A Good Day

A Gorgeous fall Sunday on the Peninsula. Recent rain, but none today--sunny and bright and 70's, a day in which I managed to combine Art and Food and Exercise and Friends...being outside along with making something, several things that never existed before.

I got inspired by a class with LK Ludwig at Art Fest in 2002 to start taking pictures of myself. Some of them are quite frightening. Being an indifferent wielder of technology, I haven't taken the time to figure out how to do a delayed shot with my camera, so have been taking pictures at arm's length for years. These are merciless in showing up every wrinkle and blemish, but I recently discovered that if I take pictures in my bathroom mirror, they come out halfway decent....Do I look 62? Decrepit or Juicy? (appropos of a conversation today with DC about what makes a person be able to be "Juicy"

Thinking of ones self as an artist doesn't come easily for some...the more you do it, the more you become it, I believe. However, I've always known I was an artist. I can remember as a child, trying to figure out how to paint light on water...still don't have it down the way some do, but a curious mind is a valuable thing to own. Does inheriting one depend on enlightened parents, good genes, luck? Can we give ourselves curious minds, baby step at a time?

Back last winter...or was it the one before? I wanted to set myself the task of making a collage/painting a day. I only finished a small handful, which you can see in my book, A MOMENT OF PURE JOY ON AN ORDINARY DAY. Today...I don't know why today instead of many earlier days...I started up the habit again, finishing two! These are about 10" x 12", but I envision bigger ones...on a pile of 10 sheets of watercolor paper I've been saving. Giving myself assignments in order to do the work that I want to do anyway??? Well, why not. Somehow it becomes difficult to force myself to do the very things I want to do...why is that? Am I afraid of failure? I KNOW that the more I do, the more ideas I generate, the more skill I develop...HELP ME TO OVERCOME THE INERTIA TO SIMPLY GET GOING!

So today's Monday, and I'm taking advantage of an afternoon off to catch up with the things I didn't finish on the weekend.

I was SO Excited to finish two drawing/painting/collages yesterday, and today I'm able to post them for you to see. I'm reading: AN ILLUSTRATED LIFE by Danny Gregory, which shows sketchbooks from artists, illustrators, and designers, and after I got over feeling intimidated by all the great work people are doing every day, I re-Remembered how Important drawing and looking are to every kind of artist and writer.

Of course, a book to read and a book to draw and write in travel with me everywhere I go. I showed you a page from the med-sized book I took with me to Portland, and
when I know I'll have some time and opportunity for collage, I take that 8" x 6" size. My purse book is 3.5 x 4.75" and I may only take that one when I go to Iowa for a few days to see Mom...There won't be too much time alone on that trip...and I'd like to finish out the current book, that I started in 2006.

This is my purse-sized sketchbook, with a page from Portland. I used the bigger sketchbook back in my hotel room, and the small one when I went into the city via pubic transportation at night after classes. I did this at the South Park Seafood wine bar, just east of the Portland Art Museum...I'm so East Coast Centric, I keep thinking the ocean is on the other side, so I had to think about that for a moment.

I keep getting inspiration and giving myself directives about what to work on and how to do it...Sometimes I do go back and follow my suggestions...If I don't write it down I Know I won't have a prayer of doing it.

I have lots of small sketch book work while waiting for the ferry... a way of life out here on the Peninsula. I like drawing with ball point pen, because I can go back over. Now that I'm noodling ideas for a graphic novel, starring ART WOMAN, I'll probably take one or two extra fine point Sharpies with me, too, to play with large and simple patterns. Ever since I can remember, I've had a box/bag of project with me while traveling...and now that my memory is fading, it's good to look back and see where I've been and what I've been thinking about.