o.k. so obviously i didn't coin the phrase.
Joseph Beuys’s often misunderstood statement "Everyone is an artist," reflected his idea that every person can be creatively active. I definitely believe this but my adoption of the phrase comes from something else.
Several months ago my girlfriend was running an arts-club night. Going through my list of friends to invite, i realised that everyone could be categorized into some area of arts and/or media. Similarly with my girlfriend, many people she had thought would not be interested, came out of their artistic closets to profess their secret creative aspirations. we both found this amusing and wrote it off as a reflection of the social circles we mixed in.
Days later I was having a ciggarette with my smoking buddy. He works in an electronics shop next door. We were engaging in our usual ritual of complaining about our day. Today however he seemed particularly down. I enquired why.
"I don't know Paula..."
I can never remember his name but he always remembers mine
"I just wish I could get out of this stupid job"
I asked him what he'd rather be doing
"Well I went to art school. All i ever wanted to be was a photographer. I keep meaning to work on my portfolio but .."
For the launch of my girlfriend's night, in the style of cole and linda porter I gave her a ciggarette case. I had it engraved. When the engraver saw what i wanted written he smiled at me.
"nice quote that."
you can guess what it said.