If, indeed, that's what it really is. Or maybe just being uncertain or undecided. Or trying something new, a different approach. But the thing is I have all my art projects planned out. A whole series based around this piece, and another continuing along these lines. So I was working away on another drawing and it was becoming a struggle. Not because it was challenging. More like it wasn't challenging me at all. So I avoided working on it and my scheduled plan and started playing around with my Caran D'Ache Neocolor II crayons on a block of Arches hot press. After wetting the drawing with my water brush I went at it with a spray bottle. The lack of control was interesting to me, as well as what happened as it dried. Then I went back in with dry colored pencil, selectively, in order to retain some of the crayon marks and splashes from the spray bottle. This is the result. It's not a finished work by any means but I enjoyed the play in making it. I don't intend to abandon my intentions for those other works, just working out a way they can co-exist with some of another direction. Maybe it's the planning of art projects that needs to be let go of. It may be too much of a to-do list without enough room for inspiration.I have been reading Art & Fear by David Bayles and Ted Orland. A lot of you have probably already read this book but it couldn't have come to me at a better time. Just when I have been feeling a little bored with my art work or that it has become a little too predictable. Perhaps because I was a little too certain about what I was doing. Anyway, I have been finding lots of passages to highlight, including this one:
"Uncertainty is the essential, inevitable and all-pervasive companion to your desire to make art. And tolerance for uncertainty is the prerequisite to succeeding."
-Art & Fear by David Bayles and Ted Orland
-Art & Fear by David Bayles and Ted Orland
8 comments:
I really believe these things come to us as we can use them. I've read the book too and really I'm pretty fearless until someone says, "It is good!" That always freezes me. I'm doing it for joy not for other's praises. Man, I have to learn how to handle that.
I really like this piece. I enjoyed looking at all your sketches but I particularly like the soft haziness of this one. Thank you for visiting my page and the kind words
I can tell you are excited about this, and that excitement is great! It will show up in your work. I really like this post and the encouragement to make changes, try new things, be impulsive sometimes.
I really like this. Has a soft, dreamlike quality to it. Wonderful colors.
I have that same book... but haven't read it yet- perhaps it's time I did!
This IS different from your other stuff, but I like it, especially the glow on the trees. And the thoughts about playing and uncertainty are good. Thanks for sharing and sparking those thoughts.
I think its great you have "plans". That doesn't mean that's all you can have though. Go for more. Go for the discipline and ultimate pleasure in completing your series and structure you are imposing on yourself for these other works but don't let them decide for you that you can't do more!
Being a homemaker it is my job to put dinner on the table but that doesn't mean I can't enjoy a meal out. Routine is only good if it serves you. If you feel constrained take up a third series and call it Experiments. Have fun especially.
Love the very soft feeling you obtained there. I'm keeping the name of the book for later reading, after I've gone down my current pile!
These experiments have an ethereal quality to them. I find them very calming and beautiful.
I haven't read Art and Fear, but I certainly like the line you've quoted from it. I've had some difficulty with my work lately and am only now learning a bit about that "tolerance".
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