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Sometimes I wish Pinterest came with a warning label, like skateboarding shows or anything anyone on MTV is attempting.

“You are not an artist. No matter how much you think you are. You can try this it home. But yours will fail in comparison.”

McDermott

Pinterest is the place that both makes me want to be an artist and constantly reminds me that I am an artist only in the sense that a 5-year-old with fingerpaints is an artist. Except I don’t have a Kindergarten teacher to tell me how pretty my art is.

If you haven’t had the opportunity to scour it for tissue box crafts or knitting patterns, “Pinterest is a Virtual Pinboard. Pinterest lets you organize and share all the beautiful things you find on the web,” the site explains.  “People use pinboards to plan their weddings, decorate their homes and organize their favorite recipes.”

I have to say, after visiting Pinterest, I’ve discovered that there are some incredibly creative people in the world. And then there are the people like me, who steal others’ creativity.

But Pinterest is more than a site to share recipes — it is a place for people to showcase their talents, a market place of creativity and inspiration in the digital age. A one-stop shop for all the creativity in the world. And it is completely free, for now at least. So even if a Pinner doesn’t have the chops of DaVinci, she can find someone to show her how to create something beautiful.

This openness and sharing of ideas seems out of place in our copyrighted and priced tagged world — and totally welcome for anyone on a budget.

I was looking for some easy and inexpensive ways to decorate my new apartment recently and stumbled across an easy and cheap project I could hang on my wall.  You can view the project here.

The project required very few things:

• Paintbrush
• Canvas
• Electric Tape
• Two shades of paint
• The ability to paint inside very thick lines

I invited my friend Blaise over, who actually happens to be a person with actual artistic skill, to help. I purchased a canvas for each of us to paint. The instructions told me to put down crisscrossing tape lines on the canvas, creating interesting shapes and angles. Then, I painted the created shapes within the tape, using one color for most and painting a few of the smaller shapes for a second shade. She painted her canvas with the opposite colors, using the bright blue for the majority of shapes and the muted gray shade for accent shapes.

The whole painting thing isn’t something I could say I did well. My paintbrush was a little too aggressive on the canvas and at some point a clump of black paint (where did it come from, I don’t know, considering I did not purchase black paint) got into the majority of my gray, leaving lines and spots behind.

We waited for the paint to dry and ripped off the electric tape, revealing thick white lines and gray and blue angles. Blaise, the neat and tidy painter that she is, had perfectly straight tape lines.

My aggressive brushstrokes bled under the tape and left behind little splotches in the white space. This makes sense, given my nature. In fifth grade, I won the award for shooting the basketball against the glass harder than anyone else. I often poke holes through paper with my pen. I wasn’t surprised to learn I’d too vigorously painted. Yet another reminder of my artistic shortcomings.

But, shoddy or not, those canvases sit on my dresser, ready to be hung. Project complete!

Even though my canvas could have looked better, and even though I picked out the easiest project I could find, I feel proud of what I did. I spent about $15 for two pieces of art that I get to enjoy everyday. Sure, my canvas isn’t perfect, but I’m not an artist.

And that, I think, is the best part about Pinterest. Ordinary people get to take time out of their busy lives to be an artist for a day. I wouldn’t have thought of the project on my own, but through simple instructions and because of a helpful person online, I completed it. And I’m thinking it doesn’t look half bad if you squint and stare sideways at it.

I won’t be painting anything complex like a flower, anytime soon, but I can definitely handle painting in a solid color. So when someone with really great taste tells me they like my painting, I can tell them it is a Brenna McDermott original. Well, maybe not an original.

Brenna McDermott

Editor’s note: The Local Q is pleased to introduce Brenna McDermott. Brenna is a 2011 graduate of Truman State University and is the  marketing and community relations manager at the Mark Twain Boyhood Home and Museum in Hannibal. Read more about Brenna here.

I’m not what would be considered an “artist.” I’m no Monet, no Mozart, no Madonna. OK, so maybe that last one could be up for debate. However, I am what I would call a “dabbler.” I’ve dabbled in art. I’ve performed theater — see Affton High School’s 2007 production of “Singing in the Rain,” in which I performed as movie star Lena Lemont and was the first lead character who was so loud she did not require a microphone. I’ve knitted — and at least one of my scarves is actually wearable, thank you Mom. I’ve painted — I won an art contest in the first grade, and my abstract painting hung at Powell Symphony Hall for a time. I like to think of that as the turning point of my artistic career. I’ve made bad pottery, sung mostly on tune in a show choir, danced tap and drawn stick figures in birthday cards — last year’s sketches were getting pretty good too. I’ve dabbled in most of the arts. I suck at most.

McDermott

But I have opinions. And from time to time, I like to put those opinions to pen.

I graduated from Truman State University in 2011 with a degree in journalism and a desire to immerse myself in good film, music, non-fiction writing and fill my home with expensive abstract art I’ll never be able to afford.

My goal at “Alt Arts” is to explore all kinds of art — everything from piano playing to the art of the mixed drink to the methodology of fancy grass cutting. However, I draw the line at actually mowing the lawn myself. What makes an artist? How do we discern what is good or bad art? And what about art is so enticing to the human condition? What are the many ways local people are expressing their artistic sides? Alt Arts is a place to address those very heavy questions. And also light questions, like “Can I make art from Popsicle sticks, glue and my old dishrags?” And I really hope the answer to that is “yes.”

We all have a desire to create, to express something, to tell a story. Writing has always been my art form, even though I know my grandmother would prefer me to be a movie star. Sorry, Grandma, I’m no Meryl Streep.

So join me as I delve into all kinds of artistic expression. If all goes as planned, I’ll hopefully lay down some beats and start off my rap career, learn how to ice cupcakes so they look fancy and not like a five-year-old slopped some icing on top, and maybe even learn how to improve those stick figures of mine. It’s likely that none of that will actually happen. But I promise to find you interesting stories and discuss what we’re all here for — a love of creative expression, even if we aren’t the Monets, Mozarts and Madonnas of the world.

Brenna McDermott