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I probably had undiagnosed A.D.D. as a child. I wasn’t a very good student.  Every task was hard for me to complete.  Now this is the part where some artists would say they retreated into art and found they were very talented. That wasn’t me.  In elementary school, do you remember decorating shoe boxes with doilies and hearts for the big Valentine exchange? Mine always looked messy to me compared to many that were perfect and beautiful. I realized much later in life that their mothers probably helped them with theirs.  Perception is everything though.  I always thought I couldn’t create art, so I never tried.  

I became a Realtor in 1986. It has always been a good fit for me. I love marketing and am a good negotiator. As a middle child, I’ve had lots of experience. My biggest asset to my real estate sales  is my ability to decorate and stage homes. One time, I staged a home so well that the owners decided not to sell. See? A good fit.

In 1997, my husband and I started fixing up houses to sell. I was the designer and he was the contractor. We were able to transform houses that were less than desirable into beautiful homes.  Back then, French country décor was popular and walls and cabinets painted to appear old were a great to compliment this look. Artists to do these faux painting techniques were expensive, so I bought books and tapes and learned how. I discovered I was good at it! Who knew? From 1997 to 2010, we moved 6 times. When we needed money, we would put our home on the market, sell it, and start over again. I decided to put my art on canvas so it could go to the next home with me. That is why I started painting but I didn’t know the adventure that awaited me!     

 In 2006, I took my first art workshop. Once I put the brush in my hand, I was in love. My mother was ill at the time. At 82, she had gone from being a vibrant, energetic woman to the shell of her former self, and I was her caretaker. It was heartbreaking seeing her like that and terrifying to realize that could be my fate also. I quit going to the gym and instead took long walks to talk to God. He told me that whatever happened in my lifetime, He would be there with me to take care of me. I wasn’t sleeping much. I worked during the day, napped at lunch to get through the rest of the day, and painted at night. During this difficult time, art was my saving grace. My paintings took on a religious theme. I wrote I Corinthians 13 (the love chapter) over and over again as backgrounds for the paintings. To this day, they are some of my favorites. We lost my mom in 2009.

God was true to His word. The market to flip houses dried up after the mortgage crisis in 2008, so we opened a frozen yogurt and coffee shop basically to give my husband something to do. We were just hoping to pay the rent, but what happened was an income so large that I was able to go from a full time Realtor and a part time artist to a part time Realtor and a full time artist. Being able to paint every day enabled me to work on my craft and become a professional artist.  My art has always been a collaboration with God.  I put a cross in my signature.

Whatever I do, I’m an eternal learner. I never think I know enough, that there’s always something more to learn. In art, I have learned that being a good artist doesn’t necessarily require a lot of natural talent (though it helps). It’s a matter of being able to put shapes and colors together that are pleasing to the person looking at it, much like decorating a room. I’m making it sound easy and it’s not. I have worked for years to improve my art. By studying with some wonderful artists, I’ve learned painting techniques and gained knowledge of colors and composition. I’ve learned how to work with my preferred medium and how to implement the Golden Rule. It has taken many years to get the art education I missed as a child.  

Today, I’ve sold many paintings.  I'm a juried artist, had a solo show, and my paintings have been sold in galleries.  The best thing is that art has changed the way I see the world. I now see beauty in everything, even ordinary thing, through an artist’s eye.   I paint what moves me and each painting is like a child to me. When I sold my first painting, it was like sending my first child off to college.  Isn’t it cool that my art, a part of me, gets to live on after I’m gone?  

Janet Lay

JanetLayFineArt.com