In August 2022, I opened Studio Sol Gallery & Creative Space thinking it would be a place to facilitate paint and sip events and a marketplace for local artists and crafters, including me, to showcase and sell their art. My plan was to keep things simple and stick to what I knew.
Then, one day in late summer, sitting around a table with other female business owner friends, I got a suggestion that changed everything—“you should offer stuff for kids.” I felt wholly unqualified for this job, considering I hadn’t, at that point, been around many children at great length, and didn’t consider myself someone who could teach. But, I decided to start offering Saturday morning walk-in kids art and crafts, and, in doing so, changed the entire trajectory of my business.
In opening myself up to this challenge, I learned that kids are consummate artists and fearless creators. I learned that spending one on one time honoring the ideas of a child could really make a difference in their confidence, critical thinking, and healthy risk-taking. Also, after seeing the results with kids, I began applying the same principles to older people, those with special needs, and adults who thought they could never be creative because someone told them once what art should be. It turns out, we all need the same thing. We need to create.
Because of one conversation, the entire mission of Studio Sol, and of my life, has now evolved into art and creative play as healing and enrichment. What started as an LLC business is now about to become a nonprofit organization, with a slightly different name and some big goals. People of all ages have forgotten the importance of healthy play and creativity and of just being. Sol’s here to fix that.
From early ages, we are moving through busy lives of achieving, spending our downtime with unhealthy and addictive coping mechanisms, and losing sight of joy and play and creativity, as well as simply feeling and giving love. We push hard, and play hard, and even our vacations are, a lot of times, exhausting. We weren’t put on this earth to slog and achieve. Life was never meant to be about having the most stuff and making the most money and planning the joy and serendipity out of every detail. I’ve always known it, and somewhere, maybe way deep down, you have, too.
My mission, Studio Sol’s mission, is to help you, no matter your age or ability, if even for a moment, remember that it’s okay to play. It’s okay to put aside the achiever in you and make something, and not because it might look good—because creativity feels good.
As a species, we need to create. We weren’t given opposable thumbs and abstract thought just to make ourselves, or someone else, rich. Creativity is in our DNA. And if you think this particular column is nonsense and my “mission of making” isn’t for you, that means it’s especially for you.
Sara Middleton is a freelance columnist and resident artist/owner of Studio Sol Gallery & Creative Space in Eagle Grove, Iowa. Email her at sara.studiosol@gmail.com or find Studio Sol on Facebook or Instagram.
