This article describes how, over 30 years ago a chance meeting in a cafe in the King’s Road, Chelsea, west London led to my undertaking a series of spiritual exercises on the promise that I could be an artist if I did them. A gentleman called David Birtwistle offered to show me how to follow my dreams. This led not only to my becoming an artist but to my conversion to Catholicism and, eventually, being a writer and teacher. I truly believe I have found my personal vocation. What is all the more remarkable about this is that I was an unhappy and bitter atheist when I met David, yet he convinced me to take spiritual actions in order to change my miserable life for a happy one. I consider this to be a model exercise in evangelization. I tell the full story and give a much more detailed account of the method of discernment in my book, The Vision for You. published by Way of Beauty Press.
The Calling of the Apostles by 20th Century American Artist, Eugene Higgins
Many people ask me if I can give them advice on how to become an artist. One response to this is to describe the training I would recommend for those who are in a position to go out and get it (including signing up for www.Pontifex.University’s unique Master of Sacred Arts). However, this is only part of it (even if you accept my ideas and are in a position to pay for the training I recommend). It was more important for me first to discern what God wants me to do. I did not decide to become an artist until I was in my late twenties (I am now in my fifties in case you were wondering!). That I have been able to do so is down to inspired careers advice. I was shown first how to discern my vocation; and second how to follow it. I am not an expert in vocational guidance, so I am simply offering my experience here for others to make use of as they like.
I am a Catholic convert (which is another story) but influential in my conversation was an older gentleman called David Birtwistle, who was a Catholic. (He died more than 20 years ago now.) One day he asked me if I was happy in my work. I told him that I could be happier, but I wasn’t sure what else to do. He offered to help me find a fulfilling role in life.
Caravaggio_1601_Conversion-of-St-Paul
He asked me a question: ‘If you inherited so much money that you never again had to work for the money, what activity would you choose to do, nine to five, five days a week?’ One thing that he said he was certain about was that God wanted me to be happy. Provided that what I wanted to do wasn’t inherently bad (such as drug dealing!) then there was every reason to suppose that my answer to this question was what God want me to do.
While I thought this over, he made a couple of points. First, he was not asking me what job I wanted to do, or what career I wanted to follow. Even if no one else is in the world is employed to do what you choose, if it is what God wants for you there will be way that you will be able to support yourself. He told me to put all worries about how I would achieve this out of my mind for the moment. Such doubts might stop me from having the courage to articulate my true goal for fear of failure. Remember, he said, that if God’s wants you to be Prime Minister, it requires less than the ‘flick of His little finger’ to make it happen. I wanted to do more than one thing, he said I should just list them all, prioritise them and then aim first for the activity at the top of the list.
Rembrandt , Painter in Studio
I was able to answer his question easily. I wanted to be an artist. As soon as I said it, I partly regretted it because the doubts that David warned me about came flooding in. Wasn’t I just setting myself up for a fall? I had already been to university and studied science to post-graduate level. How was I ever going to fund myself through art school? And even if I managed that, such a small proportion of people coming out of art school make a living from art. What hope did I have? I worried that I would end up in my mid-thirties a failed artist with no other prospects. David reassured me that this was not what would happen. This process did not involve ever being reckless or foolish, but would always need faith to stave off fear.
Next David suggested that I write down a detailed description of my ideal. He stressed the importance of crystallizing this vision in my mind sufficient to be able to write it down. This would help to ensure that I spotted opportunities when they were presented to me. Then, always keeping my sights on the final destination, I should plan only to take the first step. Only after I have taken the first step should I even think about the second. Again David reiterated that at no stage should I do anything so reckless that I may cause me to let down dependants or to be unable to pay the rent or put food on the table.
The first step, he explained, can be anything that takes me nearer to my final destination. If I wasn’t sure what to do, he told me to go and talk to working artists and to ask for their suggestions. There are usually two approaches to this: either you learn the skills and then work out how to get paid for them; or by doing something different you put yourself in the environment where people are doing what you want to do. For example, he suggested that I might get a job in an art school as an administrator. For me that first step turned out to be fairly simple. All the artists I spoke to told me to start by enrolling for an evening class in life drawing at the local art school.
