I was given a set of questions to consider about artists I like and why. “Just jot down some initial thoughts” were the instructions. So of course my mind immediately went off in six different directions at 90 miles and hour and there was no jotting down. The idea has occurred to me before that I should start a scrapbook of sorts that will become and repository for images and notes. I have a range of tastes and to be able to see images in one place would help me see common elements or themes.
I like Hundertwasser‘s work as well as much of Picasso‘s and then there’s work by Christian Hetzel,Kitty Sabatier, Egon Schiele and Junko Oki to name a few. They are all very different and I can see how what I like depends on the context: my taste changes depending on where I am and how I feel.
I’m asking myself . . . What do they have in common. Anything? Do they need to? Isn’t enough that I can appreciate a range of artists? Do I need to question why I like them? And why are there so many painters when I don’t paint? Should I break out the paint? At this point in my development, I think I need to analyse what I like, just a little, in order to deepen my appreciation. I think I need to look not just at work that appeals and inspires, not necessarily the same thing, but also what I don’t like . . . that work that I can appreciate but isn’t to my taste.
So who are my current inspirational artists? Helen Terry,Dionne Swift, Debbie Lyddon, Mo Orkiszewski, Jude Hill . . . this list is far from complete. And then there’s work of locals, of friends, Julz Coffey, Trisha Findlay, Birgit Moffatt . . . to see how their work changes and evolves, their influence, whether direct or indirect, pushes me on with my own. And finally, the teachers . . . wonderful, talented, generous souls, every one of them.
I can see where all this is leading, how my voice is emerging, my aesthetic is developing, changing, but I’m interested in how and why. And I can hear a wee voice in my head saying “hush, just do your work.”
Where I’m going. Paper, watercolour, encaustic medium, linen thread, cotton cord. 10 x 10 cm sample Wendy @ Late Start Studio
. . . with myself. That’s how I’ve been feeling lately.
I have allowed my natural rhythms to be interrupted in ways that are counterproductive. In the interludes between very welcome and much-loved guests, I have not picked up where I left off and now it seems to be hard work out where I was. I know that under these circumstances a repetitive activity helps so I spent five hours mending . . . just plying a needle through soft cotton. I was carrying out more repairs on an Indian quilt that I have had for many years and I’m facing the fact that it has a limited number seasons left in it depending upon how tenderly I treat it. I blogged about it as cloth as a metaphor, another beginning, and a job well done
Uschi came to provide some close supervision. It wasn’t long before she decided I could be trusted with the job, burrowed in, and fell asleep on the job.
At one time I would never have thought mending would be so satisfying. If it’s for someone else I think of them, what they mean to me, what hopes I have for them, and offer my love. If it’s for me, as in this case, it quiets me and I get drawn into this old cloth as a metaphor for my life. I shall have to say goodbye to it eventually but for now . . . maintenance is key.
Settling into this feeling of unease, of inertia, is okay . . . it will pass and will be followed by a period of activity and I’ll continue my work but right now I’m as changeable as this fickle weather we’re having. A few more hours work and I’ll be done, my quilt mended, my Self soothed and my mind clear. I’ll persevere.
This morning Seth Apter of The Altered Page posed this question on FB:What would boost your creativity the most: more time, more space, more supplies or something else? and I offered this response.
“Space . . . being able to leave something I’m working on undisturbed while I do something else. I don’t want to have to put away my encaustic set-up so I can make some more monoprints or to set up the sewing machine or get out the typewriter or . . . I’m sure you get the point. A smallish spare bedroom (with carpet) that occasionally needs to be used as one is not ideal . . . guess who is thinking of ripping up the carpet! In the meantime I have vinyl on the carpet and I just take over parts of the house and garden as the need arises. My thoughts on anything that stifles your creativity is, if you really want to express yourself, you’ll find a way.”
