Scribbled things. Filled in with nonsense and part heard words
Dabs, daubs, splosh. Dragged, drawn out, drawn on.
And more, and further. Anemones? meteors? Some frenzied chaos. (I honestly don’t know.)
But as usual, I like the details best of all
The title for this week – Courage, Faith, Trust – came from the same-named scrap of paper that got itself collaged into the frenzy. (it appeared a week early, as it’s numbered 34) but it also calls up the essence of this practice. Courage, Faith and Trust in the process:
Keep showing up, don’t plan, don’t expect, just keep doing and making and going. And all will be well.
I measure out every one of these weeks and I see it unfurl new aspects, new intrigues.
I don’t always tell you them – are they interesting to anyone but me?
Well, here you go:
These are three new facets of life which entered my world this week …..
This weeks page is powered by left-overs from another project. (Too many to throw away)
Tulsi Tea – I’m taking a rest from coffee in the interests of resting my adrenals and settling my cortisol levels. I’ve switched to Tulsi. It’s really grown on me. Yes, I kinda do miss coffee, but as a temporary substitute I’m glad it’s part of my world.
and finally:
Sauerkraut – from my ongoing fascination with all things prebiotic, probiotic & gut biome related.
An eclectic mix. Meanwhile, amid the above the following page took shape thus-ly:
See the little tiny bits of neon pink in there? That’s the idea that set this page running. I saw this colour in the art shop forever-ago. I’m not a pinky kinda person but I had a really visceral attraction to this particularly teeth-jangling shade, and it was in my head until I had to buy it last week.
It’s a colour that says Bite Me.
If I was in charge of naming paint colours it would be called Don’tFuckAbout Pink. Then for some reason that wouldn’t be allowed. So I’d call it BiteMe Pink. Then I’d get a job someplace else cos I can’t tolerate that level of being told what I can’t say, or what I can’t call colours.
But I digress….
Thing is, I didn’t know what this page would draw out of me. All I knew was it was going to be powerful, virtue of is starting out as these three modest shouts of BiteMe Pink.
Even under all this noise, they can still be heard.
And it was a cacophonous week.
The weekend in the middle (my weeks begin on a Thursday, remember? please keep up) consisted of more than my usual level of soul searching at a creativity workshop. Meeting with extraordinary minds and beautiful souls. Deeply spirit rattling. Still feeling the ripples now. And breathe….
This week concluded the first half of the year. And this week concluded with a big fat full moon And the hottest day of the year, And a literal fullmoon meltdown.
It was monuMENTAL
As illustrated by the many layered frenetic scribbles.
This recurring instruction: Create Your Own Map.
It’s what I’m endeavoring to do.
I’m mapping my way as I go.
I document when I remember,
I share when I think it might help.
Starting out in the usual fashion:
Colours and curls,
Cut outs, collaging the inconsequential,
daubs, dabs, smudgy smear.
these folks will know this old trick: Squash that inky stencil between future pages of the book in which you’re playing and get the two-folded benefits of not wasting a drop of delicious colour and planting the seed for a creation yet to be born. That’s where this page began:
And another familar trick: glue in a load of the offcuts of paper that are littering the work table. Much of this was soon to be lost under layers of heavy paint. But that’s the nature of the ephemeral.
Another week, another page in the altered book to show you.
I notice sometimes when I’m working on a project, just how little control I have. It’s not that I don’t know where it’s going, I’m not even steering the way. It’s going its own course and I’m simply wielding the brush or the pen or the whatever-it-is.
Some sort of external force does all the decision making. It took my inner control freak a long while to learn to rest back and let this happen. (Sometimes she worries so. I distract her with thoughts of cheese and music and cushions. She chills, we move on)
This page was a bit of a hotch-potch til the latter stages when it seemed to start coming together.
See what I mean?
I mean it’s not lost it’s hotch-potchery vibe, but I feel like it’s crossed the line from uncoordinated chaos to cohesive vision. Although you aren’t seeing what will be the finally finished thing, it’s a large part of the way there. More again soon.
Some the pages in my altered book are already conveniently titled. The book began as an orphaned volume of short stories, and some of the tales’ titles just appealed too much to cover up.
Doesn’t Miragejust conjure such magic?
I haven’t embarked on any of these pages with a plan. Planning just isn’t in my spirit. I didn’t get that gene.
So to begin I just do something, and let that define where it wanders next.The first something that happened on this page took the form of sprinkles of Brusho swept about in circles with a wet brush.
Oh my how I love how these dusty crystals explode with colour. This stuff is the definition of less is more. More than a wee bit makes for a super rich gravy of an ink, which is gorgeous, but when you use an imperceptibly itsy amount each tiny trace of this magic erupts into zingy pigment on contact with moisture.
It is more than gorgeous. It is actual magic.
Another early layer was gesso scraped through a stencil, then extra messy gesso scraped haphazardly. If you’re a fellow scraper of gesso you’ll recognise those characteristic windshield wiper patterns of clearing excess off the scraper 😉
In the years preceding this project I accumulated a shed load of design magazines, rich full of the most gorgeous graphics and illustration. Just lately I embarked on transforming the knee high heap into 4 boxes of delicious collage ingredients, and a small mountain of recycling.
Thing is, I don’t know who this half a face belonged to, and as an artist I’d like to credit the creator. Any reference to the inventor got lost in the snippings. If it was you – thank you – and I hope that you like the new other half I made. In the spirit of self-portraiture I’ve mismatched the eyes for a familiar wonkiness!
Hope you’ve enjoyed this little trip through the putting together stages. Here’s how the page developed as a whole………
Life’s little upsidedowneries; they entertain, baffle, bemuse.
I considered not posting this page, tbh I was just relieved I took these first pics before I got too far in, so at least I had something to show for the week if I couldn’t bring myself to unveil the way it went from here….
Mmmmm yummy Golden fluid acrylics: I have like about 5-6 of these weeny little bottles. They are expensive, but they are so lush. Delicious. Mmmmmm…. And just a few little drops scrape out soooo much colour:
I love! I love these colours, I love the blending, I love so much about these paints. I recommend them wholeheartedly.
So maybe that’s exactly why it all seemed to fall apart when I began gluing other stuff all over this start to the page.
Eurgh. Hasty move.
But y’know what, I’ve been doing this for years and I’ve got good at letting go and moving along, overcoming those WHYDIDIDOTHAT?s and getting straight into the next OOHBUTNOWICANDOTHIS!
This week though, try as I might, they weren’t coming together for me. And then suddenly it’s the end of the week and I’m all WHAT!? where did that go? Cue: Massive flurry of activity.
So when I tried with some more of the lovely-insided envelopeand a bit of Inktensity I just wound up covering over a load of what I had liked with something I liked a lot less. A lot less 😦
‘Meh’
In a frenzied state of compulsive collage and paint scraping I hit it with all I could muster before I ran out of day. And I got this:
I didn’t like it much. And then I went to bed.
This morning I got to taking the photos and as I was looking at them, something odd happened:Do you get this sometimes?
A thing can be a thing, then with no warning, it becomes its opposite: It flips, reverses, and it nearly never gives you any warning.
All that was rushed, ugly and scratchy the night before was now curiously deliberate looking.
Almost artful…
The colours that were chosen by serendipity: what’s on the table in front of me…
they’ve flipped from hideous clashing mismatch to interesting contrasts.
In combination with taking photos at odd angles, I do believe this is really warming up to be something I like.
Even the ubiquitous eyes have evolved. And now I’m looking at it here, I can’t help see how the purples go with the purpley background on screen, Well whaddayouknow.
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