Past several months I have been dealing with injury to both elbows. For man whose greatest joy being at scribal desk, brush in hand, time has been frustrating lesson in patience. Some days I felt genuinely useless. Artists often measure ourselves by what we create. Finished painting. Another study. Another lesson learned through our own hands. When ability to do this is taken away, even for little while, easy to believe progress has stopped.

Looking back now, I see this was not truth, only framing of work had changed. Work simply was not on canvas. Work in head had priority.

Since I could not paint, I began study differently. Instead of asking, “How would I paint this?” I began asking, “Why does this painting work?” spending many hours studying composition, harmony of color, edges, values, and brushwork. Less attention on finished image. More attention on decisions hidden underneath it. Scribe at time of creation made decisions, choices, question being “why?” Some choices due to materials, some due to skill, some due to theology and sociologic demands, some required by patron commisioning work.

Without realizing, I had stopped practicing painting and started practicing seeing. This changed everything. Downtime became less like waiting and more like apprenticeship. Patron speaks often of what he calls Third Gap; moment just before creation. Moment before hand moves. Before brush touches canvas. Before decision becomes action. I think artists sometimes lose this moment. We become so focused on technique of recreation that we stop seeing formation of whole composition. We study brushstroke, but forget to study thought that placed brushstroke there in first place.

Now I am finally able to spend little time at easel again, slowly and carefully. Elbows still remind me not to be foolish, but brush back in hand. What surprised me most is this: I do not feel I lost those months, or at least not entirely. Queue still waits. Commissions still demand attention. But growth did not stop simply because production did. In many ways, Patron believes those months made me better artist.

Growth does not always happen while we are producing. Sometimes it happens while we are paying attention. Sometimes most productive thing we can do is accept that this season has different lesson to teach. Now comes interesting part. To discover whether hands can catch up with what eyes have already learned.