Reading other responses as well as my own, I got to some serious thinking. Deep down, I believe that if you want to do something badly enough you’ll find a way. I also agree with the saying ‘cut your coat according to your cloth.’ For years I didn’t have much time or money to indulge my creative fantasies so the fantasies remained small. I made things as gifts and I learned to make do with the resources I had at hand. If I bought resources, whatever I made had to pay for itself and make additional income. . . one year, back in the 70s, I funded Christmas gifts for my children by making and selling macrame dog leads.
So there you go, time and resources limited my output and limited my creativity but it certainly didn’t curtail it. I fitted it in.
Now, my only real limitation is space. Recently I moved my workroom from a small office to a smallish bedroom and reshuffled the furniture around the house and now I have about 10 square metres for storage and to create in.
The Late Start Studio. I think I might rip up the carpet, build a workbench along the right-hand wall with shelves under and over it for storage and display, and put the desk under the window.
Right now I’m set up for working with encaustic medium and wax on the carpet isn’t great. Fortunately I have another of my cunning plans and got my hands on some free vinyl which I laid over part of it and sealed the edge down with duct tape. When you’ve had to make do, you can come up with ingenious solutions. There’s still nowhere to play with charcoal unless I go outside( it’s winter here), splash paint, print, sew (I have 3 machines), and my easel is stored behind yet another bedroom door . . . one night is fell and almost brained a guest! Of course if only I was interested in just one art form life would be a whole easier albeit not as interesting.
Different art forms need different equipment and set-ups. Left to right: boiling and dying harakeke/flax outside, free motion embroidery, encaustic pod with muka fringe.
There might be reasons why you can’t do what you’d like but you can still express yourself creatively but excuses are just that . . . excuses.
In all honesty, I have no reasons however sometimes I have excuses . . . and that’s when I give myself short shrift.
I’ve finally decided to accept me just as I am, to go with the flow . . . water is a powerful force and I could do worse than to emulate its properties.
I have always wrestled with developing habits that would lead to some sort of self-improvement or help me towards a goal. As a child I did not practise my music, do my homework or even remember to feed my guinea pigs on a regular basis nor do recall being encouraged to do so. My children could well say the same and although I remember asking them if they had homework, I probably did it irregularly. As an adult there is very little I do regularly but that may have something to do with having had a working life regulated by appointment times and school bells. Routine and I? Well it’s always been a difficult relationship: I have a low threshold to boredom and for me, Routine and Boredom seem to have some sort unholy alliance.
My latest attempts to instill some discipline into my practice have all ended up as failures. My attempts to place limitations on how many directions I go in . . . playing with encaustic medium almost didn’t happen and, right now, I’m really enjoying its possibilities. And that’s it . . . words like limitations, discipline and routine give rise to a negative, almost visceral reaction however possibilities makes my Self sit up and smile and start to sing.
Why do I keep trying different things? In the hope that something will enthuse me so much that I fall in love with doing it and never look back? That we, the activity and I, will be romantically entwined for life and . . . what? We ride off into the sunset to live happily ever after? Like that is ever going to happen! And before you go telling me that it just doesn’t work that way with ANY passion whether it be something or someone, I know, I wasn’t born yesterday! I’ve given up trying to limit myself or form beneficial habits. I gave it a damn good try many times . . . giving up is just not the same as giving in.
There is much written about the positive effects of having a daily regimen and having a daily practice and I don’t discount it but it simply doesn’t work for everyone . . . and it’s not some virtue and I will become, by some miracle, a much better person on the inside if I somehow crack this Sisyphean task and do something ‘good for me’ on a daily basis. Read it here now . . . I will never be that person, who when asked about the secret of their success will say, “I XYZ EVERY DAY AND HAVE DONE SO FOR X YEARS.” The only thing I do almost every day is get up, use the bathroom, make coffee and take it back to bed and read (a book or online) and I have done that since I did my MEd which I completed in 2002 (working full-time I could only do the necessary reading between 5:30 and 7:30). Now, I wake when I wake and shower when I shower . . . I don’t wear a watch. And while I try to hand the car keys in the same place there is a second thing I do . . . I make all sorts of stuff.
