Still Life – REJECTED
Yesterday I posted this painting of mine which had just been rejected by Judges at a local Art Award Competition. I was upset as I believe this is a very good painting. Also two students of mine were rejected and both had outstanding works. This upset me too.
I tried hard to put a positive side to it and rambled on about “fit.” The post just did not “feel” good to me so I trashed it within a few hours.
Today, after a good nights sleep and without the strong emotion attached to it I am doing another post on the subject of REJECTION. This time showing what I really feel about it.
We all receive rejection at some time in our lives. And as I have always known, most of the really great people of this world have been rejected at first…….simply because they are doing something new. As people we generally trend to reject the new because it threatens our previous ideas and beliefs. Below are a few who had to go through the rejection rite of passage to then bless the world with their art.
A Few REJECTED Artists & Writers
Vincent Van Gogh: During his lifetime, Van Gogh sold only one painting, and this was to a friend and only for a very small amount of money. While Van Gogh was never a success during his life, he plugged on with painting, sometimes starving to complete his over 800 known works. Today, there is a major Museum and Gallery of his art, he is one artist everybody knows all over the world and his works bring in hundreds of millions of dollars.
Monet: Today Monet’s work sells for millions of dollars and hangs in some of the most prestigious institutions in the world. Yet during his own time, it was mocked and rejected by the artistic elite, the Paris Salon. Monet kept at his impressionist style, which caught on and in many ways was a starting point for some major changes to art that ushered in the modern era.
Emily Dickinson: Recluse and poet Emily Dickinson is a commonly read and loved writer. Yet in her lifetime she was all but ignored, having fewer than a dozen poems published out of her almost 1,800 completed works.
Theodor Seuss Geisel: Today nearly every child has read The Cat in the Hat or Green Eggs and Ham, yet 27 different publishers rejected Dr. Seuss’s first book To Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street.
Charles Schultz: Schultz’s Peanuts comic strip has had enduring fame, yet this cartoonist had every cartoon he submitted rejected by his high school yearbook staff. Even after high school, Schultz didn’t have it easy, applying and being rejected for a position working with Walt Disney.
Steven Spielberg: While today Spielberg’s name is synonymous with big budget, he was rejected from the University of Southern California School of Theater, Film and Television three times. He eventually attended school at another location, only to drop out to become a director before finishing. Thirty-five years after starting his degree, Spielberg returned to school in 2002 to finally complete his work and earn his BA.
Stephen King: The first book by this author, the iconic thriller Carrie, received 30 rejections, finally causing King to give up and throw it in the trash. His wife fished it out and encouraged him to resubmit it, and the rest is history, with King now having hundreds of books published the distinction of being one of the best-selling authors of all time.
Zane Grey: Incredibly popular in the early 20th century, this adventure book writer began his career as a dentist, something he quickly began to hate. So, he began to write, only to see rejection after rejection for his works, being told eventually that he had no business being a writer and should give up. It took him years, but at 40, Zane finally got his first work published, leaving him with almost 90 books to his name and selling over 50 million copies worldwide.
J. K. Rowling: Rowling may be rolling in a lot of Harry Potter dough today, but before she published the series of novels she was nearly penniless, severely depressed, divorced, trying to raise a child on her own while attending school and writing a novel. Rowling went from depending on welfare to survive to being one of the richest women in the world in a span of only five years through her hard work and determination.
Jack London: This well-known American author wasn’t always such a success. While he would go on to publish popular novels like White Fang and The Call of the Wild, his first story received six hundred rejection slips before finally being accepted.
Louisa May Alcott: Most people are familiar with Alcott’s most famous work, Little Women. Yet Alcott faced a bit of a battle to get her work out there and was encouraged to find work as a servant by her family to make ends meet. It was her letters back home during her experience as a nurse in the Civil War that gave her the first big break she needed.
For a complete list of 50 Famous People go to
http://www.onlinecollege.org/2010/02/16/50-famously-successful-people-who-failed-at-first/
Now if that doesn’t give everyone inspiration I don’t know what will. It makes me feel better and I hope it does you as well.
Copyright Burgess 2102 (c) All rights reserved.
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