Pencil Shavings

It's A New Day

I was playing around with some new techniques that I haven't used before today.  Then suddenly I had a really neat idea and now my work area is covered in tubs of gel and mediums, tubes of paint, heavy plastic, and bits of things in various states of drying.

To be honest I wouldn't be here writing this if I had a bigger table to dry things on!

I love these days of creative explosion.  I wish it could last, but tomorrow I'm at the school volunteering.  But at least I had today – and what a great day it has been!

It Seems I'm Not a Very Nice Person

I know to the casual observer I'm a nice, (nearing) middle-aged mom, who gets her kids off to school on the bus each day, and waits patiently for them to return in the afternoon.  I'm not sure what it is about my  nature that makes people think that I'm so nice and easy going that I'm willing to look after their kids at the drop of a hat.  But that seems to be the rule of thumb for the bus stop moms.

One mom is chronically late to the bus stop to pick up her son after school, and has started to assume that I will wait with her 6 year old until someone arrives to claim him.  I don't really do it because I like her.  I don't dislike her either, I just can't stand the thought of what might happen to him if I don't wait with him.  My kids have never had to wait for me at the bus stop, and I never want them to look scared and uncertain like this little boy does when his mom or sister aren't there.

Another mom is always rushing her kids down the street, usually yelling at them to hurry, just moments before (or after) the bus comes.  She has said to me that she waits to get her kids ready for school until she sees me coming down the street, because she knows that I'm always early.  (lord knows how she copes when I take the kids to school in the car, or they are sick!)

Well on Tuesday I was tired and feeling pretty groggy with a bad head cold.  My oldest daughter was being belligerent about wearing her raincoat, and I was almost grumpy enough to let her go to school and (as it turned out) get poured on at lunch time.  Finally I got the kids out the door and we arrived at the bus stop less than a minute before the bus arrived.

As I was watching the “late for the bus” family running down the street, the mom in her pyjamas yelling at her kids as they ran dragging their backpacks behind them, their coats unzipped and flapping around them, racing to get to the bus before it left. As I walked past them on the way home, I smiled.

Insipiration in a Cup

I spent over an hour at the coffee shop yesterday while my kids were taking a class.  I sketched and shamelessly eavesdropped on people while I was waiting and drinking my latte.

You know it's true that as artists we need to get out and be with people in order to get inspired.

Besides totally amusing myself with the conversations I was overhearing, totally out of context (which made them even more amusing!) I managed to get a lot of sketches done and made some notes about things I want to write an paint later.

And to drive the point even further home, today I was on fire creatively.  I finished my commission and got the three custom pendants I'm working on glazed.  I have three other paintings on the go, one of them a big experiment.  It was nice to paint with abandon and not worry about the result, feeling that the result would be good anyway because it is coming from that elusive place where my best ideas come from.

I dreamed about painting last night.  It will  be of my most ambitious pieces to date.  I even know the title of it, and it does have a special meaning for me too, which is great.  I will be painting my past in a week or so, and my future too.  I love those introspective works that are so filled with meaning.

So here is to the unexpected bonus I got from taking some time for myself this week.

Cheers

Creativity and The Painting Of The Week

I am literally tickling my ears with jazz music tonight.  Something about the singer that I'm listening too currently on the radio program (I'm listening to on the headphones) totally tickles me, and gives me little shivers all down my spine (if the announcer comes on and gives the name of the singer I'll let you know).

This week I'm continuing my Creativity Workshop on the WetCanvas Acrylic forum, please feel free to stop by.  I'm finding that doing the workshop has expanded my creativity as well.  I'm trying a lot of new and experimental things right now.  Some of this is going to be extremely personal and autobiographical which is a bit of a departure for me.  I haven't done a really personal painting for a long time.  Not since the self portraits I did a year or more back.  Maybe that's something that my work has been lacking recently.  It's been reasonably good on a technical level, but maybe it's missing that visceral impact that really personal paintings have.

Speaking of being creative though...  This week's painting of the week is something really ambitious.  I completed this painting in a series of 15 pours.  I poured the dilute acrylic paint over the watercolour paper and let it dry.  Then I would cover some areas with masking fluid and pour again.  Repeating the process over and over until I got the depth of colour I wanted.  It took me three weeks to finish this painting and I am really proud of the results, the time and effort were clearly worth it.

