We recently connected with Laura Didyk and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Laura, thanks for joining us today. What’s been the most meaningful project you’ve worked on?

The first art-related project I did was almost by accident. I have both my degrees (BA and MFA) in creative writing, but visual art wasn’t an aspiration—not one strong enough to act on. One terribly cold and gray winter in Western Massachusetts where I live, in the midst of ending a relationship I didn’t want to end but knew I had to, I found myself … speechless. I was heartbroken and the act of writing—journaling or working on my book project—felt insignificant. Instead, I reached for a Sharpie marker and a New Yorker magazine and started circling some words, blacking out others.

I must have pulled out over a hundred small one-sentence poems from NYer articles. Shorter seemed better, some words and phrases more interesting than others—how they looked in the NYer typeface, how they stacked one on top of the other, how they sounded. The space between them—five words left untouched on a full-page, for example, the rest colored over—encouraged the eye to move from one word or phrase to the next, creating surprise meaning, emotion, and humor, and operating in much the same way line breaks do in poetry.

Eventually, I graduated to book pages. The work, over time, became visually fancier, more elaborate, and reflected my improved attitude and state of mind. Without meaning to, or planning on it, I thought less and less about what spawned the project and more about ink, paper, the turns of phrase rising up from the writing of Marcel Proust, Marguerite Duras, Vincent Van Gogh.

I couldn’t revise—or black-out—an ending I didn’t want in my life, but by using language not my own I created a different “after” for myself.

That was in 2014. Last summer, 2022, I had my first solo show, Erasures. While I’ve done all manner of projects and other kinds of art work since picking up that first Sharpie, it took that long—and a lot of encouragement—to concede that they were something other people might want to see, and even own.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

With an MFA in creative writing, I’ve always thought that writing was the one thing I was good at—and my bad days, I assumed it was the only thing I was good at. I was young when I started writing seriously, and had some relative successes early on—a teaching fellowship at an excellent graduate program, publications in renowned literary magazines, and a couple of prestigious residencies after receiving my degree. I assumed the successes would just keep multiplying (oh to be young!), and I’d find my way to literary fame. I’m so glad it doesn’t work that way. Most of my friends from grad school went into academia, which I knew from the beginning was not where I belonged. We’d meet up in the years that followed at writing conferences. They’d tell me what classes they were teaching at their very respected universities—they’d ask me what I was doing and I’d have to say that I worked in marketing at a yoga center. At the time I felt embarrassed—too much time spent comparing myself to others—but I learned later there was no need to be.

I was working full-time in editorial / copywriting jobs at nonprofit organizations, or as managing editor for different magazines. In 2011, I got laid off and discovered that I preferred not being gainfully employed by someone else. So I took the opportunity to start teaching writing in my community. That was another moment of real growth. I discovered that I’m pretty great at it when I’m teaching mostly grown-ups who are hungry to write (as opposed to freshmen in college who, understandably, could care less about the five-paragraph composition). I also started getting offers for freelance opportunities through people I’d worked with over the years. Enough to keep me afloat. Those positive professional connections were (and continue to be) key to my work life as an independent contractor.

And I’ve never looked back. I sometimes have steady part-time contracts. Other times I patch together projects from small presses and private clients. It’s not the most relaxing way to live, but for me the trade-off is worth it. It’s not been easy—some years have been abundant, and others more stressful. Grateful these past few years for local and state artist foundations for literary grants and COVID-relief grants created for those who work in or participate in arts and culture. It’s important to note that I’m single with no dependents, which does eliminate a whole swath of factors that require others to make different choices. This wasn’t necessarily the dream, but now I find it quite dreamy. My friend and I joke that we want to meet someone we can be with for the rest of our lives who will mostly leave us alone. Creative work for me isn’t a luxury or a hobby. It’s… everything.

Sometimes I wish my story and the current layout of my life, were tidier. But I’ve surrendered to the fact that it might never be. I could find a full-time, 9-5 job, and have more predictability in my income and my schedule. I’m just not willing to give up the gifts that have come from doing it the way I’m doing it.

