Saturday and Sunday were my studio days this week. Taking this time is not easy, not the art part, but the feelings part. Much of the time I felt like I did the first few days of my residency last year. As in, "what am I doing here?" "me, artist?". The kind of strangeness where you look over your shoulder and anticipate someone telling you to stop and get back to regular life. I had all these shoulds, "the house needs cleaning", you are not being a good girlfriend", "the dogs need a walk", "oh, this would be much easier if my studio were not in the house" and on and on. I had a hard time focusing and concentrating, but when I look around I did do a lot...
Front cover of my "junk" sketchbook
So... I had this idea. I have had this idea for a while, and it's been pressing at me. First I made a "junk" sketchbook out of discarded paper from work, magazine cover (Thanks Toby), staples and tape. I love these type of sketchbooks because you can totally mess in them and not care.
Back to the idea... I wanted to make an adventure of sketching. I started at the library with my sketchbook, a pen and one of those twirly/spinner things from a board game. I gave myself 2 hours to walk in the direction the spinner pointed and then sketch for 10. It was a mixed bag. I wouldn't do the spinner thing again, I would choose a more interesting route and map it out first and just stop and draw what interested me most. The weather was warm and WET!! It drizzled on me and poured. The sketchbook is still all wet.
No matter my insecurities and "shoulds" this is the hard part of taking these days... they end.
They end and then I don't get them for a week. This is negative I know, but true.
Happy Monday, Alice are you there?
2 comments:
How bout a penny hike? You come to a junction, flip the penny and go the direction (heads left - tails right) the coin indicates. Just one idea from working with kids in the olden days. One other option.
A penny hike... I like that idea!
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