Linda Glass

I am the daughter of a small-town lawyer and an artist, and I have had the wonderful good fortune to be able to follow in both of their footsteps. I didn’t grow up making art and wanting to be an artist, but several years ago, the pull to make art became unrelenting. Grace Hartigan wrote, “I didn’t choose painting. It chose me. I didn’t have any talent. I just had genius.” Yes! Elizabeth Gilbert in the book Big Magic wrote about having a genius—a separate being that cannot be called up on demand. Unfortunately, my personal genius only visits on rare occasions, and otherwise, my art practice is a slog of experimentation. In 2022, I retired early and moved to the country, where I would have room to paint. I’d caught a fever, a feeling much like having a new love interest. Painting is almost all I think about. I go to bed many nights feeling confounded and disheartened. Other nights, I was walking on a cloud after a day in the studio. I never gave up on the thought that I could succeed as an artist because I’ve always been able to compensate for any lack of natural talent with a God-given boatload of determination. I recently and unexpectedly received a Best in Show award in a Cincinnati-area art competition, the first one I’ve entered!