Drawing in May

My new "30 minute studio warm up project" is on its way. I have been lucky that of the eight days that May has counted so far I was able to be in my studio for six. So I have six drawings to share from my watercolor sketchbook!

EDM #1 - Draw a shoe

Drawing is quite challenging for me. I'm no star at it and I find I only moderately enjoy it. That is to say: I don't really like drawing from life all that much. I don't hate it either, otherwise of course I would not give myself this challenge, but it's a little like doing homework.

EDM #2 - Draw a lamp

The funny thing is that I feel as if I should like it more. I'm in total awe of people who sketch their lives, their environments and just practice this skill over and over. When I see other people's sketchbooks I want that too. And what I do like about this little May-challenge is that I document every day objects from my life that have never been documented.

EDM #3 - Draw a wallet

 I mean, really, who takes pictures of their wallet? Or their desk lamp? Hmmm, now that I am considering this an idea pops into my head for a photographic challenge. Maybe one day I should do the EDM challenges differently, with photographs! Ooh, I have to write that one down in my notebook! ;-)

EDM #4 - Draw a cup

 When it comes to drawing what I mostly like is drawing things just for the fun of it. Things that are in my head and just make me smile. Like the freebie label sheets or my little houses. Maybe this also has to do with a lack of pressure in that it does not have to look like anything. Nobody's gonna look at my little houses and say: Hey those aren't up to building regulations! ;-) I guess I like my art as stress free as possible!

EDM #5 - Draw your bed

Still, this May drawing is a good practice and I am learning a little. The biggest thing I'm learning is that the things that look easiest to draw are actually the hardest. This really surprises me over and over again. For instance I thought my desk lamp and the cup with built in teapot would be super easy, but they are just impossible! I couldn't get them right at all. Very frustrating indeed!

EDM #6 - Draw a childhood toy

I've come to think this is because simple lines have to be caught just right or you will just get a wonky drawing. Whereas more complicated and curvy lines are much  more forgiving. Who's gonna tell if my wallet does not bend exactly that way and has some more thread hanging out of it?

All in all, this is an interesting experiment, but I don't think I will ever by an accomplished live drawer. I'll pick the make believe stuff any time. Hope you enjoyed looking at these anyway ;-)

Book review - The creative habit - Twyla Tharp

Title: The creative habit - learn it and use it for life
Author: Twyla Tharp
Info: 243 p. - 2003
Finished: 6 May 2011
Acquired through: amazon.com
Rating: 8/10







Notes:
This is a very intriguing and inspiring book for anybody who is even remotely serious about their art.
Tharp is a succesful choreographer and uses examples out of her own life as well as those of other artists (in just about any field, so this is not a book about dance) to illustrate the importance of devotion and perseverance when it comes to living a creative life. Habits, discipline and simple hard work are the things she stresses again and again. This books  gives a no nonsense approach to art that really speaks to me.

The fact that Tharp is a choreographer and sometimes goes beyond what I would be willing to sacrifice for art's sake does not diminish the power of her message, which is like being spoken to by a very strict but wise teacher. Art comes with devotion and keeping up a practice. Depending on inspiration won't get you anywhere in the long run.

In between the chapters Tharp offers a series of interesting exercises to keep the creative juices flowing. Some of them are dance oriented, but that does not mean they are any less interesting. This book is one I will read and reread time and again to keep me focused and motivated.

Quotes:
If art is the bridge between what you see in your mind and what the world sees, then skill is how you build that bridge.

Solitude is an unavoidable part of creativity. Self-reliance is a happy by-product.

(Quoting Mark Twain)
"...the man who does not read has no advantage over the man who cannot read."

Some people resent the idea of luck. Accepting the role of chance in our lives suggests that our creations and triumphs are not entirely our own, and that in some way we're undeserving of our success. I say, Get over it. This is how the world works. In creative endeavors luck is a skill.

The more you are in the room working, experimenting and banging away at your objective, the more luck has a chance of biting you on the nose.

I used to bask in the notion that all my obstacles to creative efficiency would vanish if I only had exactly the right resources (...) But I've learned that the opposite is true: limits are secret blessings, and bounty can be a curse.

Time (...) is our most limited resourse, but it is not the enemy of creativity that we think it is. The ticking clock is our friend if it gets us moving with urgency and passion. Give me a writer who thinks he has all the time in the world and I'll show you a writer who never delivers.

(Quoting an anonymous CEO)
"You only need  one good reason to commit to an idea, not four hundred. But if you have four hundred reasons to say yes and one reason to say no, the answer is probably no."

Be generous. I don't use that word lightly. Generosity is luck going in the opposite direction, away from you.

The one thing that creative souls around the world have in common is that they all have to practice to maintain their skills. Art is a vast democracy of habit.

In its purest form, inexperience erases fear. You do not know what is and is not possible and therefore everything is possible.

Without passion all the skill in the world won't lift you above craft. Without skill all the passion in the world will have you eager but floundering. Combining the two is the essence of the creative life.

When people who have demonstrated talent fizzle out or disappear after early creative success, it's not because their gifts, that famous "one percent inspiration", abandoned them; more likely they abandoned their gift through a failure of perspiration.

When you create beauty and wonder from the metaphorical stone that the builder refused, you have achieved mastery.