For me, trying to set up a new habit opens the door to those voices that tells me I have no will-power or won’t-power, I’m hopeless. The loudest voice of all, tells me positively screams at me that I’m lazy. I then spend most of my energy digging a hole to fall into and then have to struggle to get out again. No more. No more will I set myself objectives that need to be done daily at a certain time. I shall continue to be haphazard in my approach to what I do. My weekly goals will continue but always have the rider “unless something more interesting turns up.”
Recently I decided I would draw every day, make marks if you will, the ‘authorities’ (and yes I know, I have ascribed that title to them . . . they haven’t, however most of them are teachers so, to some extent, they have). The most I ever managed to keep this up was for 10 days straight and then something happened and I never got back into it. Maybe it was a visit from my grandhearts (who love to draw), a particularly stunning morning that demanded I go for a walk or perhaps I got waylaid in the workroom on my way to make coffee and didn’t get out of my pyjamas until 11:00. Does it matter? Did time stop? Was there some cataclysm in some corner of the universe? (And such is my level of spontaneity, it is now 12:15m and I have not showered nor had any breakfast. And don’t get me started on the difference between being impulsive and being spontaneous.)
For me, having to do something kills a lot of the pleasure . . . this probably means that deep down I’m a hedonist but that’s okay . . . I’m sure the world can cope with a few and might be the better for it.
By now you could be wondering what started all this ranting and rambling. Yesterday on Face Book I read ‘Action opens the door. Consistency keeps it open.” You might nob in agreement and say that’s fine, that’s true, but for someone who will have the epitaph “She Analysed” on her gravestone, that isn’t good enough. First I finished admiring the penmanship and use of watercolour and then, perhaps because it doomed me to failure, perhaps because I am a bit of a pedant around the edges, I found myself disagreeing with the word choice . . . big time.
Consistency (Oxford Dictionary)
consistent behaviour or treatment. “the consistency of measurement techniques”
Consistency was perhaps used with the idea of turning up, applying yourself on a regular basis but more and more I realise I can’t do that . . . it’s just not me. I think perseverance is what keeps the door open . . . persevering thought the discomfort, extending to a point just a little out of reach, not giving up until you can stand back and know, deep inside, that you did well. For me, consistency and development just don’t go together.
Maybe I’m splitting straws but in my mind the difference between consistency and perseverance is a bit like the difference between equality and equity.
Of course if it really is consistency that makes the difference between me just mucking about with art supplies and being an artist I’m really sunk. Regardless of whether it does or not, I’m off to persevere in my making and mucking about. My plastered forms are waxed and ready waiting for me to apply colour. Next week I could be weaving, embroidering, making more charcoal, a book or perhaps even drawing or painting, miracles do happen . . . but whatever I do, I’ll be making because that’s what I am . . . a maker (which is not too far from my childhood nickname of Mucker and that’s fine by me).
Plastered forms ready for waxing. Wendy @ Late Start Studio
And my mottos? 1, Necessity is the mother of invention and 2, Strike while the iron is hot . . . .and there a millions of power sockets in this world.
There is a certain wisdom in harvesting low growing fruit however if that’s all you do, sooner or later you’ll forget how to climb trees, forget the triumph of getting to the top despite the risks along the way. Your ability to stretch up and out will atrophy over time and all you will be left with is low growing fruit which is nowhere near as ripe and sweet and the fruit at the top of the tree . . . that fruit will be left to the ones who are brave enough scale the trees and those wonders who can fly.
A second problem arising from indulging in low growing fruit is that you get used to a varied diet . . . a menu dégustation or tasting menu is delightful however not a way to eat for life. Being able to do a lot of things in a mediocre way is not, I imagine, as satisfying as being able to do one or two things really well. And before there are objections about my work not being mediocre, that is my opinion based on how easy the result has been, the effort, the practise it required, and while compliments and admiration is lovely I want to feel I have worked hard for something I am satisfied with. Yes, there’s a perfectionist streak which, for the most part, I keep in check . . . but I won’t give up high standards for my work.
