In the pursuit of perfection we put an enormous amount of pressure on ourselves. Artists often work through frustrations with their work. Realizing what may seem like a mistake in a drawing, painting or collage can actually be a wonderful surprise that makes a piece of art truly wonderful.
For beginning art students or those who have been too afraid to start making art because they think they "can barely draw stick figures," there is good news. The imperfections in your creative expressions aren't really imperfections. If you step back, let go of your expectations, and look at your piece with new eyes you may actually see the unexpected "imperfection" actually takes the piece in a fun direction.
We need to have more fun.
No more tears in drawing class when the elephant doesn't look like a photograph. Individual interpretation or individual style comes from learning to embrace the little bits of our creative self expression that comes from ourselves.
Dry those tears art students and give yourselves permission to make something imperfect, something unexpected and something uniquely you. That's what art can do for all of us--let us make something that is not born of our crazy need to be perfect.
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
Call to Artists
Being a professional artist means "workin' it."
Northeastern WA Arts is here to help you work it.
August 15 we move into a new building!
The new building will house a cooperative gallery for fine arts and crafts.
If you are interested in being serious about your art work give us a call: 509-936-1527
Northeastern WA Arts is here to help you work it.
August 15 we move into a new building!
The new building will house a cooperative gallery for fine arts and crafts.
If you are interested in being serious about your art work give us a call: 509-936-1527
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
Summer Classes - Batik
This week is the fourth week of summer classes and we have had so much fun working with students of all ages.Hula is turning out to be quite a workout.
Batik is consistently challenging and intriguing. We learn new techniques and solutions.
Drawing and painting classes are progressing and we are ready to begin our next four week round of classes.
Come see what we're up to. I know, I know, the summer schedule is gone from the website because it was hacked. It will be up ASAP.
I was able to attend the Lavender festival. What fun it was, seeing the passion of the event planners and how many artists, artisans and generally creative people.
Carol, thank you for the invitation!
Friday, July 10, 2009
Website is Down
Last week our website stopped working. Apparently the server it is hosted on was viciously hacked!
Please stay tuned for a new and improved website. Please note, however, we are changing our name form Colville Arts Foundation to a more inclusive one. We hope to reach out to Ferry, Stevens and Pend Orielle counties. There are so many talented artists out there whose art needs a home.
We believe the time is right to help create community where art is vital and appreciated.
Join us!
Please stay tuned for a new and improved website. Please note, however, we are changing our name form Colville Arts Foundation to a more inclusive one. We hope to reach out to Ferry, Stevens and Pend Orielle counties. There are so many talented artists out there whose art needs a home.
We believe the time is right to help create community where art is vital and appreciated.
Join us!
Wednesday, July 8, 2009
Value of Art
Art has value as a product, a process, and as a means of expression. Creating art, as a process, helps us learn valuable lessons that can us through life.
As an art instructor I've seen students experience many "ah-ha" moments as they work through their preconceived ideas of art, their self expectations, the artistic process and the final product of their artistic endeavors.
One high school senior, when faced with the opportunity to work with acrylic paint was intrigued by the physical properties of the paint. As I helped other students work on their individual paintings I kept one eye on Jay. He never put any paint on his canvas but rather wanted to feel the paint. He used his paint brush to put a dab of green paint on his index finger. Setting the paintbrush down, he proceeded to squish the paint between his finger and his thumb. Soon he was adding blue, red and yellow to his palette. Next Jay started mixing colors and soon had the palms of his hands painted in red, yellow and green areas. I quickly grabbed a large piece of newsprint and said, "Here Jay, make prints with your hands on this paper." I smiled as I turned to help another student. When I looked back, Jay was smearing blue paint on the paper with his fingers. "I'm finger painting," he said triumphantly.
"Weren't you ever allowed to use paint before?" I asked
"No, my mom didn't want me to get my clothes dirty," he replied. "This is really fun."