There are two things that have kept me alive and thriving (no matter my financial situation). These are among the gifts.

1. 100-day projects.
Since that first erasure project in 2014, I’ve embarked on nine of these projects—different themes, mediums, and styles. It’s how I’ve grown as an artist, gained some confidence around the notion that I can actually make art every day (for 100 days in a row anyway). Several of these projects have resulted in invitations to participate in group shows, teaching invites, inclusion in books, commissions for magazines, and more.

2. Community.
I have a warm, supportive, inspiring community of writer and artist friends in my life. These connections began well before the pandemic but certainly solidified during those years, and since. We live in the Northeast, the South, the Midwest, the Pacific Northwest, and both Northern and Southern California. With this group of women—there is wonderful overlap between these different virtual groups—I attend an ekphrastic poetry class twice a month, a monthly art club (with rotating leadership so we get to practice different mediums—drawing, painting, sewing, paper arts, textile art, etc), a monthly poetry book group (with a writing component), a frequent Brave Writing class, and a weekly work-along artist group (we create while we chat). I also lead a bi-weekly writing practice group (same people for almost four years), and hold creative accountability hours on Zoom almost every weekday (we mute and we work).

In other words: I need people. The projects, the groups, the community, are what allow me to thrive as a writer and artist. We help each other beyond measure—”What kind of marker did you use for that?” “This magazine is open for submissions again… you should send!” “Can you take a look at this artist statement for this application?” We speak all the time about how we can’t believe our luck. I have a strong and steady in-person community where I live too, which is just as vital.

So, I do work I don’t mind doing that supports me enough to do work that I love.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

The greatest lesson is one I learn over and over again—certainly not a one-time deal.

When I was getting more into drawing and following different artists online, I’d see artists who were doing things I wish I could do. One example: seeing artists they had products they’d created—cards or prints or tea towels—from their work and think “I wish I could do that!” It took *so many* instances of feeling sick with envy, nearly resentful, to apply some logic to the situation. There’s certainly some practical factors that come into play, but the main issue was that I didn’t see myself as someone who could do those things. Other people could, but not me! Why not?

In my case, the willingness to do the research: to learn what software I needed to design a greeting card, for example, that was print-ready; buy, download, and learn software so I could layout a card, price things out with different printers, etc. came out of posting my work online and people starting to ask me if I had cards or was I selling prints. Enough people asked me that I felt compelled. Once I found my way through that task, I gained some confidence and started trying other things. I started being “other people.”

It’s hard being brand new at something. I tend toward embarrassment over pretty much everything, so for me it felt vulnerable and embarrassing to not know. Again, illogical, but true. So I got over myself just enough to take the first step, then the second, etc. etc. And people who know how to do this stuff are usually great about helping you—I love when people ask me how I’ve gone about doing this or that, so they can do it too.

Over the years, I’ve made lines of greeting cards that I sold myself out of my (former) art studio and from my website, as well as decks of cards, matchboxes, and archival prints of my illustrative work; bought tables to sell my stuff at craft shows; volunteered work for fundraising shows; started selling some of my original work.

I had no idea what i was doing, with any of it, but I did it anyway! I googled, I emailed other artists, I humbled myself to being brand new at all of it.

For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?

It has to do with other people—people who may not have been able, up to now, to pick up the pen, the marker, the paintbrush. There is nothing more rewarding than helping others find the way *in*. Creating points of access that are relatable, doable, pedestrian… whatever works so that person can have the experience of getting over, and then surprising, themselves. It can be a kind of spiritual practice—it is for me. It’s stopped being about becoming a great writer or a great artist, but about forging a rich, complex relationship with my inner world and, with that relationship, entering a generative space. Helping others do this, connecting their minds with their hands, their hands with their imagination, have some new experience of their interior—there’s nothing better.

Contact Info:

• Website: lauradidyk.com
• Instagram: @lauradidyk