Editor’s note: This is a lightly edited version of a talk delivered at TOS-Con 2022. The written version retains the character of an oral presentation. To view, purchase, or commission artworks by Jon Wos, visit Cordair.com.

In May 1981, my parents were looking forward to their first child. My arrival, however, was not what they anticipated.

It was immediately evident that something was wrong. My body appeared to be broken. And X-rays showed that I had thirteen broken bones. Most of these were from the process of being born, but I also had fractures sustained in the womb, plus evidence of others that had healed before birth. Twenty-four hours after I was born, I was diagnosed with osteogenesis imperfecta—OI for short.

OI is a group of genetic disorders that prevent the proper formation of the connective tissue collagen. The primary manifestations of the disorder are fragile bones and short stature, but it can also include weak joints, fragile teeth, hearing loss, and even lung, heart, and neurological problems. Here (fig. 1) you can see my baby teeth capped in silver to prevent them from chipping or breaking off.

(1) Me as a child, showing my capped teeth

My parents had to deal with the risk of breaking my legs when they changed my diaper or breaking my ribs and arms when they picked me up. My early childhood was rife with fractures, casts, hospitals, and surgeries. By the time I was ten, I’d fractured my right forearm alone about ten times, and the forearm bones had fused together. The first time I remember breaking my right arm was when I fell out of my wheelchair in the parking lot before going to see Santa with my grandmother. It wasn’t all bad, though. I insisted on seeing Santa before we went to the hospital, broken arm or not.

But broken femurs were the worst. They were the most painful and took the longest to heal. I had several surgeries in an attempt to straighten my femurs and thereby reduce fractures. But they continued. Most of these fractures required a spica cast (fig. 2), which went from chest to toes and was kept on for an average of three months. They kept me immobile and were uncomfortable, hot, and itchy.

(2) Me in a spica cast

My fractures were unpredictable. One day I could fall off a chair and not break anything, but the next I could break my arm while drying my hair with a towel. My life could be stopped and my physical freedom taken from me at any random time. This looming uncertainty caused a lot of anxiety at an early age.

But this is not to suggest that it was always fractures and casts. Although I was born with unfortunate genetics, I was also born with an amazing family, who brought immense joy to my life. Living on a dairy farm until I was about ten made finding things for me to do challenging, as most of the activities of farm life are pretty physical. But I insisted on keeping up with my peers, fractures or not. I did everything from making straw bale tunnels to racing my brother on the four-wheeler with my wheelchair. Unavoidably, though, there were times when my condition kept me from physical activity, and I often turned to art.

I loved to create and considered myself an artist before I could even say the word, proudly telling everyone I was an “arsonist” as I peddled my drawings to family at holidays. This (fig. 3) is one of my grandmother’s favorites, being the comedian she was, for if you can read my writing, you will see I could draw a horse before I could spell it. The form of creation didn’t matter: drawing, blocks, Legos, painting. I could always undertake something creative, even when I had a fracture. It gave me both physical and mental stimulation when I needed it most. I started out aiming very high with my creative endeavors. I wanted to build Lego cathedrals and mansions out of Lincoln Logs. My dad likes to talk about how I would get so frustrated with him because he couldn’t help me build a three-story, five-bedroom mansion out of Lincoln Logs.

(3) Hores and Buggy, 1991

In middle school, I began experimenting with oil paint, inspired by my virtually religious commitment to watching Bob Ross on TV. By the time I started high school, I was well versed in the Rossian technique. I focused on drawing and painting, but I actively sought to try as many different media as I could. My middle- and high-school teachers, Mrs. Voight and Mr. Dickson, were excellent. They let me spread my creative wings in all media and helped me develop some of my artistic foundations. I tried everything, from metalwork, to ceramics, to stained glass. I was particularly drawn to glasswork. I began creating stained glass at home on my own and, by the end of high school, I was doing commissions for teachers and family friends.

Amid all the experimenting with different media, I continued to draw and paint. I often didn’t have much concern for or even understanding of the subjects I chose. That was partly because I focused simply on learning how to master the techniques in the different media—but also because I didn’t understand myself psychologically, or what drew me to certain subjects.

