Ranting | Opinion

Stop Saying That!

The Challenged writing prompt of August 29th, 2026

Landscape collage taken from my scrapbook — artwork and photo by author.

For August 29th, Vidya Sury, Collecting Smiles asked: what are five phrases that annoy you and why?

There are more than five, and if I think about it long enough I probably can come up with a hundred! I’ll see where it goes, but probably a few more than five.

The ones that annoy me most are related to my work as an artist. Some things really rub me the wrong way…

While we appreciate your talent, this is not the right direction for us.

This is just one of the many phrases galleries use to reject artists when they request representation. I have heard every version and most of them more than once. What they really mean is: we don’t like your work, you untalented hack. But they can’t say that of course; instead they “let you down gently”, which is not only a tough break but also an insult to my intelligence. If you don’t like my work, just say so — I’m a big boy, I can handle it.

Digital collage / painting.

This is not so much a phrase as it is contradictory term. Collage nor painting can be digital by definition, period. Collage implies glue was used, painting…