is--well, that’s up to the viewer.

It is a beautifully done piece with the crisp quality of a Jacques-Louis David painting. I did not think Markissia’s idea was original, but since I saw it that first time, I kept wandering out to stand in front of it during each of my successive breaks. Now the image stays with me.

I like the idea of renaissance. This could be the reason I studied art history for my undergrad degree. I enjoy the idea of rebirth and flourishing ideas.

My www.myspace.com profile status reads, “Ana is emerging from a cocoon”.

I consider myself a renaissance woman. I seek the artist, the teacher, the muse, in me. I fill my days with a stew of artistic aims to achieve some kind of nirvana balance between all disciplines in art.

I get inspired by the renaissance woman in me, and it’s all over:

I’m scooping all of it onto my slate of finely-decorated china. Eat up.

So my initial endeavor as a child of enlightenment has been to eat from the knowledge tree again by getting my graduate degree in English Education, and to get some experience in the education field as a substitute teacher. I adore teaching. For three years now, I’ve also taught reading to children and adults during a summer program through the Institute of Reading development. I am the brand of nerd who thinks it is giggly-fun to find the main idea of a paragraph or to diagram a sentence, so it seemed like a no-brainer to get my teaching certification in the field.

But I have to eat.

I am making money on the side as a fine arts figure model. I have the loveliest exchanges with all of the arts community cohorts as I try to establish myself in that field as both an artists and model. When I’m not gazing off into a noble corner of a room standing nude in a classical, contrapposto stance, I’m toting my box of charcoal and graphite with my sketchbook, proudly creating art next to people who created art of me the week before.

And when I’m not doing all that, plus going to Jazzercise at least twice a week, I’m working on a culmination of my talents in the form of a project that will attempt to incorporate figure modeling, art creation, and a healthy serving of fresh ideas to my plate. My aim is to put together an event called Art School Cabaret, which will be a showcase of models and a bit of a workshop for artists in a relaxed, cabaret-style atmosphere. The event will be held at the venue Studio@620 with which I am interning, and will take some moving and shaking on the part of myself and my colleagues to make into a great idea.

This sounds all like I am trying to receive some kind of recognition for my talents, huh? I don’t know what I’m trying to achieve, but it seems I have the peculiar habit of wanting to prove that I can balance a multitude of tasks at once. Or, I simply get greedy.

I am to write a manifesto at the end of my internship that will sum up my endeavors and where my role as an artist/model/teacher is taking me. Well, right now, I am having trouble finding time to breathe.

The Renaissance Woman in me is overburdened from all the inspiration! So maybe my manifesto will include a survivor’s guide through all my plate-piling.

--For, no matter what, I’m gonna finish my plate. It’s my nature (and possibly, my torture).


Maybe I should consider portion size?