Playing with NOTAN

I had some fun this week with Notan, the Japanese paper cutting exercise of expanding the square.  I began by spontaneously cutting tree branch shapes into each side of a 6" square of art paper.  Because I didn't plan, I quickly ran out of room in the square.  I pasted the results in my sketchbook and photographed the strong black and white image.

Then the real fun began.  In Photoshop Elements, I resized, multiplied and rearranged the image in a bunch of ways.  I played with transformation, getting some really cool distorted results. I even made a custom paintbrush with the image.  I am really pleased and energized by the results.  My goal is to make a screen or stencil with the image.

 

 

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My Doodle A Day Diet!

I just added a photo album called "Doodle a Day Diet" to share my progress on my daily doodling exercise.  Click this link or you can find it on the sidebar on the right under Photos.  It is amazing to me that as you add definition - with depth, outlines, fill, embellisments, color - even a poorly drawn shape or a weak composion will morph into something pretty darned good!  I am quickly finding that the more I do, the more satisfying the results.  I guess this is another variation on the old musician's joke:

How do you get to Carnegie Hall?      Practice, practice, practice!

I challenge everyone who reads this to try my "Doodle a Day Diet" for yourself for two weeks. It's simple - no grocery shopping or cooking, just a writing implement and paper.  You don't have to buy a snazzy new sketch book unless you really, really want to.  You can even make it a "green project" by recycling the envelopes from your bills or your junk mail.  I encourage you to try a nice black pen with a fairly bold line.  I'm using a medium point PITT Artist Pen - india ink, which permanent so it doesn't bleed when you add color and doesn't soak through the page.  Second choice would be something like a fine Sharpie, although they do soak through the page.  Forget about pencil - commit to ink!  It's just doodling.  If you don't like it after you've done all you can with it, move on to the next page.

Please let me know how the "Doodle a Day Diet" is working for you by posting your comments here.  If you blog or flicker, etc., please let us know where we can see your doodling photos.   I'm betting you find it a joyful adventure, too!

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DOODLING EVERY DAY!

I was at Michaels yesterday and found this little book - “The Doodle Formula: A Step-by-step Guide to Creating the Perfect Doodle” by Adrienne Looman.  You might want to take a look at the author's blog, too.

At first glance I scoffed – who needs instruction or even a formula for doodling?  Since I had a few minutes to kill, I decided to look inside anyway.  What a delightful surprise.  The book is brilliantly simple, and quite engaging, although very slim.  It is a jumping off point rather than a complete course.  The author presents a very simple formula for developing your doodling skills, which I believe are innate.  Everyone can do this. 

 

This book is really a clever, sneaky ploy to teach, encourage, and build confidence in the dreaded drawing and sketching.  You cannot look at this book and use the worn out excuses, “but I can’t draw” or "I'm no good at drawing", as you might with some formal tome or drawing class.  I came home and tried her formula.  She’s quite right – it’s easy, it’s addictive, and it’s fun!  I highly recommend this book.  I feel rather silly being so excited about this book, but there is something about doodling that generates great enthusiasm.  You really can’t help smiling when you do it. 

When looking for book reviews on the Internet, I found several other books on doodling (who knew?) including one that offered a free lesson from the book.  “Doodling for Papercrafters” by Maelynn Cheung, the lesson is http://www.leisurearts.com/downloadfiles/9_07_basicswirls.pdf .  Try it.  I think you’ll like it.

Because this is so much fun, and good for me in lots of ways, I have resolved to doodle every day!  It's sort of a doodle a day diet.  I even started a new small sketchbook just for doodling.  I beleive this exercise will really change my artwork in wonderful ways.  For example, already in just the four pages I did above, I see patterns that will enhance my free motion quilting greatly.

 

And now, back to my sketchbook, or should I call it my doodle book?

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Happy News!

I am so excited - my quilt "Meditation" has been accepted in SAQA's Transformations '09: Reflections!

I discussed some of the work process for this quilt in earlier posts, and am very happy to say that the way I went about developing this design and executing the work really paid off.  This is the first time I have entered a quilt in any venue outside my local guild.  I truly had not expected that this quilt would be accepted; I approached this entry as a learning process.  When I finished working on it, I was again filled with self doubt, and considered not submitting my entry at all.  I am so grateful to Chris for pushing me to submit it anyway.  I am frankly stunned by the outcome.  I will take this as yet another reminder (I seem to get them regularly) that self doubt is NOT to be indulged, that if I must give it any attention at all, that should be to use my self doubt as a motivator, to drive me to take action!

