For two weekends this month, the local Creative District is operating their annual artist studio tours. There are other associated activities, but the artists’ opening their spaces for people to wander in and look around is the focus of the event. And if people are moved to buy something, so much the better.

One of the features of the tour the president of the Creative District has been pushing artists to do is not sanitize their work spaces. She feels that when artists clear their materials away into closets and throw sheets over bookcases, it removes many of the interesting elements that can lead to a conversation about process.

I tend to agree. I visited a number of studios this weekend with more on my list for next weekend. In some cases I was able to stand right in the studio was people worked. Most of the time I was in a living room with all the furniture cleared out and the work hung on the walls, arrayed on display racks, or shelving.

Because I have some familiarity and knowledge, I was able to ask some questions about process and materials used, but many curious visitors would basically have had the impression they wandered into a home gallery.

Part of my concern is that seeing a person painting in their immaculate living room with a small tarp under the easel essentially reinforces the idea that art is done by a special breed of people who create things immediately without error.

When in fact, their studios are paint and clay splattered, with swaths of material shoved in to nooks and crannies, and metal filings and sawdust swept into piles. All testaments to their efforts. Not to mention photos, sketches, and early iterations that comprised their study and preparation of the final product leaning against the walls.

Galleries are places in which artists can control the context and perspective in which the visitors encounter their work. Studios tours provide an opportunity to let visitors encounter and better understand their process. There is a missed opportunity when studio tours are essentially replicas of the gallery experience.