ArtiphyTheHeart

Doodling The Clock

This evening was the final teleconference for the Creating Time Mega Event launching the book Creating Time: Using Creativity to Reinvent the Clock and Reclaim Your Life by Marney Makridakis.  I've attended all three, and I must say that I've had more fun, met more people, and been introduced to more new books and websites than in any other webinar I've taken part in.  

In each of the three events, we've doodled clocks.  Instructions were to take moments instead of taking notes.  So I recorded the pregnant pauses as well as the salient points while I looked for the metaphors.  I listened intently, watched a video, composed a group poem, and adjourned to small groups twice for discussions.  All this over a period of an hour and a half, all the while doodling my clock and taking notes moments.  

At the end of the webinar, I was surprised.  I really hadn't looked at the paper I was doodling on in the process.  I was on autopilot, expanding time by layering my activity, my attention heightened and present for listening, moment taking, doodling, and coloring, all at once and equally present, all happing at once within the same moment in time.  

Who says time isn't pliable as putty?  Here's what I discovered I had done by the end of the evening: Not a piece of art, but a cohesive collection of ideas, colors, pattern, and metaphor.  A surprising outcome for someone who was present in so many places at the time the drawing was taking place.  

Quite different from multi-tasking, this was a free act of letting the hand do it's work while the brain watched and listened.  The words "Creating Time" and the date were added afterward.  Everything else was done while participating in the event.  

So I wanted to take the time to share this with you, and let you know that I highly recommend the book, Creating Time: Using Creativity to Reinvent the Clock and Reclaim Your Life. It's filled with insights, activities and wisdom from the more than 80 artists, creatives, authors and other luminaries who contributed to this effort.  Yesterday was its release date on amazon.com and it hit #1 in sales in numerous categories.  I'm not surprised.  

If you're interested -- and who wouldn't be? -- in celebration of the book's overwhelming success on it's first day of release, the special offer I mentioned in yesterday's post has been extended until April 24. You can find out more by clicking HERE to read yesterday's blog post, or by clicking HERE to sign up for the offer itself.  There are more than $125 worth of fabulous and absolutely free items and perks, just for buying a book you'd want to own anyway.  I know, because I took advantage of it and spent hours downloading all the fabulous morsels and tidbits, which include e-books, online courses, audio recordings and more.  Really.  What are you waiting for?  This isn't a sales pitch, it's my own personal opinion.  As they say, you snooze, you loose, so go for it!

Time Sensitive! Don't Wait! Creating Time And Free Stuff!

WOW!  Marney Makridakis of Artella has put together a package of freebies worth more than $125!  

This post is not an advertisment.  It's a public service to creatives everywhere!  I just hope I'm not too late in posting for you to take advantage of this amazing package of goodies!

You may already know that Marney has published her new book Creating Time: Using Creativity to Reinvent the Clock and Reclaim Your Life.  Today, April 17, 2012, is the release day!  And to celebrate, Marney has put together a package of goodies worth more than $125, free to anyone who orders Creating Time: Using Creativity to Reinvent the Clock and Reclaim Your Life today.  In a minute I'll tell you how to get this fabulous package, but first I want to tell you why I didn't mention it until now.

To get the more than $125 worth of freebies, the book must be ordered on the release date--TODAY!  I have been excited about this book since I first heard about it last December, and I have mentioned it in past blog posts.  But call me skeptical, I wanted to see for myself what was in the free package of goodies before I urged you all to place your orders on the 17th of April -- Today -- so I decided to place my own order first, open my package of goodies, then decide whether or not to pass along the information.  I've been saving an Amazon gift card just for this very purchase, so it was great to find out that in order to get the freebies, the order must be placed online with either Amazon or Barnes and Noble.  

I placed my order, followed the directions to type my order number into the correct box in the form on this page: http://www.artellaland.com/time.html, and within minutes, I had an email in my inbox with a .pdf filled with links to goodies provided by Artella, and also from the many contributors to Marney's book, people like creative coach Jill Badonsky, author ofThe Nine Modern Day Muses (and a Bodyguard) Third Edition, andThe Awe-manac: A Daily Dose of Wonder.

I'm not going to list everything that is in the package of goodies because I think it's meant to be a surprise, but suffice it to say that there are audio recordings, full length online classes, and more.  If you're interested in art, writing, or otherwise engaged in right-brain creative activities, this is SO generous, and SO worth it!  And all for the cost of a book you'd want to buy anyway.  At least I couldn't wait to buy it! 