It's called Mandala of Spring.  Exploring my theme of mandala's and the circles of meaning in our lives, and the great circle of life.  It's 12x16 inches on watercolour paper and is for sale in my artfire shop.

Returning to Form

Spring seems to bring the need in me to write more, and to in particular it seems that I write poetry in the spring.  Maybe it's the excitement of waiting for the first green shoots coming up through the warming earth.  I don't really know.  But I do know that I have been thinking about poetry a lot lately.

I've also been thinking about how I can use poetry in my visual art.   I think that is something that I might be pursuing soon.

I like the poetic forms of Haiku and Tanka. 

This is a poem in the Tanka form although it's more Haiku in subject matter.  Luckily I can break the rules of my  writing to suit myself. 

Foothills Spring

The air, still as snow
as the earth warms slowly
unstoppable green
presses up toward the sun
the start, life, incandescent.

Knowing When To Give It Up

I have all the stuff set out to work on anther project while the paint dries on my commission.  But I'm still going to put it away and go to bed.  Sometimes you just have to know when enough is enough.  I've been working all day on a variety of things and my neck is sore, my head hurts and I'm so tired I feel a little sick.

I have the vision of what I want to make in my head, but I know that I'm too tired to see it clearly.

I'm not sure what I will accomplish tomorrow - there are lots of outside activities waiting for me.  I'm behind on a lot of things, but there is nothing for it but to try to sleep so I can work harder tomorrow.

One of the things I'm doing tomorrow is visiting my daughter's class.  The Archeologist is coming and I get to help out.  You know I wouldn't miss that for the world.

What We Can Learn From Spaghetti Sauce.

I have been going through the TED talks.  I really like Malcom Gladwell for a lot of reasons.  He is a great writer, and has a great way of telling other people's stories and making them our stories

The Touch of Grace

I know, no posts for a week then a deluge... but this was too good not to share.

I like this philosophy, show up, everyday, do the work, be open to the touch of grace.

With Eyes Wide Open

I'm sitting by my living room window which, for the moment, is in the sun.  There are rain clouds coming in, which will make my kids happy because they love their new raincoats and matching rubber boots.

I'll have to take umbrellas down to the bus stop in a little over an hour, and hope that the wind doesn't pop them inside out.

I'm taking a break and writing from the couch today.  I've spent a lot of time in my chair at the table this week working on some commissions, and making colour cards from my new set of coloured pencils.  I deserve to sit in the soft seats for a little.

The cards are done.  I did one for every colour in the tin (72).  My husband shook his head at the project, but I know what I'm doing.  And now that the cards are all in sleeves and ready for my reference binder I'm ready to start creating with confidence.   Doing some tests with my art supplies is really important to me.  I can't just fly by the seat of my pants when it comes to creating.  Knowing what my supplies will do helps me make good choices that will determine if my work, well, works.   Also the experimenting, and discovery are important parts of my process.

These specific pencils are Derwent Inktense pencils.  They are water-soluable and the colour when wet is really quite different from the dry colour.  Also doing the test cards (showing the dry and wet colours) gave me lots of practice seeing how the pencils work on different supports.  Watercolour paper, bristol, Artboard, etc.  And it also gave me a ton of practice making images of water drops... which is something I've been working on.

I did the same thing with my acrylic paints.  I made a mixing chart for each paint showing how it mixed with different colours and white.  It was an incredibly valuable experience and my work has been better for it.  I know that a lot of people don't make mixing charts for their paints, but to not do it, to me, would be like trying to choose a colour blindfolded.

All in all, the days of working on these cards have been an investment.  And now when I need a specific colour or look I can flip back to my references and be confident that it will be my lack of skill, and not the wrong colour choice that will ruin my piece of art.

The Love Story of the Late Bloomer

Malcolm Gladwell is a favourite writer of mine, and this piece is, in a lot of ways about me.  I am a late bloomer, I am a seeker, I am of an experimental mind when it comes to my life.  I'm also involved in a love story between myself and the people who are supporting me, and believing in me.  And don't think that I ever take that for granted - even when I want to cut the canvas to strips.

Annals of Culture: Late Bloomers: Reporting & Essays: The New Yorker.