Do you have advice for someone writing their personal statement and essay for art school applications? I feel like I'm way over-thinking the whole thing and freaking myself out. For example the essay portion is to describe how a piece of art has affected you and I just keep trying to write what I think makes me sound artsy-fartsy and intellectual. I guess I'm just going back and forth with whether I should write exactly what I think or if I should try and sound artsy-fartsy...
One of my most humbling grad school experiences was when I wrote a statement that was artsy-fartsy/intellectual rather than honest and, right in front of my whole class, my professor told me she didn’t appreciate spending her time wading through a waist-deep bullshit river so … I would favor honesty over trying to sound artsy-fartsy/intellectual. Pick a piece of art that genuinely moves you and not one that you think someone would want a prospective art student to be moved by. There is no real formula for this sort of thing but you can send me what you have and I can try and give you some pointers if you want. I like to publish answers so that everyone can learn from them but if you specifically ask me not to, I won’t.