Focussing on a few things won’t mean I lose my range of skills, not does it mean ‘ll never exercise them again but for years I’ve fed low growing fruit, often because I’ve squeezed in time or the financial ability to indulge in what I want and sometimes because I’ve been scared to push myself, however lately, I’ve wanted to stretch up higher and find sweeter options. Which fruit are my favourite though? I don’t really have favourite colours, types of music etc. I like variety!
While I thought I might sort out, finally, what I want to focus on during the completion of a diploma over the next two years, it just wasn’t going to work for me. The alternative was an accountability partner. Someone who would help to keep me on track, working to a plan, and because they receive my reports of triumph and stumbles, that will keep me honest with myself.
I’m really fortunate that one of my talented friends, Trisha Findlay, has offered to take on the task and for two weeks I have done most of what out set out to do. I plan (too much) for the week, write my objectives, review them the following week and write more. To reach my goal (the top of a tree) I’ve decided to start by spending part of my time clearing away some of the underbrush, the unfinished work that is weighing me down and part of the week doing some work from Experimental Textiles by Kim Thittichai. I have the book from the library and want to do some work from it to get some ideas flowing before I need to return it . . . how I would love to attend that course but unfortunately I’m half a world away.
Next up, and it is up, through the branches, getting the odd scratch, snagging my clothes, will be more of this earlier experiment . . .
Making mesh detail . . . unfinished and full of promise.
. . . among other things of course, after all, it is a while since I did much tree climbing.
This Diploma of Art and Creativity I’ve enrolled in, the package for distance students arrived and I avidly went through book that accompanies the DVDs. To my dismay there was little there I wanted to do, I’m not really interested in drawing or painting people, landscape, or a still life and these aspects feature heavily. Please don’t misunderstand me, this is not a criticism of the institution and the quality of the materials is great . . . it has nothing to do with that . . . it is their relevance to me. I’m a maker with a primary interest in textiles, a mixed-media person who enjoys exploring the qualities of a material (even paint however I’m not particularly interested in creating representational paintings) Perhaps I should have known better after I left the end-of-year exhibition underwhelmed and disappointed that there was little that interested or intrigued me. Some lovely artwork but the only textile in sight was a piece of hessian stapled in folds, ‘last minute’ to quote the artist, to a wall as an exploration of the fabric’s qualities and that type of installation art just, well it does nothing for me and has little to do with textiles although that was indeed the medium.
There were plenty of forms to fill in and I do hate forms, and, horror of horrors, a questionnaire. I loathe and despise and will resist filling in questionnaires to my last breath. Fill your life in on this form, put yourself in a box on this questionnaire . . . no thanks! So much rebelliousness has surfaced, it’s never far below, and I’ve once again had to stop and look at the driver. I’m the driver, never the passenger, in my life so I need to look at this rebellion surging up with objectivity and talk it through with a friend . . . who fortunately for me rang when she read my mini-rant of an email. In this instance my Inner Rebel has an investment in the things as they are. The Inner Rebel is emotional while the Questioner is objective . . . and I wonder and question a lot!
Now I need to say at the outset that there is no compulsion to use any of the resources I have been sent on DVD and in the supporting book. I can work independently, set my own goals, do the work, record my hours, keep a visual diary or workbook, work through the creative process and send it all to my mentor who will do what good mentors should do . . . give me constructive and supportive feedback based on my goals (which he might have helped me formulate), maybe challenge me, offer some guidance. I’ll need to be accountable for putting in the hours, conducting my own research and arranging and any tuition I might need.
Giving that I will be finding instruction elsewhere, books, courses etc., and the word ‘textiles’ does not feature anywhere in the literature, my question is, is access to a mentor all I’m going to gain from this? It’s not entirely about the money however the fees do represent a return flight to Europe! From New Zealand! The longest distance possible!
Or I need an accountability partner? Someone who has the similar needs, form a reciprocal relationship where we make goals, work to meet them and then report back . . . we’d give each other constructive and supportive feedback, maybe challenge each other, offer some guidance. Hey! Did that sound familiar?
I will have 8 days to become convinced that this Diploma is good value and right for me.