By this point, my fracture rate was declining due to increased bone and muscle mass, as well as a better understanding of how to mitigate the risks. However, even with the lower frequency of fractures, I was still dealing with the psychological consequences of my condition: anxiety and depression (fig. 4). Art was one of the few things that melted these away—except when I was assigned self-portraits. I hated doing them because they brought my anxiety and depression to the fore, effectively advertising things I tried to hide as best I could (fig. 5).

(4) Charcoal self portrait, 1997 (5) Pastel self portrait, 1996

I made it through high school and started college at the University of Wisconsin, Oshkosh, in 1999, pursuing a bachelor’s in fine art. Early on, I focused on studying drawing, but I couldn’t give up my love of glass. I sought to expand what I had learned creating stained glass. At the end of high school, I had taken a workshop on glass bead making, in which I learned to use a small table torch to melt glass rods into beads. This form of glass sculpting is called lampworking. I was in love with it and wanted to delve deeper, but there were no glass programs or classes available at my university. So, my amazing sculpture professor, T. C. Farley, set me up with a small glass station in the sculpture studio so I could study lampworking independently. The new space he supplied enabled me to create new things, including marbles and large pendants.

Soon, I became interested in using glass to make more complex things. I started a series of glass sculptures drawing on the analogy between the material and my own body (fig. 6). I focused, though, not on my fragility, but on overcoming it. The theme was: Even with bones of glass, I can still accomplish what I want in life.

(6) OI, Resilience, Fragile Victory, 2003–2006, glass and ceramic

This (fig. 7) became my final project for sculpture class—a skeleton about half my size, sitting on a ceramic rock. Essentially, it is a self-portrait symbolizing my precarious life and my perseverance.

(7) Imperfect Bone Origin, 2005, glass and ceramic

Then I met Li Hu, a drawing and painting professor at the university (fig. 8). I was blown away by his skill and passion. I was also enthralled by his life story. He was an adolescent during the so-called Cultural Revolution, launched by Mao Tse-tung in China. His father was sent to a labor camp, and Li was sent to work in the rice fields, not even allowed to attend high school. However, he overcame these barriers. He got into Shanghai University Fine Arts College in 1984 and learned the ways of traditional masters. Four years later, he was teaching there, and he came to America a few years after that.

(8) Hu Li, 2017, oil on linen

Li’s work is monumental in scale—his largest painting, Birds of Nu Woh, is sixteen feet by forty-two feet (fig. 9)—and he was prolific. I took every class I could from him, studying portraiture and the human figure, primarily by drawing live models. He taught me the foundational skills to re-create any subject I chose, whether in charcoal, pastel, watercolor, or oil paint. Much to my dismay, one of his favorite assignments to improve our drawing skills was self-portraiture. Some semesters, Li assigned one or two dozen self-portraits. Self-portraits are one of the most convenient ways to learn portraiture. After all, you always have a model right there in front of you. But there was more to Li’s preference than mere convenience.

(9) Li Hu, Birds of Nu Wo, oil

This (fig. 10) was one of the first assignments where he asked us to do more than just a straight-up portrait from a mirror; he asked for a self-portrait that showed something beyond our physical likeness. I reflected on what I had dealt with and how far I had come—from fractures, to surgeries, to psychological struggles. This piece ended up being a major professional boost for me—in part because it won the top award of $10,000 in a national show for artists with disabilities. But more important, this painting started me on a path of introspection. I reluctantly began working with more self-portraiture, driven by a higher confidence from winning the award, Li’s direction, and the goal of understanding my own psychology. My work was becoming my diary, each painting like a page in a growing book.

(10) Self-Introspection, 2003, watercolor

I began using my work to come to terms with my experiences and identity (fig. 11). Dealing with OI will always be part of my life, and I need to put in the effort to make doing so as easy as possible. Although having OI is out of my control, I can control how I deal with it. Being honest and vulnerable through my work was a challenge, but Li’s assignments helped push me forward.

(11) Work To Do, 2004, oil on canvas

One of these was to paint a double self-portrait (fig. 12). One version had to show how I saw myself, and the other had to show how I thought others saw me. Li got us to ask an important question of ourselves and, in answering this question, I was more honest with myself about my own psychology than I had been before. Others would often tell me how brave and strong I was and how happy I seemed, but this was not how I saw myself. I saw myself as weak and fearful, and I would often hide behind the persona others created for me.