I rarely tell you to go out and get something, so today is really special.  Just don't wait.  Offer ends at midnight!  

Here's a reprise of a journal page I created during the events leading up to the kick off ofCreating Time: Using Creativity to Reinvent the Clock and Reclaim Your Life.  You may have seen this page already since it was in my last blog post HERE, but just in case, it's apropos to the day!  

P.S.  I get nothing extra for passing along this information.  As I said at the beginning of my post, this is a public service, not an advertisement.  But if you do decide to order, please consider using the links to the books that I've provided within this post, because I do get credit from Amazon if you place your order directly from clicking the Amazon links in this blog post.  Then go back to the link on this page to the form and type in your Amazon order number.  Thanks!  You won't be disappointed!

The Beginning Of Time

Monday marked the official start of Creating Time, a mega event that you can learn more about and even join for free by clicking the link on my right sidebar.  Part of this event is the featured launch of a new book by Marney Makridakis of Artella: Creating Time: Using Creativity to Reinvent the Clock and Reclaim Your Life.  I've been anxiously awaiting the release of this book for ages, and I can't wait till a copy is in my hands!

Every day throughout this event a new exercise in seeing, thinking about, and experiencing time in unique and potent ways is presented to each of the participants.  Monday's activity focused on answering a list of questions about time specifically and in general, culminating with an art project to illustrate the essence gleaned through the process.  You can see mine in a minute.

But first, before I share the journal page I did for this project, I'd like you to take a few seconds and watch this snippet of a video I put together with watches from various magazine ads.  And I want you to notice.  Notice what?  Well, that's what you have to figure out.  What do you see?  Don't scroll down till you've watched or you'll spoil what may be a surprising fact.

 

Ok, now that you've watched, did you notice anything unique?  Unusual?  Different?  Similar?  Surprising? Or perhaps even suspicious?  

Before I tell you what I noticed and what it means, let me share my journal page for Monday's Creating Time, Day 1, and tell you a little bit about it.

The first thing I did was to sketch my little drawing of someone (me, perhaps?) laid-out flat in her efforts to uphold time.  She has to keep time balanced while the clock is ticking without letting it crush her in the process.  Sound familiar?  I'm sure we all feel this way at times.  

Next, I found the clock image I wanted to use.  I could have drawn it.  It would have taken less time and effort, but I wanted the contrast and interplay that comes from using multiple types of images in collage.  I found a few other parts of pages in magazines that caught my eye, so I ripped them out too.  Then I decided which journal to use.  

I keep several "open" (aka: ready for use) journals of different shapes and sizes available at any given time.  One of the benefits of this is that there is always something on hand, ready to accomodate any size page that a combination of images will dictate.  This way the artwork is king, not the size and shape of the page.  I grabbed the journal that best suited the project, and started arranging and re-arranging the components until I came up with a pleasing composition, then I glued them down.  

All the while, I kept my answers to the time questions in front of me so that my answers stayed in the back of my mind throughout the selection and arrangement process.   When everything was on the page, I took a break, had a cup of tea, then came back and took a look.  The page contained all my answers, and more.  It showed me things I hadn't thought of while answering the questions.  Things that were just as pertinent, perhaps even more.  So I began to write.  First a thought here, then a thought there, then another over in that corner, and also one right here at the side.  My thoughts flowed onto the page, becoming commentary on my perceptions of time.

And now, back to the video.  I was searching for clock face images when I happened across the watches I clipped for the video.  I wanted a clock face or two to add to my little drawing.  I kept finding images of diamond watches, artsy clock faces, and unusual artistic shapes when all I wanted was something clear and the proper size for my drawing, but  I decided to cut them all out as I went through the magzines and sort them later.  

As I clipped, I noticed that all the watches were set to the same time.  10:10.  I looked through another magazine.  Same thing.  10:10, regardless of brand.  I started to Google "watches set to 10:10".  The minute I typed-in "watches", the words "set at 10:10" automatically popped up in the search.  Apparently lots of people know this.  My husband knew it when I asked him about it.  You probably already know it too.  I would have thought that I would have known it, having worked in advertising, but then I never did a clock or watch ad, or worked for anyone who carried those accounts.  Here's the deal:  10:10 is an industry standard.  When watches and clocks are used in advertisments, setting them at 10:10 puts the hands in the best position to frame the name of the maufacturer.  It's easiest to read "Timex" or "Rolex" when the hands are set at 10:10.  