A little something I’ve been playing with . . . local stone, harakeke/flax, pearls and silver crimps. Wendy @ Late Start Studio
I’ll tell you, you sweet taut 20 to 35-year-old who looks at older women with a self-satisfied or dismissive smirk and doesn’t countenance that such a thing will ever happen to you. I’m not old but I am ageing so I know . . . I can share my experience. And while this rant is mostly focussed on the body, because that’s likely where your focus is right now, the heart and mind and spirit are all affected.
No-one will tell you that hair will disappear from some parts of your body and appear in others. The blessing is that you are now in need of glasses so you don’t notice it for the most part . . . that is, until you are out somewhere and you feel a hair on your chin or you spot it in the unforgiving light over a mirror in the women’s toilet. You will swear to carry tweezers in your bag but you will forget.
No-one will tell you that the hairstyle you want can’t be had because the gray hairs have the most rebellious nature, almost a mind of their own dear little individual selves going off in there own direction as it pleases them, a texture defying any attempt to smooth or curl. You want sleek as it was in your youth without working for it? HA! And perhaps you will decide to brave it out and go natural (Why the hell should that be considered brave?) or maybe you will just develop a reaction, allergic or just distaste, and decide against pouring chemicals on your head with any regularity. Or maybe you’ll continue because you’ll be judged by your graying hair. Pathetic and small minded as those judges are, they may have control of your potential income.
Wrinkles? Yes they happen, and the pores of your skin on your face are more visible, your grandchild will be fascinated by your saggy skin so let them touch it, but never, ever, ever place a mirror on a horizontal surface to clean it . . . not ever! Enough said about skin because the changes are inevitable . . . and if your self-worth is tied to your youthful appearance it’s doomed.
No-one will tell you that fit as you may be, supple and you may be, your body will change shape even if your weight doesn’t . . . and sooner or later bits are going to ache if you sit still for too long. My advice is to simply keep moving.
Strength diminishes unless your lifestyle remains the same and for most, it changes because we have so many labour-saving devices . . . I used to have a push mower, use a hand drill and now I’m thinking I might need a skill-saw. No-one will tell you that sooner or later some lids on jars will not come off even if you employ all the tricks you know and you’ll be tempted to go and get your electric drill (I own two), and take to it with a vengeance because you’re damned if you’re going next door just so you can have artichoke hearts with your crackers and blue cheese and besides, it’s 2:00am and you can’t sleep!
Sleep is something no-one will discuss when it comes to ageing . . . when your body wants to sleep you will and it doesn’t matter a damn whether you want to or not. When you want to sleep . . . that’s another story. Maybe you will and maybe you won’t. I sleep like a baby; I fall asleep quickly and wake up every few hours. I’ve always thought ‘sleep like a baby’ was perhaps the most ridiculous saying ever.
Your feet . . . comes a time when not only do you see the sense in keeping your feet flat on the ground . . . you can’t wear heels anyway as you feet just won’t stand for it. Personally I would like to be barefoot all the time, socks in the winter, jandals (thongs) in summer and my old favourite boots in winter (they’ll die soon and then I’ll bury them with full honours, bugle at dawn, flag at half mast).
No-one will tell you that inside your body things have changed drastically even if you have retained stunning good health. For me, menopause was so long ago that it’s just like a bad dream. You know, one of those nightmares where you wake up and the emotions just won’t let you go? Your heart is thumping with fear or you’re so anxious that you’re almost frozen. Well, twenty-um years later I still have a hot flush with coffee (I have a 3-a-day habit and I love the stuff strong and black, unsweetened) and red wine is drunk advisedly because I know how I will sleep . . . hot and restless.
Skipping . . . yes skipping. There will come a time when you realise that what you did all the way to school and home again is just so damned exhausting! When was the last time you attempted to skip? DO IT! DAILY! In the privacy of your own home, or on a deserted beach which is my preference, if you must but do it! Why? Because sooner or later you will lose that spring in your step. Honestly, this phenomenon really happens, one day you jump down off something quite low and you realise the bounce didn’t happen. It vanishes somehow, somewhere there are a lot of bounces waiting to be reclaimed . . . they were ignored and took off to find new owners.