(12) Gemini, 2004, oil on canvas

I had a major surgery coming up the following semester, to remove the plate from one of my femurs and replace it with a rod down the center. I was dreading it. I was also overwhelmed by my new freedom and the responsibility of living on my own, overwhelmed with college, overwhelmed with loneliness. I was overwhelmed by life and didn’t have the self-esteem to combat my sense of futility.

I had struggled with depression and suicidal thoughts throughout high school. In college, on snowy days, I had an unusually hard time getting to class and back in my wheelchair. On one occasion, I reached a tipping point, my mind broke, and I tried to take my own life. Afterward, this was something I had to come to terms with and find a way to heal. Creating self-portraits, it turns out, was one such method. This painting (fig. 13) is painful, but it is something I should never forget. It is important to me in that it represents my rebirth—in the sense that my suicide attempt showed me that there is something hard I must face.

(13) Bittersweet Surrender, 2005, oil on canvas

I have always felt a dualism within myself. I could swing dramatically from being very optimistic to being deeply cynical, even nihilistic. Creating art was one area of my life where I could escape this feeling. Being an artist was more than just a professional aspiration for me, but I couldn’t really explain why.

So, it was serendipitous that, around this period, I read The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand, at the suggestion of a good friend. The Fountainhead sparked something in me like nothing before had. It moved me intellectually, aesthetically, and spiritually. I wanted to create art that motivated me like The Fountainhead did. There were so many important things in it that made me think deeply, so many things I got from it. Primarily, though, was that Rand showed me, through her character Howard Roark, what I needed to gain: a self. Roark asks the question; “And isn’t that the root of every despicable action? Not selfishness, but precisely the absence of a self?” This question started me down a whole new road.

I graduated from UWO in 2005 with a bachelor of fine art, with an emphasis in drawing, painting, and sculpture. While my senior show was still hanging, the gallery curator of a local college, Ripon College, saw it and asked if I would create a larger collection of self-portraits for a solo show there.

This pushed me to introspect even deeper. It would be my first solo show, and I had a year to create enough work to fill the gallery. Delving further into self-portraiture while devouring everything I could by Rand, my perspective began to change. This new self-portrait series would again start with my past. I realized that I could not ignore my past struggle or its importance to understanding myself. But, more than ever, I would stress the value in overcoming adversity.

I started with a series of twelve small paintings that hang like a filmstrip, each symbolizing a week in a spica cast, twelve weeks being the average to heal a femur. The series included the roller coaster of emotion that accompanies a major fracture: from the pain and fogginess (fig. 14) to the unavoidable boredom (fig. 15), even the small joys and pleasures that helped me forget about the state I was in (fig. 16), ending in the longing to be free (fig. 17) and the inevitable, indescribable, feeling of being free from the cast (fig. 18). These experiences are important to me as a simple reminder of how much I love my freedom and of the fact that I can overcome fractures—a reminder to take full advantage of every moment of freedom that I can.

(14) Rectifying 1 (15) Rectifying 4 (16) Rectifying 8 (17) Rectifying 11 (18) Rectifying 12, 2006, oil on canvas

This is Pity Party (fig. 19), which expresses the view that life is only struggle, only about escaping pain, that it is futile to try for anything beyond that. It is about hopelessness, apathy, and nihilism—about playing the victim. And it’s about the fact that this leads to more depression and anxiety, a self-fulfilling cycle—the most futile of all. This is the view that I needed to purge. Rand’s work caused me to question the value of pity. I could now admit how much I disliked being pitied, but also that I sat in self-pity far too often, wasting the time during which I was free of the cast. Having been completely helpless at many times in my life, and having little to no self-esteem, I implicitly held that pity was the only currency I could rely on. Self-pity gave me excuses to give up and not even try. Dwelling on the negative earned me pity from others and fooled me into feeling justified for giving in to resignation.

(19) Pity Party, 2006

This painting (fig. 20) is about my shift away from Pity Party, to looking ahead rather than only backward. Through art and Rand’s philosophy, called Objectivism, I was beginning to understand myself, which resulted in a shift of perspective. I started to heal my soul, to get out of my head and enjoy life, to focus on and act on positive thoughts. I realized that I have free will and am not doomed to dwell on the negative. Life is not about avoiding death but about achieving happiness.

