The Artist in the Nursery Interview: Rick and Brenda Beerhorst

Rick Beerhorst is a narrative portrait painter, singer-songwriter and urban farmer. He and his wife Brenda and their 6 children live in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where they are making art together and with friends.

Brenda Beerhorst has considered herself an artist since she was 6 years old. She likes reading novels as well. Being the wife of an artist and Mother of children keeps life pleasantly exciting most times and excruciatingly difficult at other times. But she loves it. Rug hooking is a peaceful creative outlet for her.

Editor’s Note: there is no giveaway for this interview, but feel free to comment anyway!  Let us all know what you think!

First, how did you both meet?  Was it art that drew you together?

Brenda: We met dancing at a local bar called “The Intersection” in Grand Rapids, Michigan. We were both art students at different local colleges and had a lot of friends in common. Art definitely played a big part of our attraction and relationship.

Rick: we danced a lot that night. I got Brenda’s phone number and woke her up the next morning with my call to ask her out. I was smitten.

Brenda: We clicked very quickly, I think being artists really helped us understand each other.

Was being fully committed to an artist life—with no “day job” something you both agreed to early on?

Rick: I really wanted to be a full time working artist even before Brenda and I met. Brenda was respectful and supportive from the beginning. We both took different odd jobs. Brenda worked in a group home for mentally ill adults. Later she worked with a successful local craftswoman. This evolved into design work. I worked at catering company, as a carpenter’s helper, and taught drawing/art – adjunct at local colleges. These “day jobs” gave both of us much needed experiences that helped us make our art a business. We gradually created a lifestyle and various income streams that allowed us to no longer need outside employment.

Brenda: Neither of us are motivated by money. Yes we understand it is needed. But both of us need the process to be enjoyable. I think doing what you like to do is fulfilling and has a positive energy that makes it appealing. Even if what you do is difficult at times, being available to the muse – {the creative energy that will use you as a tool} – being absorbed in the process, makes us feel alive. This can include all aspects of life, cleaning, parenting, even waiting in line — it is all ART. We are fashioning a seamless life, a unique vision and a unique life.

One of the things that keeps me continually encouraged by you is that despite six children, a mortgage, and all that comes with that, you remain steadfast in your commitment to the full-time artist life.   Some people can have a fanciful idea of the life of a full-time artist, but you both have always been very open about the struggles as well as the miracles.  Can you talk about some of the realities—financial or otherwise–of managing a large family life on the muse?  Also, why does this work for you?

Rick: I think over the years we have come to see struggle as our friend. The struggle, the hardships are like the inky black sky that makes the stars so bright. We have had times when I would go to a local church’s food pantry and wait in line with new immigrants from Eastern Europe and Latin America for onions, potatoes, and day old bread. With awkward greetings from working volunteers that knew me from college or past church memberships. Sometimes food comes from dumpsters. Sometimes we knock on a neighborhood door to ask if we can pick the fruit from a prolific untended apple or cherry tree. There have been times we have just straight up asked friends for help when money just wasn’t there. I always remember reading how St. Francis sent out his little Brothers to beg because it taught them humility. Making art can be a very enchanted place to inhabit and when you begin to collect professional accolades it can be intoxicating to the ego. Perhaps the poverty and little embarrassments help whittle that ego down just a little bit.

Brenda: Our Faith has helped us. We believe if we are true to who we have been created to be — The Creator of the Universe will take care of us. It also helps that what we use to measure a rich life is a different measure than the sum of our bank balance.

I know you unschool your kids and often incorporate them in the art making and having them make their own art.  How did that emerge and how has it evolved as your family has grown and aged?

Rick: Both Brenda and I kind of early on realized that our personal experiences with grade school and high school were pretty miserable and had little if anything to do with real learning and a lot to do with babysitting and learning to shut up and do what you were told. It just seemed that our children were precious and sending them off to school would be a mistake.

Brenda: School was a nightmare for me socially… Also the local public schools in our district are in sad shape- even people who want to send their kids to school question it. Just that reason alone is cause for homeschooling.

Rick: Homeschooling seemed the natural option. As for unschooling – anytime we tried to do anything remotely resembling “school at home” what resulted was lots of huffing, puffing and cussing. To just let the kids go natural seemed like all we could do. What seemed to work was letting the children follow their natural inclinations and curiosity. Of course you need to know this is a world without a TV (or even a computer for a long time.) Our home environment our family exists in has always been a rich one. We have lots of visitors and interesting conversations with guests. Lots of trips to the library- We don’t let the children call each other mean names or draw blood. We want them to play fair. We don’t worry too much about stuff getting broke, dirty or bent. For a long time now we have not only made our art with the kids all around us– but we also have been opening our home for family art shows.

Brenda: The kids watched us create – they created. We incorporated them and they incorporated us. Working through boredom is important for kids. As our kids have gotten older they have discovered more things that interest them and learned what they like to do and what they are good at. Their inventory of options to pick from when they are bored grows. Our two oldest children rarely say they are bored any more. Unschooling our children has been a very different life choice, it is not a mainstream option. Hopefully the results will give others the courage they need to follow their own vision for their families.

Any working family struggles to get it all done—the work, the playtime, and the cooking and cleaning. How does your household get it all done?  Do you share it equally?  What is the hardest challenge right now and what do you do about it?

Brenda: “get it all done?” It is never all done! We just quit at certain times and do something else….