No-one will tell you that you will become more sentimental, that little things will have the power to move you to tears and that the sound of young children laughing is the sweetest thing in the world. No-one will tell you that as your body deteriorates and your thinking slows, even though your intellect remains intact (so don’t you dare think that because someone needs additional thinking time or forgetful they’re not as astute as ever!) your heart, your spirit, call it what you will, will enlarge and your capacity to love those near and dear will remain untouched. You will regret that you didn’t call your parents and grandparents more often.
Now don’t get me wrong, even with the inevitable changes you will continue to love and honour your body as much as ever. (You do, don’t you? Something damned wrong if you don’t because it’s going to house you for a long time.) You will still feel the thrill as a soft warm breeze caresses your skin, yes even that flabby stuff you used to call finely toned triceps, and appreciate where it can take you, and the skills it holds in its ancient muscle-memory. You will continue to make demands on it, nurse it when its sick and curse it when it lets you down but mostly, you will love it. It allows you to say I love you and to touch and cuddle and listen to music and laugh and cry and laugh some more. Love it, better still, respect it . . . every tiny part of it.
So there you go you taut 20+ year-old. And why has no-one told you? Because you aren’t interested . . . yet. You’re busy taking your youth for granted and perhaps feeling a tad superior to us ‘wrinklies’ however if you want to hear about your mind, how every time you forget something you wonder if there’s more to it that there was when you did that exact thing when you were 20 and question if it happens more often, well ask someone. I’ll give you an honest answer if you ask but it’s purely from my perspective, no longtitudinal studies here, no polls, just my experience.
Now I think I must point out that today is a brilliant sunny summer day, birds chirping and all that, I’ve been for a walk and I’m about to water-blast the fence so I can paint it . . . I love my body but I’m tired of all the put-downs, some incredibly subtle, others blatant, and the elevation of youth as an ideal. It’s fleeting . . . if you’re lucky. Youth lasted a short time when I look back at it and I think I have about a thrid of my life to go still.
The fence behind these gorgeous blooms needs a coat of paint . . . and I needed and image for this post.
Wendy @ the Late Start Studio
Yes we have role models, mostly carefully made up affluent women who perhaps won’t leave the house unless they’re dripping with make-up and certainly styled for that photoshoot where the images will be cleverly photoshopped and airbrushed. Let’s get ourselves our there, barefaced or with make-up doesn’t matter . . . let’s just get out there as we were in the 60s and be loud and proud feminists . . . our sons need it just as much as our daughters.
A little disclaimer here: my mother was still ‘getting old’ at 96, she was not allowed to work as a young woman, “Ladies don’t work!” was what she grew up with, but she owned a library, was a pattern-cutter in a knitwear factory, could mix concrete, swing a hammer, use a crowbar with devastating efficiency, and the first thing she did when she moved house at 95 was to plant beans and tomatoes.
Well I know why . . . when I try to get rid of some of my ‘stuff’ especially when they are things I have tried to cull in the past, the emotional attachment starts to speak a lot louder than common sense. Common sense says that “You haven’t laid eyes on it for years (in some cases), no-one else has any attachment to it so get rid of it!” But then there is that little “ah” and a smile at a memory that happens which prevents me form putting it in the smaller of two piles. The piles being ‘Keep’ and ‘Get-it-out-of-the-house-asap!’
The reason for this clearing out of ancient bits and pieces came about when I had to get everything out from under a bed to move it and empty a small bedside cabinet, previously my mother’s, to give to my grandheart. And of course when you start, somehow other cupboards and beds start to yield up their bounty.
Some of it has taken up residence in my tiny office . . . it was tidy but now I can barely get in there and until I start cleaning that up . . . oh take pity on me when I start! Instead of “if in doubt, chuck it out!” it will be “I’ll keep this, it might come in handy!”