(20) Leaving the Pity Party, 2009, oil on canvas

“I realized that I have free will and am not doomed to dwell on the negative. Life is not about avoiding death but about achieving happiness.” —Jon Wos
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These elements—free will and a focus on achieving values or overcoming obstacles—is the province of Romantic art. Such art, as Ayn Rand put it, is about what might and ought to be. It is a source of optimism because it is about choices and values and what can be changed for the better. And it stands in contrast to Naturalism, the school of art that denies free will and focuses on life allegedly as it is and can only be.

A quote from Rand’s The Romantic Manifesto really struck me in this regard. She wrote:

Consider the significance of the fact that the Naturalists call Romantic art an “escape.” Ask yourself what sort of metaphysics—what view of life—that designation confesses. An escape—from what? If the projection of value goals—the projection of an improvement on the given, the known, the immediately available—is an “escape,” then medicine is an “escape” from disease, agriculture is an “escape” from hunger, knowledge is an “escape” from ignorance, ambition is an “escape” from sloth, and life is an “escape” from death. If so, then a hard-core realist is a vermin-eaten brute who sits motionless in a mud puddle, contemplates a pigsty and whines that “such is life.” If that is realism, then I am an escapist. So was Aristotle. So was Christopher Columbus.1

I was fine being labeled an “escapist” as well, because I was escaping that which should be escaped: pain, depression, and anxiety. My life would never be what I wanted it to be if I just settled for the given.

I was re-creating my relationship with myself, eliminating my self-pity so I could push myself to greater heights. My self-confidence was growing. After I graduated college, I took a trip to the Grand Canyon with some friends, which was the first time I had traveled that far without family or my usual safety net (fig. 21). This was something I had to do in spite of my anxiety about it. The dreaded surgery to rod my other femur was successful, and I was now able to walk short distances without aid for the first time in my life. I was even able to climb around on the edge of the Grand Canyon.

(21) Gemini United, 2006, oil on canvas

I could now see the view I wanted to have of myself and of existence. By coming to terms with my past, accepting my identity, and clarifying my values, I could finally look to the horizon and set realistically challenging goals.

This painting (fig. 22) symbolizes the opposite of Pity Party. My life should be celebrated, not pitied. It is a reminder to always work to improve my self-image, that it is a never-ending process, that giving life meaning and setting goals and standards isn’t really possible without self-esteem.

(22) Commemoration, 2006, oil on canvas

Valuing one’s self is the first and primary value. Anything I gained from self-reliance was tenfold more fulfilling than all I could gain from the pity of others. It is impossible to accept the love of others when you don’t love yourself. I had been habitually skeptical of others’ sincerity, feeling that the praise and friendship ultimately were out of pity. Not until I could objectively agree with them, by my own standards and judgment, did I even begin to accept some truth in what others say.

I wanted to see myself more clearly and objectively (fig. 23). Only then could I see the world more clearly and work better within it. I realized that an inaccurate view of myself inevitably leads me to set unrealistic standards. Just as we need standards for measuring the world, we also need standards for measuring our values. This need became all the more real to me after grasping Rand’s point in The Romantic Manifesto that art is fundamentally a concretization of one’s values, an essential psychological need.

(23) Clarifying Self, 2010, oil on canvas

Romantic art is particularly important because it highlights the fact that we have free will and focuses on how things ought to be. As such, it can sharpen how we evaluate our choices and values. This focus on values can prompt deep introspection, which is vital for a healthy, growth-oriented mind-set.

My feelings began to catch up with my new perspective. I was the most confident I had ever been (fig. 24). I started doing talks like this, which would have been unthinkable just a few years before. I also started driving my artwork all over the country. Both of these gave me anxiety, but I pushed myself to do them anyway.

(24) Self Made, 2008 oil on canvas

Comparing these self-portraits with those I did in high school (fig. 5), it is obvious how my perspective of myself has changed. I’m now able to grasp the significance of details I included in my early self-portraits even more clearly than when I created them: the cracked mirror, looking away from myself, the colorless reflection. I now felt a sense of harmony as I continued to introspect and see that I was ultimately responsible for my self. I realized that much of my anxiety came from my reliance on others, and it was dissipating as I learned to rely on myself.

