Be Limitless Stray from the Path

The quickest path between two points is a straight line. In a crowded world that is nearly impossible.

I like the winding path. Un-enforced and edge-bumping ways tickle my fancy and are traceable only by having passed by that way.

Stray from the path and be the explorer; sail for the edge of the map; do so with a kindly spirit and merry wonderment. Strive to overcome prior training.

I am sure of a shrinking list of propositions, like efficiency, production, and patterned recipes for success. I am friendlier toward my imagination and what I make when I ask:  “What if I?”

It is alright to stray from the path in Art. Meander in concept and in practice raise the hackles of design.

Fine but how to do all this “straying” and “raising of hackles”?

I suggest give up excuses. Then, consider each new project as an adventure; one that you make. Eliminating excuses means you have to perform. Excuses hold Artists back. Replace excuses with being limitless.

Limitless

Being limitless means experiment, explore, and expand a given method. Re-focus design, methods, and propositions, or generating more “What if’s”. In short it means give up relying on: “I can’t.”

• What other tools work? Inventive.
• What am I truly seeing here? Adaptative.
• What if this material or method were used as if it were…. [fill in the blank] Experimental.
• Transfer one set of learning to a new problem. Thinking.
• Make a new path. Keep your promises. Responsible
• Instructions are guides not shackles. Authentic voice.
• Personal experience is the real and the imagined. Placing You in the Design.
• Starting over is strength. Purposeful.
• Be thankful for serendipity. Happy accident or unconscious play.
• Put the “you” into your Art. Make your art a production, featuring your authentic voice. Produce your Art.
• Create your own projects. That is how you can be truly Expressive.

Becoming Limitless

Back to the allusion of getting from point A to point B in that straight line method of efficiency. In my design I intend to make point B because I can.

Drawing Blanks–How To

Ink & acrylic on stretched acetate

Many times I look at a blank page and have a curious thought: “what’s in there

that I need to find?” Have I trained myself to think that way? Yes and no. I go

that way mainly because I rebelled against blank pages (and walls) so I drew

some shape or made a splotch of color or scribed a word or a sentence. So I kept

the habit as I lived. It’s like giving a horse a little nudge in a wide open field

with no one else present, just a friend, the wind, and wide open spaces.

So what is the “how-to” of this?

Move forward and try.

See how far you can take your day-dream. Better yet see how it can take you.

All it needs is a little nudge.

Fables & Tales, Fox Amongst Hares

Fables tell us about who we are and how we came to be. They give us a shared basis we can use to know more about the world. In many cases Fables tell us about the world yet to come, the passage of time, and our generations as a people.

Tricksters and jokers have been our teachers for many generations.

This painting is a design for a small engagement and it will be a stage set for telling Trickster Tales.

The painted set will be on fabric with suitable lighting from behind the painting.

I want to invoke a night telling around a fire as may have happened when the original artist made their marks.

 

Smiles, I Artist

The obligation attached to being an Artist is to make things. Take something and make something else. I like collage in this way because it gives something different from the original materials.

Just “different” is not enough.  Only to a certain extent do I “know” what I am making. I received a lot of encouragement over the years, however, I still hear, “What’s that mess going to be?” I typed the words but not the quote, because it was not so easy on the eyes.

I gave up on what I was working on, even on Art more times than not. I had many un-finished drawings, ailing canvases, and un-used materials.  I put it up to impatience, but it was the message about the “mess” that came through later, without many smiles.

Now that is not so much the case. Now I power through the “comments” people make at classes or out in the public or when I share a sketch book with someone who is curious.

I usually hole up in the studio or somewhere private to draw.  I took some inspiration from allies and took the minimal kit to a public spot and drew.

“What’s that you’re doing? You’re an artist!” Now I’m surrounded by seven to eleven-year old people craning to see into my books and wanting to see more.

The more of my drawings I show them the more they are delighted. They smile a lot, all the way up into their eyes.

Now I sort of know what Art I’m making.

I’m making Smiles.

Picture This: Catching A Rainbow

Neighborhood Double Rainbow

Picture this: On a neighborhood street traffic is backed up, more of the usual stuff for those who dare to drive vehicles on roads.

This was a line of cars not moving, not for a crash, not for yielding right-of-way to a pedestrian (if that still happens). Drivers stopped in the street for a rainbow.

Arms of all shades poked out of car windows holding up phones taking pictures of a vibrant double rainbow.

Picture this, people stopped to take a picture of arching radiation wavelengths in the sky they deemed so very beautiful, of such imminence, worthy of a moment to capture it as a series of ones and zeroes with batteries freshly charged.

A small line of people snapping a moment of color, a shared event, group appreciation that was over quickly and the drivers resumed their drives. It was a bit goofy stopping in the middle of a neighborhood street for the pleasure of taking a picture. Better to stop for a moment than to try to get the picture in the sky whilst driving on the pavement.

In files on their phones they have the same scene, slightly different angle, from personal points of view at approximately the same time but it is theirs and mine and ours and my money is on us sharing it with at least half a dozen other people before the morning is out.

Perhaps the soul requires humans to recognize and to respond to colors, shapes, and scales that have the sky as a canvas as exhibited in a rainbow or even in fireworks.

I am sure none of the drivers were out to prank the rest of the motoring public as an “in-your-face” flow stoppage. My justification is I had to stop.

“Oh, by the way, might as well snap that giant rainbow sailing in the sky.”

Wednesdays are now Catching Rainbows Wednesday.

And I picture this: Catching other humans being Artists.

Mallory, First Year Teacher, Makes a Chair

Mallory you are already extra-ordinary as first year teacher in a new school– that kind of new as in it has just been built new. How do I know you are already exceptionally impressive, because you are seeking to make your own brand, something recognizable and memorable, and most telling, your trademark has meaning.

You looked at me and started the conversation with a question, “Are you a painter?”

I was in the art supply part of a big box store. I had brushes and paints in my basket.

I thought, being a painter is what I used to hear around the holiday dinner table when the folks referred to how someone in the family earned their daily bread. I smiled at the old-timey reference.

I said, “I am an artist.”

“That’ll do.” You were emphatic and asked me about painting a chair.

Painting a chair? A 3-D chair you sit on or one in a painting?

You smiled that teacher smile. You are good, very good.

You wanted your classroom chair to be special, to stand out. It was a rescue from a thrift store and you knew you could make it sparkle.

Why?

Because you will love what you will be doing, teaching, so much in a chair that is full of colors and shapes. It will engage the students’ imagination. It will also make a statement that the learning space is a special space. Therefore, you pupils must be so special too.

It’ll give you a certain dignity too.

Dignity and charm, two good allies for those who dare to teach others.

Mallory, I see you sitting on a stage in your special colorful chair in fifty-years surrounded by your pupils and former pupils. They will be honoring you for your service as a fantastic teacher, a role model of the highest quality.

You will begin your speech recounting your years as a teacher by telling your admiring audience, “Let me tell you about my chair and how I made it.”

You will tell them about your fabulous chair and your extraordinary life.

And they will marvel at you all the more.

I am pleased I was able to marvel at you when we had our brief conversation and how we searched for just the right colors for your chair. I enjoyed your vision and your ideas. How creative you are.

Thank you, Mallory. You touched something in my soul.

Free Art Friday Week 6

7″ x 7″ Color pencil on 40# paper.

I wanted a painting to convey healing and nurturing for this week’s Free Art Friday “drop”.

When the finder takes it home I hope they will feel what I put into this piece.

Love your work.

Love people more.