"Art is Coming Face to Face with Yourself" --Jackson Pollock

Good Morning! I found this quote while browsing rubber stamp sayings and immediately marked it down. I want to ask fellow artists how does this hit home for you? For a long time I actually feared my photography and writing abilities. Not fully delving into them. 


I felt as though my creativity was bottled up, encased for many years.  Fear freezing it up, so it was hard to get to. Until I was willing to come face to face with myself, hence face to face with what was holding me back to allow myself to be the creative person I know I am deep down. 

I am talking about being afraid to hear what my heart was whispering about doing different creative endeavors. Not trusting my own creative voice and not facing who I really was underneath. You probably know exactly what I'm talking about. 


I do believe it has been by the grace of God that this creative dam was broken inside me, and now my ideas for creative projects seems to flow steadily where I am often challenged to decide what to focus on first. 

For instance, in the last decade, when I spot something that interests me photographically, I find my camera and just snap away and then see if I have anything. Instead of mulling it over and over, is this a good picture or not?  It's best just to follow an instinct to where it wants to go.


I'm more willing to risk, try new things, face myself more! Another gauge is opening up your writing to critique. It is opening yourself up to others seeing who you are and thus you are vulnerable.  That's why it feels so scary. 


You ultimately see what has been hidden inside you and what you've allowed to come forth ... and allowing the story to unfold.  This could mean facing many things that you may not want to see.    

But from the gray, cold, dismal, eventually comes spring and summer ... Stay warm and fearless!!

What Dreams Are Made Of

At the onset of the 1990s, I had one of the most profound dreams I can remember. The setting was inside my childhood house on Mohn Street, pronounced moon. I could feel myself being drawn to the living room from upstairs, surrounded in darkness for the most part. The only thing illuminated was an easel with a canvas on it. 


I have the dream written down and the creative writing it inspired since then. The painting on the easel was supposed to be my father's. My father wanted to get training as an artist when he was in high school but wasn't able due to lack of finances. 

It wasn't until I acknowledged my own artist within as an adult did I realize how frustrating life must have been for my father. Although he did have one creative outlet, his music. He learned to play the accordion without lessons, but by ear.  

I have gotten so much from this one-scene dream, like a movie clip. Nothing was said and not really vivid. It's message was revealing. I should say its messages were many--Like pay attention to the silent whispers, the hidden canvas you've forgotten, or find that something waiting to be uncovered. Whether in writing and allowing a character to emerge from the depths of your psyche, or taking that first step to pick up a paint brush.  

It's about having the nerve to be creative, artistic. Listening to the revelation and picking up that camera or chisel and not be afraid of the surrounding darkness that sometimes presses in. Go forth this New Year, soon a month old, and dream up a storm!!!

Listening

A New Year is underway. I don't know about you, but my holidays felt very rushed and like I was on a high speed train watching the scenes go by quickly as I gazed out a window. Our world today is on a fast track and often we don't take time to listen. I'm speaking for myself. I find at times I'm thinking of other things while someone is trying to communicate a story or slice of their life to me.


Just like these old, rusty chairs I spotted along a walk through my neighborhood, if I hadn't seen something aesthetically pleasing about them and hurried past them, I would have missed something to photograph. Same goes for when I'm fretting and feel like I don't have time to really listen, I may miss an opportunity to share an important part of someone and possibly enrich my writing.

Not only did I find these worn chairs appealing, there is potential for a story here. Today I found myself entranced by an encounter I had with someone older than me and with a totally different life experience.  


I listened and really heard things he didn't say. That's what listening is all about, hearing what isn't spoken. He also knew how to weave a story and I immediately was drawn in to his world.

Doesn't look like much in this next picture, yet taking a closer look you may be able to see more than what is there.  Like I can ask, why were these chairs left to rust? How old are the chairs? Was this shed once an out-house? What makes some old deteriorated metal chairs sitting outside abandoned make me take my camera on a walk just to capture them?

The rustier the better in my view.  So for this second week of 2011, may all us creatives take more time to listen and see. And for myself, take more time to meet my writing and other creative goals this year.  Also to grow my blog here ... 

Keep Pruning

Yes, I am here this morning with a cup of coffee, contemplating all that needs done creatively and around the house for the holidays. My main characters have been filling my head along with sugar plums dancing in my head. I have yet to bake cookies, go serious shopping, and decorate a tree. 


Seems for some reason Christmas came up on us from behind and now we're faced with less than two weeks. I haven't felt much in the spirit, tis the season for my allergies and sinus inflammation. I also haven't made headway with my work-in-progress novel and my main character, a soon 30-year-old female, wanting life to just go on as it has for the last 15 years. Doesn't like complications.


But sooner or later, mostly sooner, we all are face to face with those types of things, and whether we finally do something about it, is up to us and how much we've grown as a person. So how will my character respond to evidence that presents itself and shakes the world she has known?

This photo best illustrates where I'm at with my main character these days, I have to get the big hedge clippers and get all the overgrowth to find the gems to her personality. This pic was taken in one of my favorite states, Maine.  All around this man's land were old rusty vehicles hidden by fallen tree branches and overgrown grass, etc. 