This is not to suggest that I do not get help from my awesome family and friends sometimes, but I am speaking about self-reliance in a psychological, even spiritual, sense. Rand said we are beings of “self-made soul,” and I now understood what this means. You are the only one with direct access to your soul. You are the only one who can truly feel it. You can show aspects of your soul to others, but they can never perceive it directly the way you can. It is a universe within a universe that only you can sense directly—and shape. The choices you make and the development of your character can only be done by you. Others can certainly help through guidance and example, but ultimately the work is yours. In that sense, psychologically speaking, we are all islands and, therefore, are self-made.

I could now clearly see the power of philosophy. This is how other philosophies made me feel (fig. 25). Each brick is an idea piled on the others, trying to reach for something. But it is a disintegrated mess doomed to topple, stifling your potential rather than improving your life. I needed to see, concretized, the attitude I should have about life. This is how life should feel (fig. 26); a proper philosophy gives you a deliberately integrated foundation of wisdom, enabling you to achieve soaring heights. These two paintings are meant to hang together, in contrast, as a reminder that philosophy should not be confusing and disconnected from reality but should instead be a tool for furthering one’s own life and purpose. I now fully accept that life is knowable, happiness is possible, and that it is mine to achieve.

(25) Leaving a Bad Philosophy, 2009, oil on canvas (26) Building a New Philosophy, 2009, oil on canvas

“Philosophy should not be confusing and disconnected from reality but should instead be a tool for furthering one’s own life and purpose. I now fully accept that life is knowable, happiness is possible, and that it is mine to achieve.” —Jon W
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Each painting led to the next, all pointing to the conclusion that I was becoming a Romantic artist.

My love of stained glass never diminished, and I continued to create it between paintings. This is my dining room window, my most extensive glass project, which I created completely for myself (fig. 27). It contains 2,293 pieces of glass and is a little less than three feet by four feet. It is the tree of knowledge, specifically the knowledge that life is all about continual growth, progressing in small steps, piece by piece. It reminds me that I am better than I was yesterday and that tomorrow can be even better than today. This knowledge helps me enjoy the now.

(27) The Tree of Knowledge, 2008, stained glass

While I created this piece for myself, I was simultaneously building a small art business, doing commission work, and selling pieces in galleries, some of which were glass. I also did a few residencies in schools, where I taught and painted murals with the students.

But commissions filled most of my professional time. I did everything from mosaics (fig. 28) to pets (fig. 29), but portraits became my biggest request. I did dozens and dozens of them (fig. 30–31).

(28) Growing Potential, 2012, glass and ceramic mosaic (29) Tilly, 2009, pastel (30) Afternoon Breeze, 2018, oil on hardboard (31) Ben and Morgan, 2016, charcoal and pastel

A few years ago, having done so many of them, I needed a break. For a period, I turned my attention to still life. I was curious about how to make the simplest things more interesting (figs. 32–33). I have come to deeply enjoy creating still lifes. They are like little meditative moments. I can spend days or weeks selecting the objects, the arrangements, and the lighting. From the start, my goal hasn’t changed: Make everyday life more dramatic, even exciting. In essence, we all design our lives with the objects we surround ourselves with, and we need to be reminded of our values as often as possible, to stay focused on them, because it is easy to get overwhelmed. We need the important things to be pointed out, emphasized, and integrated with day-to-day life.

(32) Atlas Rests on Reason, 2014, oil on linen (33) To The Glory Of Man, 2019, oil on linen panel

As an analogy, I often think back on how, most fundamentally, my mentor Li Hu helped me become a better artist. Ultimately, he taught me to pay closer attention to what I perceive. He helped reveal things that were right in front of me but that I could not fully see, in part because I was overwhelmed by the magnitude of perceptual data coming in. He would walk around the class as we were drawing a model, coming up to each of us and pointing out what we were not seeing.

He would say simple things, such as, “pay more attention to this area,” or “there is a reflection on that object that is missing.” From then on, I would see instances of such reflections everywhere, even on relatively nonreflective surfaces. They were now glaringly evident, like when you learn a new word and it seems to pop up everywhere all of a sudden.

