Artist Series: Etel Adnan

As I have spent much of my time each week at Creation Studio (CS) over the last month and a half, I have become more and more curious about painting and drawing. I have been a photographer and knitter for my entire adult life (a knitter since I was a kid), but I’ve always thought of myself as too uncoordinated and sloppy to ever draw or paint. Our artists inspire me to try. When I have a spare moment, I have found myself at the table with them, drawing. Today, for the first time, I tried oil painting. Since it became clear that CS was going to happen, I knew that it would change my life in a myriad of ways. I didn’t know that it’d also inspire me to paint.

While I was sitting in the studio one day recently, I came across Etel Adnan’s work. Her art immediately gripped me in a way I haven’t often experienced. I think it is because it reminds me of the color blocking I enjoy doing in my knitting.

Adnan was born in 1925 in Beirut, Lebanon. She spent the majority of her life working as a writer and professor. She taught the philosophy of art at a university in California, then returned to Lebanon to work as a journalist. While teaching in California, a friend of hers remarked – you love speaking about art so much, why don’t you make art yourself? Her immediate response was that she felt like she was too clumsy. She was inspired by the question, though, and began painting.

For the rest of Adnan’s life, she painted during any spare moment she had. Her art is exhibited in museums across the globe including the Museum of Modern Art, the Whitney, and the Guggenheim. In addition to her paintings, she also made beautiful tapestries in a similar style.

I’ve found my new painting hobby to be exciting and relaxing at the same time. Life feels more hopeful when I get to experience artmaking + others’ art.

-Hunter