So after my little rant post, a friend of mine commented that I need to just think about why I love art and I was so inspired I pulled out my Art Journal. According to the dates in the book, the last time I journaled was March 16th. Way too long to go without journaling! Now that I have nothing but time on my hands, I will be rectifying this problem and posting what I do :)
So 10 reasons I love art
I really love working in a journal that is longer than it is tall. But it’s hard to show the pages at the same time. So here are the two pages separately as well.
It took me a while to come up with 10 things but once I did, it felt like such a relief and I’m not sure why I was struggling in the first place.
I think the one that’s most important is number 10:
If I let it, art has the power to make me happy.
Doing this journal page really helped me release. I have been hating everything about art lately, not sure if I want to do it at all anymore. I was just sitting around, watching tv, not getting out of bed, not wanting to think about art but now I’m beginning to get into a good place again.
Last year, I stretched some watercolor paper onto stretcher bars. I really love the way it looks first off.
So I made one large canvas (it’s 18×18) and it’s just been sitting around for over a year now, unused because I felt like I had to do something great with it, I was trying to plan it out too much.
So a few days ago I just decided to completely let go and just do it. I got out some paint, paper and just started slapping things down.
Whenever I’m working on something, a painting or a journal…I always take pictures at each point of the process.
I love looking back and seeing how it’s changed and transformed.
Here are some close-ups (left side is the very beginning, right after putting initial paint and paper down. Right side is where it is now…except the second set, that’s just two pictures of what it is now)
And large views. The bottom is what I’m at right now.
I think I need to put a quote in large letters right in the middle.
Do any of you have a great quote? Something inspiring, something you think of right when you first see the canvas? Help! :)
One other thing that’s helping me get back to loving art and things in generally…not sure if I’ve actually talked about it a lot here but…
I love to write, I can never decide if I’m more of a writer or a visual artist at heart. For the longest time I’ve been in love with poetry. But I’ve always had a soft spot for writing fiction.
A few weeks ago I was looking through my old writing files and found a story I was working on two years ago…
I read through it and when I got to the end…I wanted to know what was going to happen next but for the life of me couldn’t remember what I had planned out for the plot! (which, I must say, seemed very odd to me! I feel like I should have known what was going to happen but I was very happy that I had written something that, when I got to the ended I needed more!)
A couple of nights ago, I started writing for it again…got about 5k words written in one night.
Today I finally came up with a full plot outline, back story and the whole story! I am so very excited! I have never had a full plot/outline for a book that actually made me excited and I can’t wait to write it!
So I’m taking steps in the right direction. I have a lot of time to just relax and fall in love with art again this summer. I am going to try to work more on my blog as well, I have great plans for this little blog of mine and hope to get it where I want it to be! :)
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