Still life works this way, too. It shows us what to look for to make every moment special, so that, like hearing a newly learned word everywhere, we can spot these special moments in our day-to-day lives and make life that much more interesting.

But little makes life more interesting and worthwhile than the people we surround ourselves with (fig. 34). Unlike a still life, or even a landscape, the subjects are always one of a kind. The objects in a still life can be replaced, a beautiful scene can be revisited, but the people in your life and the moments you share with them are irreplaceable (fig. 35). Other people can be the source of our greatest joys, and given that we are all inherently finite and irreplaceable, portraits can move us the most. Portrait painting is about more than just capturing a likeness. It is also about capturing emotion, or a shared moment, or the love between two people, or the reverence one feels for someone (figs. 36–37).

(34) Enlightenment Women, 2019, watercolor and pastel

(35) Understated Elegance, 2018, watercolor and pastel (36) Hayden, Laine, Bennett, and Liam, 2017, oil on linen (37) Ryan and Emma, 2021, oil on linen panel

Li had become more than just my professor. He became my mentor and my friend. And shortly before he passed away, I was able to do this portrait of him (fig. 38). Li’s love of creation and passion for his work were profound. He told us: “When I am working here, when I am staying in my house, every day I want to go down, even if I don’t paint. I just look at my paintings, just like the way you look at your baby, you know you enjoy it, that’s your kids!”

(38) Who Is Li Hu, 2016, oil on canvas

Li would often tell us that passion is more important than talent (fig. 39). What I think he meant was not that passion is a better guide than reason but, rather, that in a certain context, passion has primacy over skill. Your passion for something must be more powerful than disappointment. In other words, my desire to create art was always stronger than the desire to avoid the inevitable stumbling and disappointments involved in learning how to create it. My passion or love of creation is the source of my skill, as it is what drove me to develop and improve my skill. My passion came first, and the skill followed. When my passion fades, my skills go unused.

(39) Symphonies Of Hu Li, 2017, oil on canvas

And I realize now that this is applicable to my whole life, beyond just the creation of my work. Passion for my whole life should be stronger than the impulse to avoid the pain it involves. Li Hu and Ayn Rand showed me their passion for life through their work, and they fueled my fire within like no one ever had before. That I was so fueled simply by seeing their example was proof to me of the power of a vision, a vision of the ideal, the essence of Romanticism.

This is best summed up by a quote from The Fountainhead: “Don’t work for my happiness, my brothers—show me yours—show me that it is possible—show me your achievement—and the knowledge will give me courage for mine.”2

I want, and implicitly always have wanted, to show a reverent view of reality. But I have learned that holding a reverent view of life is not automatic. Our minds can focus on only so many things at a time. And what you focus on, you will see everywhere. If you are always focused on the negative, then that is what you will look for and find as a matter of habit. If you can make it a habit to direct your focus to the good, the positive, then there will be less room in your lens for the negative (fig. 40). Whatever you set your gaze upon gets magnified; what you shine your light onto becomes clearer. So it is vital to set your gaze on a vision that helps you flourish. This vision can help you cultivate a sense of serenity that washes away your anxiety and fuels your passion (fig. 41).

(41) Field Of Dreams, 2022, oil on linen (42) Head Strong, 2010, oil on canvas

Rand’s unique conception of Romanticism, “Romantic Realism,” hit home with me, and I now identify as a Romantic Realist myself. Romanticism holds that art should be focused on showing life as it could and ought to be. Realism signifies that this ideal can be portrayed realistically, that artists need not rely on unrealistic or supernatural standards to convey the ideal. This is perfectly concretized in a quote from Rand’s play Ideal, which touched me on a profoundly personal and artistic level. She wrote:

I want to see real, living, and in the hours of my own days, that glory I create as an illusion! I want it real! I want to know that there is someone, somewhere, who wants it, too! Or else what is the use of seeing it, and working, and burning oneself for an impossible vision? A spirit, too, needs fuel. It can run dry.3

I am a Romantic because I seek a better version of life, an improvement on the given. I am a realist because I want this better version to be real and achievable.