So there you have it.  Now you can say:  "I knew that!"  Or, you can say, "Wow!  I never knew that." Or you can get your friends to watch my little video and ask them what they see.  If you have the time, of course.

Little Pages

Most of my time is taken up with painting.  I work around a painting in layers, section by section.   While one section dries I work on another, then I go back and add more layers, fleshing it out.  This is slow, satisfying work.  I spend a lot of time thinking about it while I paint, and I take breaks often.  I love this slow work that takes a days, weeks, or months to complete.  But I also have a real need to finish something in a day for the pat-on-the-back that a sense of completion brings.  

This isn't the reason I work in a tiny collaged book that will morph into an art journal.  I do it because I love it, and because it provides a home for some very luscious snippets that really shouldn't end up in the dust bin.  But working in a tiny book does have the added benefit of quick accomplishment, especially when it's broken up into tasks, such as collage and paint today, embellish and journal on another day.  

Here are a couple of 2 page spreads from my tiny collage book.  They have a very unfinished look partly because they are unfinished, and partly because they haven't yet been sewn into book form.  Working this small, it's much easier for me to collage and embellish the pages, then sew and journal later.  If you click HERE, you can see a post that puts the size of these tiny pages into perspective.  The pages are 3" X 4-1/2".  The book is the one I'm holding in my hand in the first photo when you click the link, and also in the last photo when you scroll down. 

I've also been spending a lot of time reading.  I'm a big fan of Haruki Murakami, and I'm finding that his book1Q84 is unputdownable.  I work more smoothly when I'm in the middle of really good fiction.

And last but not least, there's a new post up on ArtiPhybers.  Click HERE and take a look.

Shorts Book

Here's another first book for those who are learning bookbinding.  Once again, even though I've made these in the past, I'm so glad to have the refresher course because there's so much I'd forgotten.  I had to ask for clarification that my page-turning was in the correct order, but it turns out that I got it right.

This is another book constructed from a single sheet of paper.  I used 98# Canson mixed-media paper, a heavier weight for this book than the last because there were fewer folds, and I didn't want the watercolor and ink to bleed through the pages.  It worked. I prepared the paper by spraying a light solution of gouache over a few of stencils on both sides.  I ground some ink and used the wet side of a sheet of sumi-é paper to make a few brush sketches.  When I realized that I had done nine cats, I got the idea for Nine Lives.

The cats were randomly sketched all over the paper, so I tore them out and added some gouache to the edges.  Pages three and four open up and down.  There are four folds and two sides, so eight pages in all.  I decided to use these up and down pages to add the ninth cat.

The chop I used says "long life".  It's a traditional chop carved from soap stone and I inked it with the traditional toxic red chop ink that takes forever to dry.  I zapped it with a hairdryer to speed things up, but I think it will take the full few weeks before it sets, regardless.  In the meantime, I blotted it a bit, then separated the pages with waxed paper.

This book is part of a project that some members of Artists Of The Round Table are working on.  We plan to make 100 books using Alisa Golden's bookMaking Handmade Books: 100+ Bindings, Structures & Forms as our guide.  

If you'd like to see all posts of the books I'm making for this project, scroll up to the top of this page, click on "Archives", then click on "Making Handmade Books Workshop" from the category menu.  

Toys

Even when I was a child, I loved vintage toys.  I always preferred a vintage rag doll, a porcelain beauty, or a hand-carved pull-toy to most of the newest and most popular toys on the market.  I loved paper dolls, puppets with strings, and everything with simple to complex mechanical moving parts.  And if there was a way to make my own, even better!  I had my favorites. I was over the moon with Steiff originals, and I still am.

When our Affair With Art group challenged us to create something with movable parts, I was all over it in a flash!  I thought of all the wind-up toys I had, and fondly remembered my clockwork Organ Grinder and his Monkey.  Combining my love of paper dolls and the movement of the arms and legs of the fabulous Steiff animals, I used StampFrancisco's "Cymbal Monkey" stamp from Bartholomew's Ink to craft the trio pictured above.  

The assembly, in case you want to make one:  For each monkey made, three stamps must be printed.  The orignal stamp shows only a fraction of one leg, so it must be "built" from a scrap of the fully pictured leg, then glued into place.  This leaves only a partial torso from the leg which was cut.  Another of the same leg must be cut and hinged with a brad to a torso with the upper part of that leg still intact, thus the need for three prints.  Then it's just cut and glue, color, and assemble.