I couldn't help but shake my head at how so many of us, as parents, don't realize what we are doing when we try to do our very best for our kids. Jay was so enamored by the paint that by the time class was over he had painted his arms clear up to his elbows and he had a huge smile on his face.
What was it Jay found in the process of art making? He certainly wasn't focused on the product! I never got a chance to ask Jay what he took away from the experience but I hope he connected with his natural curiosity and found that it was fun. I'm glad we could provide Jay with a safe environment with which to gain his experience and I hope he uses his natural curiosity in his work as an adult.
Kaylee, an 11 year old, came to me as quite a perfectionist. Everything had to be in its place and it had to be the same place every time. This concept is not completely foreign to me but I'm happy if I can just find a place to put things in a somewhat organized fashion.
I remember attending a women's fair once in northern California where the key not speaker asked, "how many of you have a junk drawer at home?" The entire audience of women all raised our hands.
"How many of you have more than one junk drawer?" We all looked around while many of us sheepishly put our hands up.
"How many of you have more than two junk drawers?" Hands continued to go up, one of which was mine.
"Don't worry," she said, "creative people have multiple junk drawers. In fact, I'm so creative I never have to put anything back in the same place twice."
Well, Kaylee was raised differently. I have no intention of undoing her good upbringing but she did share an insight with us after class this week.
"Remember when I made a glob of wax on my dolphins? I was upset because I had spilled my wax but you told me it looked like the dolphin was blowing a bubble. Now I like it. I learned that it is just like life. You might make a mistake but you have to just keep going and make the best of it that you can."
Wow, such profound thought out of a such a young person. What an important lesson for someone who is very hard on herself. Perhaps she will relax when her brother makes mistakes too!
As an art instructor I've seen students experience many "ah-ha" moments as they work through their preconceived ideas of art, their self expectations, the artistic process and the final product of their artistic endeavors.
One high school senior, when faced with the opportunity to work with acrylic paint was intrigued by the physical properties of the paint. As I helped other students work on their individual paintings I kept one eye on Jay. He never put any paint on his canvas but rather wanted to feel the paint. He used his paint brush to put a dab of green paint on his index finger. Setting the paintbrush down, he proceeded to squish the paint between his finger and his thumb. Soon he was adding blue, red and yellow to his palette. Next Jay started mixing colors and soon had the palms of his hands painted in red, yellow and green areas. I quickly grabbed a large piece of newsprint and said, "Here Jay, make prints with your hands on this paper." I smiled as I turned to help another student. When I looked back, Jay was smearing blue paint on the paper with his fingers. "I'm finger painting," he said triumphantly.
"Weren't you ever allowed to use paint before?" I asked
"No, my mom didn't want me to get my clothes dirty," he replied. "This is really fun."
I couldn't help but shake my head at how so many of us, as parents, don't realize what we are doing when we try to do our very best for our kids. Jay was so enamored by the paint that by the time class was over he had painted his arms clear up to his elbows and he had a huge smile on his face.
What was it Jay found in the process of art making? He certainly wasn't focused on the product! I never got a chance to ask Jay what he took away from the experience but I hope he connected with his natural curiosity and found that it was fun. I'm glad we could provide Jay with a safe environment with which to gain his experience and I hope he uses his natural curiosity in his work as an adult.
Kaylee, an 11 year old, came to me as quite a perfectionist. Everything had to be in its place and it had to be the same place every time. This concept is not completely foreign to me but I'm happy if I can just find a place to put things in a somewhat organized fashion.
I remember attending a women's fair once in northern California where the key not speaker asked, "how many of you have a junk drawer at home?" The entire audience of women all raised our hands.
"How many of you have more than one junk drawer?" We all looked around while many of us sheepishly put our hands up.
"How many of you have more than two junk drawers?" Hands continued to go up, one of which was mine.
"Don't worry," she said, "creative people have multiple junk drawers. In fact, I'm so creative I never have to put anything back in the same place twice."
