Oftentimes I look at things and I wonder what can fill the space, it's like seeing a hole in a brick wall and knowing the exact pattern that the missing bricks would follow. I'm good at that. I'm good at filling the unknown with the expected. I am well versed in mathematics, logic and sense are two things that are no stranger to me.
As I continue to move forward and continue on my path as a stylist there are many things that haunt me. I wonder often if they haunt others. As of late I am often booked for jobs that I honestly am not excited about... And then I remember that as a freelancer I have the opportunity to decide what I do and do not do. I cannot be forced, but I can agree to do something and the outcome not be what I desire most. That determines the jobs that I am able to get and the ones that in some way or another I must take.
I am attempting to take myself in the direction of art, of free spirited, non constricting, but FOCUSED work. Did I mention that I have a difficult time focusing. How can I love stories but be completely incapable of telling one that has continuity. Every time I do a shoot I'm more and more afraid of my lack of ability to both tell a story and to fill the blank spaces in my styling artistically instead of methodically. I find that having been so good at math, at least for me, isn't working out so well for being what I desire to be in the field of fashion.
I look at my work that other people seem to love so much and I can scarcely stand to look at it. It haunts me how good that it isn't. It destroys me to see myself not live up not only to my own standards but to those of people whom I want to work with. I don't want to be the Hedi Slimane of styling. Expensive with poor execution. I want to be the Grace Coddington, the Edward Enninful, Patti Wilson, Lori Goldstein, Karl Templer, so on and so forth. I want to be good at what I do.
Often times I think that it comes down to access, but continuity... is that access or is it imagination? Am I pulling all the wrong things? Or all the right things and putting them together the wrong way. I'm afraid that all of these people who say that they love my work and that I'm great are lying. I can look at my work and know that this isn't good, this isn't continuous and in all honesty...I don't like it.
Does that mean that I give up and that it isn't for me? Or does that mean that I dig in, do better, and move forward? Practice makes perfect...so maybe it's just that I have a lack of practice. Who knows? But something is missing.
xx,
Raymond