Some resources:  If you're interested in making toys that move, I've listed a few of my favorites.  I've seen them all and own a couple of them.  It always amazes me how easy it can be to make things that seem so complex once you have a good set of directions.  And after making a few things, you inevitably start to use that knowledge to design things of your own.  

Karakuri: How to Make Mechanical Paper Models That Move is a great book for making whimsical moving toys with paper and card stock.

Paper Puppet Palooza: Techniques for Making Moveable Art Figures and Paper Dolls is in my library, and I've used it as a resource for more than one project.

Making Shadow Puppets (Kids Can Do It) isn't just for kids.  There's a lot of basic information in this book that will translate into tons of your own original projects.

If you'd like to try your hand a making vintage toys out of wood, Turning Vintage Toys by Chris Reid is a great book with beautiful pictures and step-by-step instructions.  Even if you're not into wood, the photos in this book make it a great addition to any home or studio library.

More Collage

I love knowing what people are up to and reading status updates, but I hate whining, so I hope you won't think I'm whining when I tell you that from the 18th of December until just a few hours ago, I had the flu.  It affected a knee joint.  Flu + trouble walking was not a fun combo.  The knee is somewhat better but it still bothers me, and the flu is pretty much gone except for the residual tiredness.  Still, I managed to get some things done, and also to teach myself to use iPhoto for the slide presentation I uploaded to Vimeo.*  Sitting at the counter in my fuzzy slippers, cutting and glueing was really good medicine.

 

 

Here are the 13 pages I created during flu fog for Kelly Kilmer's Revel In The Moment workshop.  Much fun!  I didn't realize just how much a person could create when even too foggy to read a book or watch a movie.  This was the perfect thing.  I could work, drink tea, then rest.  I've been doing this for so many years that I've found I can collage on auto pilot, which is something I wouldn't have guessed if I hadn't been placed in the situation.  Although, I vaguely remember being sick in bed as a child and my mother bringing me a tray with magazines to cut out, scissors, and paper to glue things on.  So maybe collage is my comfort food.  

Now that so many pages have been done I've decided  to collage the entire book before working the pages with with the good stuff--paint, mark making, lettering, and journaling.  Not the way I usually do it, but hey, nothing wrong with being pushed into a different way of working in order to adjust to the situation at hand.   Who knows?  I just might find I like this well enough to do it another time.

 

* A head's up for those of you who have ever used slide.com:  Slide will be leaving the web in early March of 2012.  You have only a month or so to get your photos moved, or lose them forever.  Just saying, just in case...

Eight and Nine

Yesterday I decided to remake a page.  Actually, I do this almost every day.  It isn't about whether or not I like what's on the page, it's about putting what I happen to want on the page today, and reconciling that with what's already there.  I could start with a blank page.  In fact, I do that all the time.  I've heard people say that blank pages can be intimidating.  I've also heard people say that pages with too much stuff on them can be confusing.  Since I'm neither intimidated nor confused, it really doesn't matter to me whether the page is blank, or full.  Either way, to me it's a just substrate.  

Here's the semi-finished product--semi-finished, because it hasn't been written upon yet. The pages are really not wonderful until they've been written on, so this one still has a long way to go.

 The page was remade primarily with paint, and a pine tree that I drew and carved into a stamp several years ago.  "Road-tested" was clipped from a magazine and used as-is.  "High Altitude" was constructed from white rub-on letters on top of a piece of black magazine paper cut to fit the top. The road and date were drawn onto the page with a Rapidograph and Inda ink.  

For remade pages, much of the the beauty is simply that what's under the finished product lends so much to the final outcome, both texturally, and in meaning, that the page wouldn't at all have been the same if what's underneath hadn't been there in the first place.

 Here's what was underneath the page above when I started:

If you look closely, and maybe squint, you can see some of the dots and part of that smilely face underneath the finshed page.  I didn't remove a thing.  Even the brown grid tape was laid on top of the pink tape that was already there, which added to the color of the tape layer on top.  

I use art journals and sketchbooks to stretch my creative muscles.  Sometimes that means sketching out plans.  Sometimes it means glueing-in a lot of things that please me.  Things which might contain elements I'll want to use in a finished piece later.  Sometimes it's all about color, and making notes.  