Well, Kaylee was raised differently. I have no intention of undoing her good upbringing but she did share an insight with us after class this week.
"Remember when I made a glob of wax on my dolphins? I was upset because I had spilled my wax but you told me it looked like the dolphin was blowing a bubble. Now I like it. I learned that it is just like life. You might make a mistake but you have to just keep going and make the best of it that you can."
Wow, such profound thought out of a such a young person. What an important lesson for someone who is very hard on herself. Perhaps she will relax when her brother makes mistakes too!
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
Doodling and the Color Wheel in Batik
It turns out doodling is not easy for everyone.Being able to doodle random patterns and then expound upon them is a lesson in freeing your mind. If you are a perfectionist doodling is counter intuitive. Yet, the randomness of doodling may help with memory as one study in the UK suggests (http://www.bio-medicine.org/medicine-news-1/Take-Note-3A-Doodling-Can-Help-Memory--38053-1/).
Not all of us have been allowed to doodle while in school or church or while hanging out with boring adults-- so we spend our time trying to be quiet, holding still, and generally being miserable.
Yet, we should all have permission to doodle. Even Bill Gates of Microsoft has been known to doodle. (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/4220473.stm)
This week in batik class we learned how to make the color wheel by mixing dyes. As you can see we did not have a true blue so we could not make a true violet. Nevertheless, making a color wheel with dye is a bit of a guessing game - counting out the drops of yellow and adding one drop of blue to make green.
We certainly enjoyed the lesson and the review of the color wheel.
With out new knowledge about making so many new colors we will move on to advanced doodling in class next week.I am looking forward to expanding my experience with wax resist. When the next 4 week session begins in two weeks we will try our hand at working on silk instead of cotton. We anticipate the colors being more vibrant after rinsing.
Joy of Being Alive
The 4th of July was a beautiful, hot, summer day. I spent it on the river with my family swimming, boating and kite boarding.
We like to take all of our stuff out to the little island that is only an island when the water is high by Old Kettle Falls. At one point we heard a cry for help. My husband, Roland, had noticed some teenagers heading from shore to the little island. He knows the island is further away than it looks and you can no longer walk to the island.
We quickly took our little boat toward the teenager's cry for help and found one boy exhausted. Fortunately for him his friend was able to hold him up for while. It took some time to get the boys into the boat because the one was just so utterly exhausted. After taking the boys back to shore the four of us sat in the boat just relishing the moment of all being alive. The sun was shining, the water was sparkling, and everyone was breathing - in - out - in - out. What a tremendous feeling. After a few minutes the exhausted boy was finally able to raise his head to look at Roland.
"You saved my life."
"Yes, you have the blessing of another day," Roland said.
"Thank you."
It was a moment I won't soon forget and this grateful feeling I have will, no doubt, be transferred to my art. But how does one express gratitude in painting, drawing or a piece of batik? I'm not sure what gratitude and joy will look like but I know it will be there in every piece.
We like to take all of our stuff out to the little island that is only an island when the water is high by Old Kettle Falls. At one point we heard a cry for help. My husband, Roland, had noticed some teenagers heading from shore to the little island. He knows the island is further away than it looks and you can no longer walk to the island.
We quickly took our little boat toward the teenager's cry for help and found one boy exhausted. Fortunately for him his friend was able to hold him up for while. It took some time to get the boys into the boat because the one was just so utterly exhausted. After taking the boys back to shore the four of us sat in the boat just relishing the moment of all being alive. The sun was shining, the water was sparkling, and everyone was breathing - in - out - in - out. What a tremendous feeling. After a few minutes the exhausted boy was finally able to raise his head to look at Roland.
"You saved my life."
"Yes, you have the blessing of another day," Roland said.
"Thank you."
It was a moment I won't soon forget and this grateful feeling I have will, no doubt, be transferred to my art. But how does one express gratitude in painting, drawing or a piece of batik? I'm not sure what gratitude and joy will look like but I know it will be there in every piece.
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