Rick: As far as getting house work done, leisure and play — we strive to share things equally. We want our kids putting their clothes away and making their own beds. This means almost constant “gentle” reminders to turn off lights and pick up rooms for the younger ones. The older kids seldom need reminders. In fact our teenagers do lot around the house such as cooking meals and getting the house ready for guests. Since we are all together a lot it can be a struggle to not just really bug each other sometimes. Everyday tempers are lost and we take turns making our way to a humble apologies later. Keeping in each others good graces required a lot of delft control and hard work as well as frequent retreats to coffee shops and walks in the neighborhood.

Brenda: What is the hardest challenge? — Vast quantities of food and clothing — cooking – laundry, sorting and order. Rick has 3 cooking days, I have 2 cooking days and Rose and Pearl (our oldest kids) each have a cooking day. On your cooking day you are responsible to cook lunch and dinner for 8 to 10 people (we have 2 boarders that live with us) each meal. Other daily/weekly chores are assigned as well. There is a lot of living that goes on in our house! Moods and tempers… Fun and frustration levels can fluctuate wildly in minutes. Sometimes alone time is demanded {as in I need a break} and sometimes it is sentenced {take a time-out on the stairs.} It is a deep life – not superficial– this realness gives depth to our art-making it is authentic.

You seem to be very connected to a thriving community of people.  Do you feel a sense of community is crucial to the artist and the family life?  And if so, how?

Rick: We could not exist without a very deep community of friends and support. I think “we” inherited a world of isolation that feels like the Edward Hopper painting “Nighthawks”. The family I grew up in was a dysfunctional struggle in a desert of isolation in the middle of a tidy and verdant suburb. I wanted a very different life for my own family. In fact I have found much healing from past hurts and scars by the hands of loving and faithful friends. Artists need habitat. The company of other artists is that habitat.

Brenda: Community is necessary. Creative people need laughter and affirmation from other creative people. We can literally die if we think no one understands us.  We have pot-lucks at our house on Sunday evening. It is a very open invitation, and those that like it keep coming. Those people become our community and our collaborators.

So much of our lives are centered around virtual communities, but often that doesn’t replace the grounding of an in-person community.  Can you talk about how you have built your own thriving community up and kept it going?

Rick: Potluck dinners is a biggie for us.  There is something very basic and emotionally binding about eating together around the same table. We have a potluck dinner every Sunday evening beginning a 5:30.  We have a very open home, and like to have people over. Last winter we had a series of house concerts with mostly local musicians.  We have art show open houses a few times a year which has helped bring some good people into our lives.   We are almost always home, so when people stop by we are usually here.  This means we are often interrupted and maybe not getting much done some days but it is good for relationships.  We used to drive to church and we saw people when we were at the Wednesday night bible study or the Sunday morning service but hardly ever did we see these people during the warp and woof of our ordinary daily routines.  We left what felt like a artificial community to find something more organic, and that is what we feel like we have now.  Since we don’t have a car, we stay in our neighborhood for our shopping, walks and coffee shops and because of this we are always bumping into people we know.  This makes it easy to keep in touch with the people in our community.  Over the years we have noticed that it is as if certain people are just meant to be in our life. As these people just arrive we want to embrace them, make room for them, and learn from them as best we can.

Brenda: Sunday night has been our “have people over on purpose” night for a long time. It has changed many time over the years as people come and go in our lives. You have to be fluid with it… for awhile it will “wax” and the gatherings get bigger and are very exciting –and then what follows is “waning” where the gathering dwindles as people who have been faithful in coming have life changes and move on. We recognize this and try not to take it personally. We continue to open our house on Sunday night because we feel it is important for us and for the people that come. (And it is fun!) Since March this year we have been preparing as a group for Artprize 2010 and now that is over… who will still come? What will we focus on next? or will we just gather to hang out? We will see.

What are you working on now?

Rick: We just finished a big spring/summer/fall project for Artprize ’10 here in Grand Rapids, Michigan called “Plan B.” We worked with 15- 25 collaborators (from our Sunday night Pot-luck) to create a post-peak oil eco village on the banks of the Grand River in downtown Grand Rapids.  We lived in big tents made from billboard vinyl, cooked over “rocket stoves” in a make shift kitchen made out of scrap wood, filtered water in a 55 gallon homemade sand and gravel water filter and tried to produce our own electricity with a 3 bike powered electric generator. We had somewhere around 30 bands playing shows over the course of 2 1/2 weeks of Artprize. We had a puppet theater and drum-circles. We won a $5,000.00 “Best use of Urban Space” Award from New Urbanist city Planner and architect; Jeff Speck. All birthed out of our pot-luck community! We are now left with an artistic intentional community wondering where to direct our energies. Some ideas are percolating…

Brenda: Just got done with Artprize — what an awesome adventure… Probably next to think about is a family artshow in December.

Do you have any advice for the working parent trying to balance their creative work and the demands of parenting?

Rick: As for advice for parents and balance– when you are feeling burnt out and crunchy take some time out for yourself right away. If you are miserable you aren’t good for anybody. Brenda and I both start the day with “Artist Pages” as put forward by Julia Cameron. This habit has become like a spiritual discipline which has provided a deep anchor to keep our course through many a stormy creative sea.

Brenda: Advice? Be nice to yourself and try not to be so distracted when you are with your kids — leave it and focus! And when you fail — say you are sorry, it was wrong of me to do that. Please forgive me. Ask the Creator of the Universe to use even your failures for good in your children’s lives. Maybe having a high strung Mom that yelled at them occasionally will help them later in life — I’m hoping