I want to thank everyone who wrote me with their helpful opinions and kind support when I was waffling about insetting the center block.  I am so glad I did it, and I will definitely use this concept again.  Cutting into it was a little bit scary, but I planned carefully and found it very rewarding in the end.  I saved the piece I cut from the center, and plan to make a smaller quilt from that too.

In the meantime, I am once again busy sketching and playing with my decorated papers to develop my next quilt.

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Work in Progress

   

I finished selecting and creating my fabrics last week after working out the details in my sketchbook (see my post on my new creative process).  The lightest fabric I dyed, bleached, did rubbings with paint sticks, stamped, then layered on this really cool sheer fabric with mylar sparkles.  The green fabric is layered too, some silk I dyed last year at Gale's studio over a hand dyed cotton jacquard weave.  Over the weekend I constructed the blocks.  Even though I planned only to use 4 blocks in my quilt I made 5 blocks because I wanted to use 5 different fabrics.  At the last minute, I replaced two of the corner fabrics with a white on white fabric that I dyed deep blue.  I didn't have enough of it to be one of the 5 fabrics, but I loved the fabric, so I threw in a little bit.  Stepping back from the blocks now, I'm not sure I like it in this quilt.  I might replace it with one of the 5 original fabrics.

As I was arranging and rearranging the blocks on my rolling design wall  I threw the extra block on top of the others just to see what it looked like.  I like it!    I really like it.  It makes the piece more interesting, and still in keeping with the theme of reflections.  Or should I keep it simple...

What do you think?  I would really appreciate your comments about this because I'm waffling on which arrangement to use.

 

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Technique for Working Through a Bad Day or Artist Block

I feel so low today.  I wish I knew better how to make art about or through feeling like this.  Today it’s all I can feel; it’s like a big, thick, wet, dirty blanket smothering the urge to create, and just about everything else.  I know it’s situational, it will be gone in a few days, as it always is, and that I just have to hold on until it passes.  I just wish I could spend those few days making something, even if it’s not bright, joyous and beautiful.

Perhaps asking these questions of myself will help me find the way:

What color is it?

Black is too obvious, but it is dark.  A dull, mottled, deep, bloody or plummy burgundy seems right.

What does it look like, what shape or form best approximates it?

It’s flat, wide and spreading, like a grimy, gritty pool of spent motor oil.  Thick.  Static.

What kind of line or mark would it make?

                Flat.  Heavy.  Without implied motion.  Sloppy or imprecise.  No sharp lines or angles because it lacks vital energy.

What sort of images would illustrate this mood in a way others might understand?

                A pit or depression in the ground.  A cave.  A blob.  A shallow empty bowl.  A broken jar or vessel.  A flat dead crow.

What media would be most effective in expressing this feeling?

                Very thick acrylic paint.  Big fat dark greasy crayons, oil sticks.  A puddle of dirty, bedraggled rayon velvet with lots of wrinkles.  Black and white paper (Notan?) or low key B&W fabrics.

Postscript.  I tried.  I got out the sketchbook and drew crows.  Some look like chickens, some eagles, none really look dead, but it worked.  I feel better, lighter, and productive again.

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Make Art Every Day

This is pretty much my new mantra, the answer to most problems, and apparently the path to a happy life.  I started early this summer, and I must say it really helps me in lots of ways.  If I'm upset or frustrated, my first response  now is to make art.  If I'm at home, I go to the studio, but I can do this anywhere, anytime, and with just about anything, even if it's just a matchbook sketch or a plastic straw "sculpture".  It's almost addictive, a delightful high of sorts (without the hangover or legal issues) - the more I do, the more I want to do.  I rarely miss a day.  This is probably about endorphins.  Too bad I have never been able to get exercise to work the same way for me.

It didn't take long at all for this practice to become a firmly established habit.  Interestingly, the results don't seem to matter.  My internal critic seems to have no place in this process, no voice at all, which is LOVELY!  Now that I think of it, I haven't heard from my internal critic in a while.  Maybe it's dead!?!  Hooray! 

I think that part of the reason that the results don't matter is that I am not striving at all for completed works.  My idea is to have art making time, not to make this, that, or the other thing.   I can make something if I choose, but not having that as an objective is very freeing and satisfying.  Even cleaning the studio satisfies me, makes me feel better, happier, more energetic.  I've spent many happy hours lately sorting, culling, and reorganizing art tools, supplies, and books.  I've rediscovered all kinds of things I had forgotten about.  A large give away pile is steadily growing in the middle of the room. It's rather interesting that after all the years of believing that acquiring art materials would lead to making more art, it turns out now that giving stuff away is having that effect.

More about this later...

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