This particular book was made for Mary Ann Moss's Full Tilt Boogie workshop, and I've been working in it since mid-summer.  I'm using it to stretch my conscious creative decision making.  I say conscious, because so many of the decisions we make are habitual and shortcut the thought process.  This book is full of pages patched together alongside full blank pages, alongside pages with other elements added.  If you'd like to see what the book looked like just after it was created and before I started working on the pages, there's a flip-through you can see by clicking HERE and scrolling down to the bottom of the page.

Speaking of other elements, I drew some of those today to use later.  I've used quite a few frames on other pages of this book, and really like how they can be used to confine and define select words and design elements, so I drew a couple of funky frames with a wide-tipped Sharpie to have on hand for future pages, one on plain paper, and one on patterned.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

That takes care of Days 8 and 9 of Traci Bunker's 30 Days of Drawing.  A great incentive to keep pencil to paper, and to post about it.  It's not too late to join the challenge.

Variations On A Theme

For days six and seven of Traci Bunkers 30 Days of Drawing, I've used the same inspiration piece.  The short story is that every Thursday my friend Rita and I try to meet for coffee and drawing, and last Thursday, Rita was drawing an owl that I fell in love with.  You can click HERE to see Rita's owl.  Her inspiration was an artificial sweetener ad from a magazine.  When she finished, and I continued to "Ooooh" and "Ahhhh" over her drawing, she handed me the ad and said, "Take it home with you and do it yourself.  Just be sure to bring it back with you next week.  It will be fun to see the differences in our drawings."  It sounded like a great idea to me, so I started playing around with it on day six, and here's what I came up with:

 

Techinically, he isn't finished, but I might just leave him as is.  I'm really happy with the way he's peeking out from the spine of my art journal/sketchbook.

I decided to take the process a little further today.  You can click HERE to see my Day Seven drawing.  Since it's a mandala, I posted it to ArtiphyTheSoul.  Amazing what all can be done with variations on a theme, and I'm ready to take this even further and use it in other ways, as well.  Maybe experiment with the general patterns using other colors, added textures and different subject matter. 

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And for those of you who are interested, I posted a commentary on artistic productivity to ArtiPhacts today.  You can read it by clicking HERE.

Word!

More exercises from Quinn's book!  I'm loving the group of us that are working our way, page by page, through Raw Art Journaling , guided by Quinn McDonald herself, and her handcrafted lists of exercises designed to stretch and flex our creative muscles.  

This past week was all about words and squeezing them to get the meaning out.  Here are some of mine inside the container I made for them:

What I did with the words is something else all together!  Amazing what can come from just a handful of words!  I won't show you here, but you can come and join us HERE to find out!

Sunset Orange

I've mentioned before that I'm following Kelly Kilmer's Journey Of You workshop (JOY), and that I love the taped binding, paperback journals we use in the class.  I've made dozens of them since first following Kelly's PDF.  I've also mentioned that we're doing a fun project to stretch our color muscles in another group I belong to, by working our way through the entire set of Crayola colors and creating separate illustrations for each of those colors.  

I keep a lot of journals "open" (available to work in) at a time, and I work in each of them differently.  The sole purpose of these books is artistic growth.  Some are sketchbooks.  Some are collage.  Some are mixed media.  Some are watercolor.  Some are sumi-é.  There are others, each with their own purpose, as well as their own media.  This particular book combines collage and pen work almost exclusively.  

Today I'm going to outline the method I use in this book to get the color on the page and tie it all together.   I'll also tell you the general set of rules I created for this page, and how I used them to make sense of the page, by resolving the remaining disparate elements of composition.

First, I scribbled a generous amount of the Crayola color du jour, in this case Sunset Orange, onto a clean swatch of white paper.  I grabbed a small handful of magazines and a pair of scissors, and quickly flipped through each magazine, stopping only when the color on a page matched the swatch of crayon color in my hand, and I cut it out, then kept going.  

With those cut swatches in hand, I then started my page flipping fresh, in order to find various tints, shades and saturations of the same hue, located them, and cut.  Then I did a third flip-through, looking for one major, and one minor accent color, keeping in mind the (interior) design maxim, "something dark, something light, something dull, and something bright."  

Once I had all my swatches, I set the magazines aside and fiddled with a background arrangement.  I limited my choices to the shapes and textures of what I had cut out, and how they would actually fit on the page.  

