Moving From Inspiration to Art

This is a piece from my scrap pile. It began life as an earwire gone wrong. As I was clearing up my workspace for the day, it caught my eye and triggered a thought: while it was too fat and short to be an earwire, it had a pleasing curve to it so I plyed around with the design and this is what it became.











That piece became this:



And then this:

So, for now, I'm lost on a curve and spiral obsession. My mind wanders through possibilities: snails, nautilus shells, the monument in Ireland at New Grange; which leads on to Celtic style knotwork and on and on, . . . until I have several sketchbook pages full of ideas. Some of them will become artwork of one form or another, most will remain only sketches, their job of being springboards to the next idea complete.

Then there is another form of inspiration: the ones that are blank potential just waiting to be born!



Crayons, raw copper, brand new unsharpened pencils, a spool of wire: and the list goes on, . . . for all of us.













By the way, this



became this


















So, what will the pile of raw copper become? Whatever it is, it will eventually show up in my ArtFire shop so be sure to check here and over there.
In the meantime, I'd love to hear from you! Leave a comment and share something that inspires you.

Reviving Flagging Creativity

365 Days of Creativity

It’s been a really long time since I’ve posted anything. I’ve found that It’s all too easy to get caught up in the day to day grind of making a living and taking care of business. My soul suffers when I don’t take the time to create, so I’m embarking on an adventure to do something creative every day for the next 365 days. The ‘image bank’ in my mind has run dry. My ultimate goal is to produce more pieces to post here! Follow along with me, or jump into this challenge yourself. Check out my blog: www.lisas365daysofcreativity.blogspot.com

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Any gardeners out there? Check my new blog. Let's talk gardening! http://ping.fm/XIBNA

Time for ‘Doing Nothing’

I had a day off from ‘regular’ work today—you know, the work that pays the bills? For the next few weeks, I’m actually working 2 jobs, adding up to almost 60 hours a week. I’m tired, . . . really tired! But today is my only day off and I found myself in a dilemma. Because this is my only day off during the week, there are so many things calling for my attention, things screaming to be done. I had planned on working in the yard today; mowing the grass, preparing a new flower bed and a new veggie bed. But, it’s raining, . . . .

Ok, then there are dishes in the sink, I need groceries, there is dust on the furniture and the floors, clothes to be laundered, . . . . and the list goes on, and on, and on.

Then, of course, there are drawings waiting impatiently on the easel and the drawing board, also calling for my attention. Problem is, I can’t focus when there are so many things that need attention, so here I sit at the computer, surfing and thinking and typing away.

I felt really guilty at first, just sitting and letting all the ‘work’ call to me only to be ignored. However, the longer I sat, the better my soul felt; and I began to think about ‘stillness’. Yes, that’s what has been missing of late—great art can and does come from chaos, but there must be the times of stillness in order for the mind to gather up the chaos and organize it on paper—whether you are a visual artist, a writer, or a musician.

And so, . . . the art will come in its own time, after this time of mixed chaos and stillness, . . . stay tuned, . . .

Color

I’ve been thinking a lot about color this week. Normally, I work from photographs (my own, of course!), but right now I have a Celtic knot work piece on my drawing board. When I work with photos in a realistic style, the colors are pretty much set—I only have to interpret them. Granted, once in a while I take a little ‘artistic license’ and veer off on my own a bit. But this time, there are no photos; this piece is purely from my imagination, so it’s up to me to choose the color palette. I’ve found this to be one of the most difficult challenges I’ve faced in a while. Why? Why should it be so difficult to set a color scheme? For me, I think it’s because I love color! There are too many choices, so decisions had me paralyzed for a few days! LOL! I finally chose a palette for this piece, but since I had such a tough time with it, this will most likely end up as a series instead of only one!


If one says "Red" – the name of color – and there are fifty people listening, it can be expected that there will be fifty reds in their minds. And one can be sure that all these reds will be very different. (Josef Albers)


That is a really interesting quote to me—I happen to think that it is ‘spot on’! Just like everything else in life, it all boils down to experience. Colors evoke memories in us. Some have good connotations to us, some bad, and some neutral. How do those colors make us feel about a piece of art? How often are we drawn to a specific piece not because of excellence of execution or interesting subject matter, but purely by the colors?


I’m going to try an experiment this week: I’m going to ask a few people to head to the paint dept. of their favorite store and pick out one red, one blue, and one yellow paint chip. I’m going to collect them all, compare them and then ask everyone why they chose the particular shade that they chose.


I’d love to hear your thoughts on color. Please feel free to comment!

Contrast in Art and In Life

Contrast
Verb. To set in opposition in order to show or emphasize differences.
Noun. A difference, especially a strong dissimilarity, between entities or objects compared.
One thing that is strikingly dissimilar to another.
The use of opposing elements, such as colors, forms, or lines, in proximity to produce
an intensified effect in a work of art.
The difference in brightness between the light and dark areas of a picture, such as a
photograph or video image.


Contrast: it’s what allows our eyes to see. Think about it; if everything we see were only in mid-tones and we converted it to black and white—what would we see? My eye is drawn to things that have really high contrast—very bright lights and very dark darks. It makes my eye wander over to the light, but I also wonder what lies in the dark areas. It piques my curiosity. It gives my mind something to play with; stimulates my imagination. I can make up entire stories about what could be in that darkness.

I happen to be a fan of horror/suspense movies. While the graphic visuals can be amazing and get your heart pumping, to me, nothing can beat the ones that leave your imagination to fill in the blanks. It’s an interesting phenomenon; our brains are capable of coming up with many and varied, and at times, much more scary images than if the film-makers gave us the whole image. It makes us a part of the action, by forcing our brain to participate in the making of the movie—it becomes partly our creation. I also love it when a movie ends prematurely; you know, when you feel as if there were more to the story, so that you are forced to imagine what comes next.

So, how does that translate into our art? Visual artists use the same ‘tricks’. We use compositional elements to lead the viewer’s eye around the painting, we use soft or disappearing edges to force the viewer’s eye to finish that section of the painting for himself, and we leave part of the story of the particular piece untold to give the viewer a chance to make the art his own.

Alright, so here’s the challenge: involve your viewers in your artwork by adding some contrast!

Quote: A common problem for beginners is their fear of bold contrast. The decision to reduce tonal range in this way is a misguided attempt to draw attention away from any errors. It only robs the work of vitality and depth. (Janine Parsons)