There’s not going to be a lot of work happening here! Wendy @ the Late Start Studio
This argumentative pair are bound to come in handy don’t you think? Perhaps I could put a use by date on them. Wendy @ the Late Start Studio
So there I am with an untidy pile of old tat all over the floor, tripping me up, stuff that I haven’t touched for years yet somehow I can’t part with much of it . . . and I’m not talking about resources for art or craft work! So far I have managed to be fairly ruthless however there are other things that will sit in a box, and sit, and sit until some time way off in the future when space is more of an issue. Things like: a card I discovered, from me to my mother that she kept (actually I’ve now decided to toss that); the little notebook she had less than a year before she died where, in her shaky 96 year-old handwriting, my address and phone number appears on every second as does her own; a letter, not dated, from years before where her writing was strong and purposeful. There is no getting rid of some things . . . it’s just too difficult.
I have jewellery, not good, from umpteen years ago, not worn for yonks . . . .that’s all going (unless I think some of the bits might be useful to make a wigwam for a goose’s brindle some time). And can you tell me why did I keep the hideous Harry Potter-like spectacles I wore about 35 years ago? Furthermore, why didn’t anyone tell me they were so fugly? These are the easy things, these and the brass bells and candlesticks from the 1970s. Why did I keep them in the first place?
And after this lot is taken care of, after the office has been culled and organised, after I’ve dropped things off to the second-hand shop and made a trip to the tip . . . well then I have to start on the mementoes from 7 years of living overseas and travelling around the world. I know I’ll feel great when it’s done but heaven forfend! Save me from myself!
Recently, The Textile Artist made me an offer, 3D Mixed Media Textile Art, almost to good to refuse and if you’re in need to good, sound advice (this based upon the content of the site) it might be perfect for you. I turned it down . . . yesterday I received an email asking for feedback which I responded to thus, albeit with a couple of minor fixes and changes:
I guess I’m feeling deluged by inspirational posts and offers of courses and resources and in danger of spending more time looking at the work of others that developing my own. I have far too many read books on my shelves (my own and from the library) and ‘bookmarked’ web sites, more than I can hope to give adequate attention so I have unscubscribed from many blogs (not yours) so that I can focus on my own work. As a mixed media ‘maker’ and someone who has always tried anything and everything it is time to focus and the only way to do that is to withdraw a little from all the wonderful work and wisdom available and simply do my own work . . . follow my own wisdom.
I appreciated being asked why I’m not partaking of what is obviously a wonderful offer as it has made me bring to the surface and articulate what has been gong on in my mind for a while now.
This morning after I read The Muse Whisperer on Quinn McDonald’s blog I got to thinking how all creative tasks involve skills plus ideas and then about where, or how, I get my ideas. I realised that unless I’m working on something I don’t become inspired. I need to be ‘thinking with my hands’ (thanks Quinn), exploring the properties of a material, in order to generate unique ideas. Sometimes they’ll come when I’m walking the beach or working in the garden, not thinking of anything much, just noticing what is around me but usually, real inspiration comes when I’m completely engaged. Ideas come and take on a life of their own through the materials. Occasionally I’ll set out to make something and end up with something completely different because I listen to the idea . . . or is that the muse?
The other part of completing a creative task are the skills required to actually produce it. I could have the most ingenious, fantastical, original idea but without the skills to carry to it out the idea would be like a bell without a clapper.
I read once in a book about Tai Chi that there are three aspects to mastering anything; talent, teaching, and perseverance. You may have a truckload of talent and the best teacher available however if you don’t persevere you won’t master what you’re trying to learn. You can take talent or the teacher out of the equation and a level of mastery is still possible if you persevere. This applies to learning anything.
So what ever I want to learn to do, I can . . . as long as I show up and do the work . . . daily.
As a result of turning up today I’ve added to my skills and learned more about acrylic paints and what effects I can get from leaving plastic on it as it dried . . . I know I can use it but I want to experiment with using plastic of different thicknesses. Can I control the effect? If you look carefully you’ll see I’ve used a large size bubblewrap on the magenta. Some of the bubble wrap had traces of yellow paint on it, traces of which stayed behind when I peeled it off so I stored that bit of information away as well. Play is a great way to learn. Wendy @ Late Start Studio
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