Made for neat pictures, I found the aesthetic even with all the rust, tall grass, and unkempt land.  I walked and walked through it and found what I was looking for! I uncovered the beauty, my vision of beauty. Just like we are to do with our characters. 

Yes, I was really into the dilapidated and made my husband stop so I could take pictures of this house falling apart at the seams. I could actually use these pictures as jump-starts to getting the juices going with my character when I get stuck.  What are your characters hiding behind the tall shrubs or behind the walls to this broken-down house? 


I plan, along with the baking, wrapping, and getting packages out in the mail, to work on her as a gift to myself during the holidays.  It makes me happy to be creative and give myself the time to do so and make progress ... will keep you all posted. HAPPINESS to ALL for a GREAT HOLIDAY, however you celebrate!!

Part of the Picture

It seems like forever since I've posted. It's been a combination of being very busy at work to allergy season taking its toll on me. It seems no matter I can't seem to catch up lately. I'm still finding my way with this blog also. So bare with me!

The pictures above are different perspectives of the Eiffel Tower I took in Paris this summer. It's only part of its vast structure. I tend to like pictures that give small hints of things and where you fill in the rest. You know the saying of less is more. 


Somehow the less part is more appealing than seeing the entire picture. I like to try and use different angles or find a new way to take a picture of a major landmark like the Eiffel Tower. It was truly magnificent. 

Of course a straight shot speaks for itself, but it's more challenging to find new ways to take a landmark that has been photographed a zillion times. Many times writers and photographers and painters don't have to give the 'whole picture' in order for the audience to understand what the message is or what is going on in the story.


It might seem something is left out but that can make it more interesting and that in itself may be the entire point of the piece. Like in a short story, if the writer places every single detail about a main character from head to toe, there'd be nothing left. We'd soon lose a desire to find out what happens to this character as we have gotten lost in the full picture maze finding out she only drinks Maxwell House coffee, is tall, eats pizza every Friday, visits Aunt Ruth every Tuesday, exercises on Wednesday and Saturday, wears red shoes a lot, etc.

This was part of a huge wall painting of the coronation of Josephine at Versi (excuse if misspelled). I decided only to take pictures of parts of it as opposed to capturing the whole. You can see a whole lot in the faces of these three women.


Good night for now. 

A Day in the Life of a Creative

Remember the DAY IN THE LIFE series? If memory serves me, that started 1985 or 1986, where professional photographers were asked to go out into their communities, their countries, for a day and truly capture what "A Day in the Life" was like to certain cultures, certain peoples of the world. I have a couple of those books. The result was incredible in terms of the creative pictures that were captured on a certain day in the life of people in Italy, US, China, etc.

So A Day in the Life of a Creative should be surreal and dripping in creativity, right? Well, not every day in the life is filled with ideas coming at you left and right, and you're painting like Van Gogh regularly, or your novel just flows from your pen onto the paper without any hesitation.  It's more like going to your day job, thinking about some ideas for a project at lunchtime, taking 20 minutes at lunch to type a few paragraphs in a Chapter. Coming home to house and family and making supper and something strikes you about the said novel you have still playing in your head.

Creativity can be like the light coming from an open door in a dark hallway, sometimes you remain in the shadows and other times as you allow yourself to get closer and bask in it and are drawn to it, wanting more, and letting its brilliance guide you.

If we were to take pictures of a Day in the Life of a Creative, some would show the mundane struggles we all have I'm sure. Others would attest to the Utopia we all feel when an idea or project is working and  our creative juices are overflowing with such richness we think it will never go away.

I have to say each day I am aware of my potential for creativity.  Some days it is overflowing and can be overwhelming what to do first, I feel I'm not acting upon some ideas quick enough. I can't write my novel fast enough because already I have another idea for another novel that keeps knocking at my door to make its sales pitch to me. Other days I am bogged down with daily chores and worries--the dog needs a bath, I really should clear out the pile of junk mail on the dining room table. Then there's always laundry to be done.

Our creativity is always with us, ready and waiting on us to set it free ... waiting for all the fog to disperse. As we are already in mid-October and fast approaching the holidays, hopefully we can take a few creativity breaks from the everyday Days of our lives.

The Sky's the Limit

For the past decade or more, I've been enamored with vibrant, dramatic skies that seem to be mostly right in my back yard. Although traveling to Tuscany, Italy, this summer the sky appeared to follow me. My husband and I ran outside our Villa so I could soak in the sky with my camera. 

These skies bring me inspiration for whatever creative endeavor I am involved in at the moment.  They are "eye candy" and very meditative. They occur at sunset and there is something majestic about them and how the sun leaves behind for a short time its artwork painted in the sky with brilliant color.

The clouds are saturated with color at times and other times strewn across the sky like pulled cotton candy in pastel pinks and baby blues. The next pictures were taken in 2007 in Philadelphia. That's the thing with being both a photographer and writer, one complements the other. I can use the photographs as an exercise in descriptive writing and to document what I don't want to forget and use later for a writing piece. Or vice versa, from my writing I want to visualize and put into a photograph.

It definitely puts a new twist on picking out faces and animal shapes in the clouds!  

I hope these inspire to take a second look at the sky as it leaves us a signature before saying good night. On that note, I will say good night and HAPPY FALL ... as we have now crossed over into October.