Painting is My Oxygen
In my career transition, my available time is shifting. I recently started a part-time job in my local area to assist with the solitude that comes with being an artist and entrepreneur. In the summer I started offering a room in my house as an AirBnB, pursuing another dream I’ve had for many years after an extended vacation in New Zealand.
I didn’t pursue many dreams because of very full-time corporate sales jobs I worked in the past. This isn’t a complaint. Because of those corporate jobs, I was able to pursue international travel vacations year over year and save for retirement. And it was the experiences of working with the people I served, librarians and faculty in higher education that gave me my love of relationship management, or, more directly, helping people with online research solutions through the online archives that the publishing companies I worked for made available and easily accessible than past formats. Building relationships is a skill that I didn’t even know I possessed. Every experience I had before prepared me for my next opportunity, much easier to see in hindsight.
In the lull between corporate sales jobs, I published a book, a dream I held since my teenage years. I knew I wanted to be a writer and what I didn’t know then, that I know now is that I was a writer. In 2021, I published the book I had in me all those years to be of service to others who found their way to Finding Moksha: One Woman’s Path in Uncertain Times.
In the lull between one publishing job and those that followed, I started painting again. And that led me to scholarship with Rome Art Program. Later I built a website including articles about what other creatives were doing and published interviews. I sold paintings.
There was a difficult period that followed; my painting and writing stopped.
After that time passed, I returned to painting sporadically as a form of art therapy. In the need for income, I again took on a corporate position at a start-up company. I worked fully remotely with most of my team in Belgium. While I had always wanted to work with an international company, I realized this experience gave me the contrast of what I do want; I am grateful for those lessons.
I returned to being a full-time creator, again, as a painter, now being seen in international galleries like Dubai, Paris, Venice, Switzerland, and recently Grenada. I continually build my network with other artists, galleries and curators. I participate in some local exhibitions, having the flexibility to choose what feels right for what I need. My love of relationship management skills was reignited - or, more simply, when I again began building my network, both professionally and personally. During this time I followed my curiosity. I built communities in unexpected ways unlike before of doing what felt safe or “right” according to societal expectations. I followed the connections I was making, all along with an openness and curiosity. These connections have led me to growth and expansion, finding better ways to promote myself through conversations I have having with the people I met. I remained being of service to communities and built new friendships and partnerships.
Circling back to my introduction of Painting is my Oxygen, my time is now filled with the many avenues of connection that I have attracted as I’m living the life I was meant to live and becoming the artist I always wanted to be. In all of these new avenues and the changed schedule of building communities, creating the paintings has gone by the wayside.
Last night I finished a painting, called Pont Neuf.
I hadn’t worked on it in about two weeks. I had created a reel on February 19, 2025, about the process on Instagram @amandamottornartist. I had taken out my watercolor paints and remembered a style of the artist, Georgio Morandi that I learned in Rome Art Program. Morandi grew up in Bologna, Italy, (yes, like the sauce) and rarely left Italy, while his art exhibitions did. What I like about Morandi’s style is the focus on the form without all the details. The painting style is the suggestion of what is known without being revealed.
As I worked on this painting, Pont Neuf, I was thinking about how the paper was not soaking in the watercolor paint the way it normally did. Then I realized the archival paper was suitable for oil painting. I remembered that the earlier painting I had done held rich dark colors in a way my typical watercolor archival paper hadn’t. I had forgotten I’d started in acrylic. Yet, I loved the contrast of the bright colors of the buildings standing against the deep passionate colors of the bridge. What I see in this painting is determination, curiosity, openness and acceptance, as if creating that cycle of those feelings allowed Pont Neuf to reach its completion. I had considered adding acrylic on top of the watercolor. I decided against it. The contrast gave me the openness and wonderment of what the painting needed. And while the lamp posts could use straighter lines, thicker and thinner lines in various places, I love seeing the perfection of imperfection.
While I didn’t paint a long time last night, it was as if I had come up for air from holding my breath underwater.
Painting is my oxygen, my ability to take out a long exhale.
Painting gives me that calm that nothing else does.
Painting is my relief.
Painting is where the love begins.
Painting is where life begins, grows and expands and all the places creativity takes me - to growing my compassion and acceptance which allows me to share it with others.
With my painting as oxygen, I can more easily serve others, helping them to find theirs, and growing my friendships and partnerships of community in ways I had never done before.
Amanda L. Mottorn is an author, artist and lover of nature. To watch her creative process and learn about new paintings available for private art collection investment, upcoming art exhibitions and to learn about the writing process that allowed her to publish her novel, follow her on Instagram, @amandamottornartist