catching up

I’ve been procrastinating about updating my blog for ages so now that I have a few hours ahead of me while I wait for my flight I can’t think of a good excuse. I missed the flight (long boring partially self inflicted reason) and got on the next. My original flight was cancelled (bird strike on landing) and everyone had to rebook – the more fortunate ones on my flight and quite a few much later in the day. Seems like a pantheon of gods and goddesses were looking out for me is a peculiar sort of way. I might have been facing a ten hour delay instead of a mere three hours.

For the past six months I’ve continued to focus on paint: exploring mediums, experimenting with colour mixing, and training my eye to see shapes and values.

I’ve done a couple of courses with Melinda Cootsona whom I highly recommend. Apart from learning about oils and cold wax I did a course called Re-Marks. For each painting posted in her group you receive questions about your intentions, a critique in terms of the elements of design and in some cases her emotional response. In some cases she even makes changes on you image to illustrate how it might look if X was darker/smaller/a different colour etc. If you make changes and repost the work she comments again which I found well worthwhile. By the end of the month I was able to critique my own work more easily.

The past six months have been somewhat disrupted by significant reconstruction of the riverbank opposite my house. Having a 160 tonne crane outside rather adds to the noise and the whole house shakes when it vibrates 18 metre piles down into the ground.

The construction company has been great though. First the paid for some noise cancelling headphones and when the frame moved closer and the vibrations started the paid for the rental of a small cabin to use as a studio – it’s sitting in a friend’s driveway. Even so, I feel like I’ve only had limited access to my home for the entire spring and summer as the started work in June and won’t finish until “some time in March”.

The behemoth outside my bedroom window.

The Bolt Hole – my temporary studio and retreat.

It’s no all noise though as with traffic diverted and people walking past my house, I often overhear snippets of conversations about how nice my garden is, how wonderful the hollyhocks are. Motorbikes and even cars have come through on the footpath which has me musing about my some people are so inconsiderate and lacking in respect for the community: if you aren’t treated with consideration and respect how will you learn to act that way? But I’m a Hope Hunter – one day I could hear the deep throaty sound of a large motorbike about to head down the footpath as a family was walking by my house. It was apparent the biker was waiting for them to come through before he did which meant he was idling, waiting, for a good couple of minutes. When they were safely through he rode by. Yes, maybe a gang member but he demonstrated a sense of decency. Being a Hope Hunter you notice things like this.

The hollyhocks are past their best now and these are just a few. Around the corner of the house some are about three metres tall!

In the meantime I’ve painted lots of A4 two and three value portraits using the Notanizer app which has really helped me develop my eye for shape and values as well as my brush skills. I don’t draw and rarely measure, I just go straight in with the darks focussing on shape and proportions. It looks unrecognisable for a while and it’s necessary to simply trust the process.

Dame Vivienne Westwood

Dame Judy Dench

Sir Anthony Hopkins

Stephen Fry

Dame Maggie Smith

Sir Edmund Hillary

I’m also working with ArtGraf Viarco and/or graphite and clear gesso. I love the grungy look and wiping areas back with a rag or my fingers. I started using an A3 sketchbook but now I’ve moved on to painting large A1 size portraits – some of the construction workers kindly posed for me. They’re expecting some nice refined A4 three value works so hopefully they’ll be pleasantly surprised.

ArtGraf Viarco and clear gesso, 840x600mm

Matt – graphite and clear gesso, 840x600mm

Kian – graphite and clear gesso. 840x600mm

With all this going on, I decided I wouldn’t participate in Open Studios this year but I have some ideas: painting members of a volunteer group as a fundraiser and a joint exhibition with a friend later in the year.

So it’s done! An overdue blog update and consequently I have only half and hour to wait. Time to stretch my legs I think.

a small challenge

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

a long time in coming

While I try to keep it to days or weeks, it has been months.  I have no reason nor any excuses to offer however I am aware that Guilt is there at the outskirts of my mind. I can allow Guilt to lurk out there: it has a role to play in battling Procrastination.  I have no responsibilities toward anyone except myself here, no-one is hanging on my every word . . . the feeling is to do with a responsibility to myself so I say my mantra “Each day passes whether you participate or not” and get on with it.

So far, this is my primary way of sharing what I do but I have made a commitment to myself to exhibit my work next year.  I was going to have a small space at a local art and craft shop but cancelled as I didn’t think my work fitted there so I am getting together with a couple of friends to apply for another space where there is more foot traffic and perhaps more likelihood of selling.

Of course that brings the question of how to price work . . . I’m not looking forward to that.  I use simple materials, often recycled, sometimes very old . . . my mother’s.  Taking time, stitching, utilising skills developed over a life time, some learned as a child and some more recent, self-taught and taught by wonderful generous women (usually).  Simplicity and time, one way or another, is there in my work.

I’m letting loose this particular aspect my creativity rather late in life and I have yet to exhibit . . . does that make me an ’emerging artist’?  I quite like that idea of still emerging just as much as I enjoy seeing which pathways appeal.

Here’s an amuse-bouche of what’s to come.