In this book, I purposely make myself work with page sizes that are large in order to put myself in a position to have to strain my brain to use only the limited stash I've cut to work with.  If my pages were small, I might be able to get away with only one or two pieces.  But with larger pages, there is inevitably the need to piece some things togehter, not having enough of one or more cut colors to fill the larger space.  

At the same time, I work with another rule that I made for myself which requires the composition to be artistically balanced.  My personal rule for this book is that it doesn't have to make sense in any other regard. I'm not working with images, I'm composing with color.  If an image or a pattern springs up, it's used for the color and the balance of color, not because of what it represents as an image.  I don't lo0k for subjects;  I let the subjects evolve.

When the page is covered, I step back.  I usually take a break and walk away from it for awhile.  The break also gives the glue some time to dry, which helps the page uncurl.  Then I come back to it, and if necessary, I look at it very closely and ask it what it needs.  Maybe the answer is "nothing".

A "nothing" answer is so rare that truly, I can't rememer if it has ever actually happened.  Most often, a focal point is either lacking entirely, or needs support.  This is when I look for, or create, specific "fits" for the piece.  I ask some balance questions, too. Too chunky?  Add some line.  Too liniar?  Add some chunks.  Too dark? Add some light, Too light, add some dark, etc., etc.  I make everything , including the date, part of the composition by including it the most auspicious place.  

If you're a collage artist and not sure which of your creative muscles most need to be stretched, I'd recommend Kelly's J.O.Y. workshop.  I'd also recommend Kelly's workshop if you already know what you're doing and just want to have fun.  Guaranteed, you'll learn something new along the way.  If you're paying attention to what you're doing, Kelly's classes train you to teach yourself new things.  You'll develop a better sense of compostion, and also a better sense of detail.  Your eyes will be sharpened.  

Kelly gives you everthing you need to get started: Clear instructions for making the book you'll use, an array of design templates that you can use as-is, or customize, a place to share your work and interact with others who are on the same artistic path, and personal feedback when you need it.  

The rules I followed for my page were my own, not Kelly's.  But with Kelly's workshop, you will inevitably discover things that you are more and less comfortable with, and you'll begin to create for yourself, new and different rules each time you work.  You'll stretch.  

My advice is to push yourself in the direction of your discomfort.  Create artistic dilemmas through rules you make which severly limit your choices.  Create conflict, then resolve it.  You'll be amazed at what you find you can do after all.  And once you've become familiar with them and have learned to master them,  a lot of things that you thought you didn't like to do will mysteriously begin to appear on your lists of "like to do" items.  

When it comes to your artistic tool box, which is simply your set of skills, there is one overriding truth:  If you hate something, it's your master.  If you love it, you've mastered it.

Once Upon A Time

I sat down with my brush and inked out a rooster, with absolutely no idea why.   What is a rooster?  Why is it on my mind, so close to consciouness that my brush put it on paper?  Roosters signifiy morning.  Wake up.  Sunrise.  A new day.  

Then my daily dose of Wylde Women's Wisdom from Tammy Vitale hit my inbox.  It all became clear.  My rooster was there to remind me to begin each and every new day with Once Upon A Time.  

Once Upon A Time, Barbara woke up, and by opening her eyes to the morning, she began a whole new day, filled with endless possibilities and magical outcomes!

 Once upon a time is always now and always forever.

 Once upon a time is a sacred place and a sacred time

in which miracles happen.

 

It's the essence of a fairy tale.  It's the essence of story.

 

When we hear it, we become a child.  That is,

we become innocent.

We are ready and able to understand

what is mysterious.

 

I mean, you can hear as you listen to the story

the way it speaks our journeys.

 

Deena Metzger

 

 

Wylde Women's Wisdom collected and brought to you by Tammy Vitale.

 

 

 

Moleskine Rabbit

Once again, no time to grind ink sticks to a rich black and make the seven shades of gray.  Patiently grinding sumi-é ink is one of the most meditative and helpful practices I've found to center oneself for artwork.  But I have to live with my Western schedule, which sometimes means exchanging Eastern ink sticks and brushes for pencils and brush markers.   

I should have been more attentive to the limitations of the priniting in my Western dictionary.  The second character of the calligraphy was printed with an ink flaw which colosed it at the top, and I copied that mistake on to this page.  My daughter corrected me, but saw the dictionary mistake only after I had already copied  it onto my drawing.