My experience since has been that I have always had enough momentum to encourage me to keep going. To illustrate, here’s what happened in that first period: the art teacher at Chelsea Art School evening class noticed that I liked to draw and suggested that I learn to paint with egg tempera. I tried to master it but struggled and after the class was finished I told someone about this. He happened to know someone who, he thought, worked with egg tempera. He gave me the name and I wrote to him asking for help. About a month later I received a letter from someone else altogether. It turned out that the person I had written to was not an artist at all, but had been passed on to someone who was called Aidan Hart. Aidan was an icon painter. It was Aidan who wrote to me and who invited me to come and spend the weekend with him to learn the basics. Up until this point I had never seen or even heard of icons. Aidan eventually became my teacher and advisor.
There have been many chance meetings similar to this since. And over the course of years my ideas about what I wanted to do became more detailed or changed. Each time I modified the vision statement accordingly, and then looked out for a new next step – when I realized that there was no school to teach Catholics their own traditions, I decided that I would have to found that school myself and then enlist as its first student. Later it dawned on me that the easiest way to do thatwas to learn the skills myself from different people and then be the teacher.
I was also told that there were two reasons why I wouldn’t achieve my dream: first, was that I didn’t try to achieve it; the second was that en route I would find myself doing something, that wasn’t on my list now and which I enjoyed so much that I would just stop looking further.
David also stressed how important it was always to be grateful for what I have today. He said that unless I could cultivate gratitude for the gifts that God is giving me today, then I would be in a permanent state of dissatisfaction. In which case, even if I got what I wanted it wouldn’t satisfy me. This gratitude should start right now, he said, with the life you have today. Aside from living the sacramental life, he told me to write a daily list of things to be grateful for thank God daily for them. Eventhings weren’t going my way there were always things to be grateful for, and I should develop the habit of looking for them and giving praise to God for his gifts. He also stressed strongly that I should constantly look to help others along their way.
As time progressed I met others who seemed to be understand these things. So just in case I was being foolish I asked for their thoughts. First was an Oratorian priest. He asked me for my reasons for wanting to be an artist. He listened to my response and then said that he thought that God was calling me to be an artist. Some years later, I asked and monk who was an icon painter. He asked me the same question as the Oratorian and then gave the same answer.
ST Luke
What was interesting about all three people so far is that none of them asked what seemed to be the obvious question: ‘Are you any good at painting?’ I asked the monk/artist why he said that you can always learn the skills to paint, but in order to be really good at what you do you have to love it.
Some years later still, when I was studying in Florence, I went to see a priest there who was an expert in Renaissance art. It was for his knowledge of art that I wanted to speak to him, rather than spiritual direction. I wanted to know if my ideas regarding the principles for an art school were sound. He listened and like the others encouraged me in what I was doing. Three years later, after yet another chance meeting, I was offered the chance to come to a liberal arts college in New Hampshire, to do what precisely what I had described to the priest in Florence as artist-in-residence. A few years after that I was approached by www.Pontifex.University who wanted me to be Provost and design their inaugural program, a Master of Sacred Arts.
In my meeting with him the Florentine priest remarked in passing, even though I hadn’t asked him this, that he thought that it was my vocation to try to establish this school. He then said something else that I found very interesting. He warned me that I couldn’t be sure that I would ever get this school off the ground but he was certain that I should try. What he was certain about was that along the way my activities would attract people to the Faith (most likely in ways unknown to me). This is, he said, is what a vocation is really about. It seems, that it wasn't just St Peter who was called to be a fisher of men...we all are!
JanStyka-SaintPeter
Art, from top: the Calling of St Matthew, Caravaggio; St Paul on the Road to Damascus, Caravaggio; Artist in Studio, Rembrandt; 6th century mosaic, Ravenna, Italy; St Paul on Road to Damascus, icon, artist unknown; St Paul on Road to Damascus, fresco, artist unknown; the Calling of St Luke, school of Caravaggio; The Calling of St Peter, Duccio; St Peter Preaching at Pentecost, Van Styck
My book is The Vision for You: How to Discover the Life You Were Made For