A small section of a larger piece. Watercolour paper, watercolours, encaustic medium, waxed cotton cord.
Wendy @ Late Start Studio

Save

Save

the fight is over

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”

synonyms:evenness, steadiness, stability, constancy, regularity, uniformity, equilibrium, unity, orderliness, lack of change, lack of deviation

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.

low growing fruit

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.

a decision made

When I have a strong gut feeling I turn to my objective side and gather evidence to back up my intuition . . . or prove it wrong.  Last week I attended a block week course for 4 days, checked out some of the facilities and met with my mentor whom I am sure I would have enjoyed working with for the year.   I’ve weighed everything up and today withdrew from the Diploma in Art and Creativity and made other plans for my creative development.

I think the institution, or at least the diploma programme provided, would probably best meet the needs of people with a creative bent but little experience, people for whom painting and drawing are a focus but who would perhaps like to investigate printing techniques, ceramics and sculpture, casting . . . there are opportunities to try everything, everything except the fibre arts.  Such a shame but perhaps if there are enough inquiries that might change.

And now? Now I will work with supportive like-minded friends who will listen to my goals and encourage me to work toward them.  I’ll work my way through a couple of books to build my technical skills and sharpen eye for design and take a couple of classes on-line. I’ll divide my time between play (experimenting) and work (developing and idea) and have a lot of fun as I do it.

Basalt, muka (harakeke/flax fibre), tiny pearls. I think it needs more pearls and silver crimps on that hair-like muka.
Wendy @ Late Start Studio

Thank you to all of you who made such thoughtful comments and have waited so patiently while I worked my way through the problem.

my response to an offer

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.

And might I add I’m still very tempted?

a change of direction

I’ve tidied away the paints and I can see flat surfaces.  Now it’s time to get back to this . . .

9 in 9
Wendy @ Late Start Studio

Which led to this and then . . . stopped.  Or maybe some of this although it’s too windy to harvest today.

Harvesting harakeke/flax.
Wendy @ Late Start Studio

I need to use my hands again rather than brushes . . . to get in close contact with the materials.

A wonderful week

Last week I had the privilege and pleasure of spending the week learning alongside 7 other wonderful women . . . Lucy Worsley and 6 other workshop participants on “Stitch it together with collage”  organised by Fibre Arts New Zealand.   I took the workshop as a challenge . . . collage is not my strong point by any means although I’m a dab hand on the sewing machine and recently I’ve enjoyed hand stitching as well.

At first I struggled because I was looking at the image more than the colour and texture it would impart to a background.  Once I shifted my way of viewing the materials I had on hand I began to explore abstracts based on a cruciform composition.

What I ended up with was a series of three images where I was able to incorporate my love of topographical maps and texture.

Topography Series #1

Topography Series #2

Topography Series #3

So what have I learned?  Listen to feedback and then decide for yourself what to do, step back, sleep on it, return and decide.    Pare back . . . less is sometimes more, don’t allow a desire to use materials to swamp good design, in short, let materials speak for themselves.

I felt so encouraged when the first of the series sold as it hadn’t occurred to me to offer it as this was an exploration at a workshop however another participant loved it.  So there is was at the showing with all the work from the other workshops with a little red dot . . . how happy was I!    Before I left #2 and #3 were also sold . . . Goal #1: ‘To make work so appealing and interesting that people would want to own it’ achieved.

Happy, happy, happy!  Now, to work towards Goal #2 . . . I’ll let you know what it is when I achieve it.

 

resolve and perseverance

One without the other?  Would that work?   If you have no resolve, can you persevere?

I keep coming back to the words of Deng MIn Dao in 365 Tao  where he wrote “each day passes whether you participate or not.”  I often chastise myself for not doing more with my time and get comorted that it isn’t true . . . but I know it is.

My first journal pages from 5 years ago.  The border is a printed page of one of Teesha Moore’s journal pages using a printer that was almost out of ink . . . I think giving credit is very important.

I’ve done little of this quality since . . . I had a “done that, what’s next?” way of thinking.  But something has changed, I can feel it.  It might be something to do with age, that feeling that time is becoming more precious when you know that perhaps 2/3 to 3/4 of you life has passed or it may be because I have the time to devote to . . . what?

If you visit here often you’ll be aware of the breadth of what I do . . . and I love that aspect of just mucking around trying many things but now, now I want something a little more.  In a word, I want excellence.

During the last couple of days I’ve left comments on two of my favourite blogs, that of Quinn McDonald and Diana Trout that excellence is my goal.

I’m such a dabbler flitting from one thing to another and while I can do a reasonable job in what ever I try, I’d like to be really good at one thing over and above all the others . . . to feel accomplished instead of ‘almost there’ and I guess that’s what keeps me going, the search for that fabulous feeling of a job well done at the moment of completion . . .  and then do it again in search of that high.  I need to focus or I’ll just fly around in circles like a catherine wheel and never achieve the best result that I’m capable of!

People get to the top of whatever they do because they have the drive and passion and perhaps that’s what others respond to as much as their work. I don’t necessariy want to reach some pinnacle of fame and fortune . . . I just want to be able to look at what I’ve done and say “Now that is well made!”   I want it to be well made to my satisfaction which, surprisingly, does allow for small imperfections.   I want to make things that I think are original, unique.

So my resolve . . . to persevere in my search for originality and excellence.  Now I need to focus.  Continue to muck around, yes, but perhaps flit a little slower between my varied interests?  Is that possible?  To flit at a slower pace?  Maybe a month by month focus?

I started with questions and have ended the same way . . . that’s life.