I have a reason for making these sketches, beyond the calming joy and satisfaction the process brings.  They are seeds of a larger project which I will tell you about when the time is ripe.

If you are interested in sumi-é, I suggest you begin with looking at lots and lots of artwork until you begin to notice the subtleties that make each painting completely different.  

This isn't something to undertake if you plan to treat it casually.   It is most advantageous to have a sensei, or master teacher, if you are lucky enough to find one.  

If you plan to study from a book, the best book I know of for a comprehensive study is The Mustard Seed Garden Manual of Painting.  

Also very good, Wang Jia Nan and Cai Xiaoli's book Oriental Painting Course: A Practical Guide to Painting Skills and Techniques of China and the Far East is one that I have read and refer to quite often.  

It is futile to study the technique without also practicing the way, as this type of art eminates from and communicates an unbroken inner energy, or "chi".  Without "chi", or with broken "chi", there is no life to the drawing, no matter how skillfully rendered.  

I recommeded a film to watch, and I posted the trailer to it in yesterday's blog post, HERE.   It's a documentary of a Japanese-American master painter, and one of the most uplifting movies I've ever seen.

Moleskine Cats

All I had to work with were three Pitt brush pens, a Moleskine, a couple of cats lingering in my imagination, and about 15 minutes.  I was itching for ink and a brush, but had to make do.  Much better than nothing, but to tell the truth, I don't like quickly covering large areas with markers.  I much prefer ink.  

Speaking of cats, if you haven't seen The Cats of Mirikitani , then you haven't seen one of the best films ever created.  Ever.  No exaggeration.  Here is the trailor, but it doesn't begin to do justice to the film, which will restore faith in human nature to all but those who are beyond hope.  

I've been told it's an instant play on Netflix, if you're a subscriber.  It's definitely a must-see, and after you've seen it, I think you'll agree that it belongs in everyone's library, to view, and view again!

Visionary

This is one of my favorite ways to work in a journal.  Not because of any particular technique, combination of techniques, or content, but because of the process of discovery.  Sometimes it delays, and that takes patience, but it never disappoints.  

I make up the rules spontaneously as I go along, working in segments that I define and set time limits to.  It doesn't matter what comes first, second, third.  I just decide, for instance, that I'm going to use two things I haven't used in ages, and three things I use all the time.  I set the timer for 8 minutes and use them.  Then I move on.  Maybe this time I'll write for 5 minutes.  Maybe I'll decide to pick up 3 magazines and cut out things that catch my eye for 4 minutes, then take another 2 minutes to use them all.  It doesn't matter what, how long, or when.  It's about rules, but rules decided randomly, on the spot.  So in the greater context, it's not about rules, it's about me, and my choices of the moment.

 

Without fail, these are the sketchbook pieces that I identify with personally, as opposed to pieces that identify me.   I don't work to illustrate my identity or define myself.  When I'm working, especially in this type of process, I identify intimately with the work that evolves, as it evolves.  

In dreams, the symbols and  connections that are brought to mind by the dream cannot accurately be defined outside the context of life of the dreamer.  In this respect, these sketchbook spreads are like dreams.  Each of the symbols a person perceives, even archetypical symbols, can be defined only through the life and experiences of that individual.  So whatever you see here, it's for you.  If you make identifications in my work and draw parallels, it won't be me you're seeing, it will be yourself. 

Of course this is finished.  And it isn't finished.  Which means that it has said all it has to tell me today.  I think probably this is where it stays, at least for now.   But you never know about later.   

There are lots of great things that come out of working like this for me.  Two of the biggest benefits are that these types of pages almost unfailingly lead to stand alone work, outside of the sketchbook.  Not work that looks like the sketchbook, but work that the sketchbook evokes.  

The other huge benefit is what I see after I've finished, walked away for a time, and then come back fresh.  Things that looked like something at first, now seen in a new light, take on different meanings.  There are Aha! moments.  Things I saw before that had me saying to myself, "I think this may be...." and, "Hmmm, this looks a bit like....", etc., all of a sudden jump out and have me saying, "Ah!  So that's what that is!"  

If you haven't done this type of work before it may seem a bit odd, crazy, quasi-mystical, etc.  But it's none of those things.  It's just making dreams from the unconscious appear on paper, and going back to see what they might have to say, then using ideas from them in larger works.  That's simply all there is to it.