Such a beautiful book! Today I'm feeling quite bored actually with my 100 Day Project - I'm only on day 35. So far it's just been sooooo good to get back into the swing of painting. Things have just poured out of me for this past month. But now I'm starting to get bored with the limitations of this kind of painting. I cannot take my time or really think that much with this kind of sketching. So I must push myself and experiment more - getting more and more "uncomfortable" - practicing what you preach yes?! This blog is just the daily reminder of what I need to hear and think about. And I happen to share with the 4 people on my subscriber list! :)
When I get into these spells, I slow down the painting process and then feel like cleaning up my studio and re-organizing. It's just part of the whole process and I trust it now. I go inward and start to retreat to think and just sit with stuff. Ideally in my masters' programs, I would start to look for inspiration everywhere and anywhere. And just be in reflection, quiet mode until something kind of sparked and initial - ok let's try this!
But I do not have the time here. And while picking up stuff I happened upon this book again, The Wreath Recipe, that was given to us for free to all the participants of the 2015 Alt Summit conference in Salt Lake City (if you've ever heard of this conference it is AMAZING!). But when I got this book I thumbed through marveling at the stunning photographs and even more strikingly beautiful compositions of these wreaths. I knew I would never do any of them - this is an instructional book showing how you can make your own beautiful wreaths throughout the year. I knew I would never do this sadly because I'm just not a "crafty" type of person. I'm also pretty lazy and I HATE HATE HATE following instructions - like . . . that's one of my biggest peeves. Whatever. BUT I knew I would of course keep this book when I thought of the compositions.
Well I found it again this weekend. And so my post for Day 35 is in reference to this photo of a beautiful staging of sweet pea flowers. I love the simplicity, the soft colors and the shockingly bright fushia of the little flowers underneath. I also appreciate the vast spaciness of the gray background - my graphic design coming into influence here which I yearn for in my paintings but never seem to force myself to do - perhaps I should for fun.
But my point is that you can find virtually anything to be an inspiration to you. But I love that I didn't recreate this photo literally. It's to reference - I might do a couple of these paintings in reference to this photograph. Take some of the elements of the form, the line, the colors and practice translating it into abstract shapes. Yes my Day 35 painting is reminiscent of floral or organic shapes. But all my paintings reference this - ESP in my 100 day project series so far. Not all my paintings feel so botanical but almost all my paintings so far are organic.
So have it! Look around your world and just note what's inspiring to you - what just makes you pause. You aren't looking to render it at all. But using it for reference to start your own work.
