Doing Things Badly

The slogan or motto that pops into my conciousness is:  "Anything worth doing is worth doing badly".  So in the midst of this sense of doing things badly, I decide to take stock.  Not to decide the doing's worthiness but to attempt a reality check.  Comparing the actual to today's state of mind.  Creative blocks versus creative breakthroughs.

Listing statuses and number of painted pieces considered as concepts attempted but missing something during their execution:

*Left unfinished (4)
*Finished but not satisfyingly (1)
*Emotionally loaded in content and therefore unfinished (2)
(source example:  photo of a deceased family member )
*Designated as completed only because I stopped working on them (2)
*Still open to direction (4)
*Waiting on some (time passage) perspective (2)
*Needing practice on new techniques (1)
*Maturation required in my experience with painting this type of subject or style (1)
*Just plain uninspiring (3)

I experience relief that there aren't actually that many paintings in the categories listed above.  Further along now, I list:

*Works done for fun and/or practice (all)
*Paintings included in more than one category (4) 

It is important for me to identify trends or shared blocks amongst the pieces.  I am aware now that the items I do complete involve an experience of timeliness that is beyond my willfulness or obsessiveness.  I go back to a canvas more often than I abandon it to be left incomplete.  My interest now naturally lies in the education I receive during each creative experience rather than in the need to produce as in the past.  The process excites me instead of any projected result.

Wether the Weather

Having experienced everything from rain to snow to haze to fog in the past few week's time, I can say that the effect has been as if to be swimming underwater.  Given all the moisture in the air and on the ground, I suppose that could be literally true. To "get anywhere" takes longer both in regard to mental and physical movement.  Then there are all the gradations of cold; cold and dry, frigid and damp, cold and wet, cold and windy, as examples.  In my mind I think "enough already!".  After looking around and seeing no change from what it is now to becoming a suddenly warmer climate, I try acceptance of what it is now instead. 

I learned not to "struggle against" a long time ago.  It sets up a dynamic where I feel the universe is pushing back.  When the awareness of a struggle comes, I try to turn myself loose of any expectations.  Specifying the expectations I have for a particular episode of life that currently enraptures my attention.  This interior work allows me to inhabit the outer world with more equanimity. 

Template

I find I want to explore the use of an abstract compositional tool I worked with during another painting.  The tool involves a variation on a theme involving free form shapes placed interestingly on a canvas.  The shapes are then outlined in pencil or charcoal.  After the forms are removed the outlined areas are filled in with paint.  

This time while I search through materials such as newspaper for inspiration, I find an old interoffice envelope.  I know upon sighting this envelope that it should be opened out or butterflied and then used as a template.  I move this template around on a canvas whose size is selected for it's corresponding scale.  The large envelope calls for a large canvas.  I want to work towards creating larger pieces.  When the design excites my eye, I draw around the envelope's now altered form.  I use  the holes in the envelope to paint semi-random dots, almost like using a stencil.  The colors used for the dots suggest the pallet for the color range of the painting as a whole.  

I brush on one layer of background color and then paint half of the form before I run out of time.  I wish to continue and lay down another section of color.  The sadness I feel at this moment is relished.  I want to paint more and yet I know that to stop now allows a better end result.  I could apply more in a hurried manner.  Then I risk more time correcting what appears rushed or forced.  Instead, I want to continue to tap into the source that allows creative spontaneity to flourish.  I choose to stop and to wait until spirit calls me again.       

Postings Along the Path

In an effort to try new behaviors, I am spending more time out of doors.  Packing a camera and a sketch book, I have logged some miles recently by hiking in various state and local parks.  Although the weather has been cold, I am spurred by my re-discovery of the beauty and artistry of nature.  Usually I respond to freezing temperatures by hibernating.  Usually I respond to the lack of greenery with melancholy.  So being outside at this time of year shows me what I miss by residing in such responses.

Along the way of my spiritual travels I am often reminded that I need to fill my self with plenty of positive experiences.  The best kinds of experiences provide a lot of sensory stimulation (especially where the visual sense is fully engaged).  This filling up allows me to "coast" until the next gathering of the memorable.  It also furnishes me a cache from which to access when I need a boost. 

During my hikes, I also seek to expand my education using new practices.  Sometimes that means reading the placards posted along a path.  Other times it just involves consulting a map.  Often I get so caught up in observation that I ignore this kind of basic information. 

The image included in this post however, is of something closer to home.  It is a photo of the sunlight shining through the peephole in my front door.  It created the smallest of circles, the size of a quarter, on the hallway wall.  I wonder that I would have noticed it before, or that I would have sought to photograph and enhance it.  This "noticing" gives me an added thrill when I record even the smallest of beauties.