Since the beginning of the month, I’ve been putting all my assets together to apply for another Pollock-Krasner grant. If I spent this much time putting together my application 20 years ago, maybe it wouldn’t have taken me more than seven tries to win it.

From what I know about how the panel operates in judging, it all comes down to your visuals more than anything else. They don’t even read your written materials until you get past that blind jury, which counts for about half of your overall application. Then you are thrown into the next pile of consideration: merit, your cover letter and statement, and then your references.

Regardless, I’ve been spending countless hours (and hours) trying to perfect my artist’s statement. I started out pretty confident about it, and slowly (or not so slowly) my confidence began to erode away. Why? Because I asked the mentors for help on Netvvrk. This is exactly what happened to me when I applied for the Guggenheim. My writing was torn apart and edited into bullshit academic hell, completely changed, until I didn’t recognize my voice any longer. Then, I decided not to apply at all.

You’d think I’d learn my lesson, but I didn’t. I should know by now to keep my own counsel—100%. Instead, I thought I would get a few simple suggestions and even some validation on how well this one was written. I know I’ve had recent brain surgery (which is part of the reason I wanted some feedback), but I must have been high out of my mind to think that any academic would praise my horrible writing!

Hannah couldn’t stand seeing me give up on applying for the Guggenheim, so she rewrote the whole thing in absolute plain English. Simple. I went over it again, using 99% of her suggestions and sent it in, knowing I won’t win. It is like winning the lottery after all.

My thoughts about my writing are usually a dangerous roller coaster ride. One moment, I think I’m pretty damn good. The next minute, I know I suck! Some people might call it imposter syndrome, but I don’t think so. I think, in the scheme of things, I write one sucky thing after another.

I realize art writing is an entirely different animal. Maybe I’m pretty good at just typing out my thoughts on this blog, or writing stories, books, memoirs, and whatnot, but an academic art writer, I am not. I mostly don’t even try to do it because I wind up trying too hard, and it’s rather obvious.

In that respect, Hannah should be the only person I run these things by. She is actually a very harsh critic, but she intimately knows my writing style and appreciates my efforts. She is also not an academic, but she is a published writer whom I highly respect.

So what ended up happening? The best suggestions and feedback I received were from Hannah and two fellow artists. In the end, my artist friend, Kelly Witmer helped me, or reminded me, not to be a cliché writing schlub.

My statement had a few clichés in terms of “art speak.” I actually hate art speak. “I am exploring the intersection of…” “My work transforms (this or that)…” (okay, I didn’t write that one. I hate the word “transforms”). “I am investigating (the following subjects/topics)…” So, I took anything like that out. But I did leave “my lived experience,” which is a little annoying to me. I think I wrote it because I think the jury wants to hear that stupid stuff. But fuck that.

I edited it yet again, ran it by Hannah, and just submitted it. I stopped thinking about it so much, and took my chances.

Of course, after I sent it, I looked it over again this morning and realized I repeated myself in the third paragraph, after I said almost the same thing in the paragraph before. How didn’t I catch that? How didn’t Hannah, or Kelly? I am hoping the PKF panel won’t notice it. But if they do, will that really ruin my chances of getting the grant? If I were to get through the first part of the judging process (the blind jury that looks at the images), I’ll say no. The next part is the cover letter, the CV, and then the statement. It’s basically less than 17% of the overall importance of your application. So why was I obsessively belaboring such a small part of the application? Because I’m a little insane (or a lot).

In any case, there’s always next year. But this will be my third time applying since more than 20 years ago. If I get turned down again, I’ll just add it to the gigantic pile of rejections I have collected throughout my lifetime. Such is the life of an artist.