“I am a Romantic because I seek a better version of life, an improvement on the given. I am a realist because I want this better version to be real and achievable.” —Jon Wos
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Romantic Realism is inherently optimistic. But it is wider than just optimism. It shows that values are possible within this life but also that they must be freely chosen and then earned (fig. 42). Even psychological values must be earned by developing the right attitude. Romantic Realism helps me do that work, cultivating an attitude captured by the first part of the serenity prayer, which reads, “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference.” Realism represents the things I cannot change, and Romanticism represents those I can.

I need the realism with the romantic. It was more than mere positive thinking that got me through my struggles and helped me become who I am today. I needed to understand and accept those facts that were outside my control. And I needed the romantic with the realism. Beyond recognizing the immutable facts of my situation, I needed a vision of what could be and the courage to pursue it. Both are necessary elements of objectivity. The dualism I once felt was caused by swinging wildly between them. Now I could understand how each improved my life; I could integrate them and thereby achieve the serenity, courage, and wisdom necessary to fully and deeply love my life.

This ignited my passion, a fire that needs to be fed and protected (fig. 43). One of my favorite quotes is from Rand’s Atlas Shrugged:

Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplaceable spark, in the hopeless swamps of the approximate, the not-quite, the not-yet, the not-at-all. Do not let the hero in your soul perish, in lonely frustration for the life you deserved, but have never been able to reach. Check your road and the nature of your battle. The world you desired can be won, it exists, it is real, it is possible, it’s yours.4

(43) The Fire Within, 2011, oil on canvas

Everyone has a tipping point; it is only a matter of degree within the context of each individual’s life. The struggles of hard times, of loss and disappointment, can swamp one’s passion for living, and the darkness of nihilism can begin to encroach. To combat this darkness, we need Romantic art to keep us looking ahead at what is possible, to show the joy life has to offer, and to remind us that overcoming the struggle is worth it. These moments of joy, of experiencing one’s values here and now, protect your inner fire from being blown out by the winds of struggle. I created this stained-glass lantern to represent that needed protection (fig. 44). Each piece of glass is like an experience of joy—joy now in the moment, joy remembered from the past, and joy that is possible in the future.

(44) The Source, 2016, stained glass

Art is like a lantern that we use to illuminate and clarify, spotlighting what’s important in life (fig. 45). Romantic Realism is a particular way of using that light, to see both what is and what could be. I now realize it is far more than just a theory of art—it is a whole approach to life. Romantic Realism keeps you focused on where you’re going; it keeps your eye on the prize, so to speak. I now choose to focus my light on the reverent moments, the moments that make all the struggle worth it and lead to a passion for that irreplaceable value that is my life.

(45) Lighting The Darkness, 2017,
oil on canvas

Your fire, your passion—only you can sense and care for it. It needs to be tended at all times. It is up to you to discover what fuels your fire. Just as you consume the physical values to nourish your body, you must also consume the spiritual values that nourish your soul and keep your passion burning. Passion for your life is the source of curiosity, ambitiousness, benevolence, and, ultimately, success. Like an inoculation against nihilism, Romanticism provides a defense of your passion. It is the vitamin of the soul, of which you need a regular dose.

I now see this as my purpose, to create that regular dose of Romanticism we all need (fig. 46). For some may be able to survive without life’s burning passion, but they certainly cannot truly live without it.

(46) Foraging For Midnight Oil, 2021, oil on canvas

Many will tell you that life is not important because it is random, and we are just cells and chemicals, and everything you do is meaningless. Others will tell you life is important because an unknowable higher power created it, that everything you do should be for the glory of God. But, as Ayn Rand made clear, life is important because it is the source of all values. Everything you do should be for the glory of that irreplaceable value that is your life.

So, I will leave you with a question: Do you look down and merely accept things as they are, waiting for the challenge that is life to be over—or do you look ahead and seek something better, taking a step and accepting this great challenge to make your life the best it can be?

“Art is like a lantern that we use to illuminate and clarify what’s important in life. Romantic Realism is a particular way of using that light, to see both what is and what could be. . . . It is a whole approach to life.” —@WosArt
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Endnotes

1. Ayn Rand, “The Goal of My Writing,” The Romantic Manifesto (New York: New American Library, 1971), 167–68.

2. Ayn Rand, The Fountainhead (New York: Penguin, 1943), 528.

3. Ayn Rand, Ideal: The Novel and the Play (New York: New American Library, 2015), 232.

4. Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged (New York: New American Library, 1957), 1069.

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