Three freebies and a birthday card

I'm having a fabulous four days off work and I am taking some extra time in the studio. With this I am also finding out I am not one of those people that can work in the studio all day long. It doesn't matter what I do or how much I like it, after about four hours I just get fed up with it. This means I was rather cranky when I left my studio last nigh after a full days work and I won't be doing that again this weekend. Looks like I need variety even when it comes to the stuff I love.

So today I am alternating between studio time, reading time and going for a walk (not in that order by the way).
I have four things to share with you, well actually three things you may share and one I guess won't do you much good, because it has a person's name on it and unless you happen to have a friend named Tonny who's birthday is coming up you won't have much use for the birthday card I made her ;-)

Let's get to the freebies first. Here are two more tag sheets for you to use. Again they are handdrawn and colored in with gouache. I let go of the felt tip pens, because after I left one of the previous ones out in the sun for only a short while the pink already started to fade and that's no good! So it's all gouache from now on.

The first one is my least favorite of all of them so far. I don't know. It just didn't do what I wanted it to and I simply didn't feel inspired by it. But I guess it's still kind of colorful and I will use it for my self made journal.

The next one I really really like. I went to some softer colors by mixing the gouache with a little more water and I like the theme of flowers that I put in the labels.

After all these labels (I made four sheets in total as you may recall) it was high time for some other elements, so I started thinking about what else I could do and it hit me: borders! So here's my very first border sheet! These were such fun to make!

If you want to use these sheets in your art feel free to do so. You can click on the pictures and it will take you to my flickr where you can download them in various sizes including the 300 dpi original. You don't have to tell me if you use them, but it would sure make my day if you did ;-)

And here's the promised birthday card:

There they are again: my little houses! I made this card as a kind of try out for maybe making more cards in the future. I am really falling in love with this handdrawn stuff that I can color in with gouache. It's almost like meditation. The only 'bad' thing about it is the time it takes to fill in all those little details, but I guess that's why it feels like meditation too, haha.

I am currently working on a second border sheet, where the borders will be longer and of course those will become a freebie too. After that I think I will have enough to start putting the book together. I can't wait!

I hope you enjoy my freebies, if only just looking at them. Wishing you all a wonderful weekend!

What are you up to wednesday - part 7

Whenever I take a picture of my worktable for what are you up to wednesday, it feels like nothing has changed even though I have been working really hard. The point is I've been working on the same kind of thing for a while now, which is tag/label sheets for my selfmade journal project. I have now finished four sheets of them and I am working on a sheet of borders.

I just finished drawing it and  have colored in just a small part of the sheet. On the left you can see the two sheets of labels I did before the current sheet. I will put these up as freebies on friday and I hope to have finished the border sheet then too.

It's very relaxing to make these sheets and I may be getting a little addicted to doing them. They are just simple pen drawings that I fill in with gouache. While I work on them I listen to podcasts of interviews with artists by Ricë Freeman Zachery. It's a good way to spend my studio time!

On a different note: remember my little houses? I have gotten several responses from people who have done stuff with my tutorial and just today I received a mail from Andria who did her own houses in her journal after mine. It's so cool that  people are inspired by them, so check out this post on her blog if only because she praises me to kingdom come which is very good for my oversensitive ego ;-) Thank you Andria!

On a second different note: the may drawing practice is on it's way. I have made three drawings already! I will show them in one of my future posts. I know that there are people out there who, when they do a daily project, post every day, but I just don't have the time. You will see them all though, promise (I'm not sure I'm doing you a favor when I say that, haha).

On a third different note: the atlas I am preparing to become a journal has now been fully gesso'd. Now I can add some color to it's pages. I am taking a free journaling workshop by Roz Stendahl through the Strathmore site. I may have said this before: Roz is my hero, so I could not resist a free workshop by her and the atlas will be perfect for trying some of her tips in. You may want to check it out yourself. It's over here. There are other free journaling workshops over there too. Have fun!

April Collages

April has come to a close. Can you believe how fast the time goes? It's May already! With the close of April also comes the close to my April Collages. I made ten in total, which is not bad considering how little real studio time I had the past month. I already showed you three and here are the remaining seven.

I really enjoyed making these and they have given me all sorts of ideas. Like, what if I made these kinds of collages and added stitching? Or what if I made paintings after these collages where instead of paper I would make the shapes with paint? That's the cool thing about trying something new, it leads to even more things to try out. Artsy  people are never bored as long as they keep experimenting!


What I also really liked was starting my studio time with a regular exercise. It was like flexing the creative muscles. I now have set up a sort of new routine because of this. Whenever I have several hours in the studio I start with half an hour of a self imposed challenge like the April Collages. And after that I spend half an hour on things like preparing backgrounds with gesso or doing other prep work. Right now I am gessoing the papers of the altered atlas I am making, which is rather tedious work if you do it for too long. A half hour a day goes a long way however and after spending the first hour of my studio time on some sort of routine like this I am all ready to get busy with the 'real' work, whatever project I may be working on at the time.

Anyway I have decided to continue the 30-minutes-of-practicing-something-followed-by-30-minutes-of prep-work routine and for May I am going to be drawing! To not have to think too much about this (What should I draw?) I am using the challenges of the Every Day Matters group. It should be fun to see what will come out of that.