Ojalá, Selah, Lateda

The Censor

As I’m reading the introductory chapters of The Artist’s Way the idea of a censor, “our own internalized perfectionist, a nasty internal and external critic, who resides in our brain and keeps up a constant stream of subversive remarks” rang true to me. I know exactly how that voice sounds. Silencing it, or least subduing it a bit sounds great to me. So since the book said drawing a cartoon version of it would help I drew three.

The first one I did was making the censor a prim little demon perched on my shoulder. She certainly looked like a “cunning foe,” but when I went to paste her in my notebook she didn’t seem right somehow. I reread the chapter and the suggestion to, “think of your Censor as a cartoon serpent slithering around your creative Eden, hissing vile things to keep you off guard.” So I went with serpent. My next drawing I like a lot. I think it captures well how immobilized I’ve been creatively for so many years. But in that drawing it looked like the Censor was winning and that just won’t do. So I tried one more time and I think I got it. So Censor beware. I’m ready to start fighting back.

IF: Routine

They say that if I don’t get them on a bedtime routine they will be sleeping with us till they’re off to college.

For Illustration Friday: Routine

IF: Detach

Illustration Friday: Detach

Absolutely no one who lives in my house or has walked by my desk today at the office has gotten what I was getting at with this illustration. Perhaps Illustration Friday viewers will be more perceptive?

In my post yesterday I mentioned that I will be joining an online collective working through The Artist’s Way. Since IF posts get a lot more views that my others I thought I mention it again. It will be starting September 1, check out the Creativityist blog for more info.

Trying Threadless again…

It’s been almost a year since I tried submitting a design to threadless, but things are extremely slow at work today, so I took my sketch from last week’s Illustration Friday and redrew it in illustrator. Perhaps people will like it better than my previous entries.

If you have some time on your hands and would like to give it a $5 that would be just swell.

Creativity

“How do you know if you are creatively blocked? Jealousy is an excellent clue. Are there artists whom you resent? Do you tell yourself, ‘I could do that if only…’”

 -The Artist’s Way, Julia Cameron

Starting September 1 I’m going to be joining a group that will be working through The Artist’s Way. John Chandler, who writes the Creativityist blog will be facilitating. My mom brought me her copy of the book yesterday because I think mine got left in Mexico. I read the introductory chapters and was especially convicted by the lines I’ve quoted above. I know jealousy isn’t a very nice thing to admit to, but I don’t think I’ve ever pretended, hmm, well,  recently pretended not to have all sorts of neurosis where my art is concerned. The baggage I carry from the 2 years I spent at School of the Arts alone could fill a couple U-Hauls. But I think I’m ready to try and work through it, and I’m fascinated by the idea of doing it with an online collective. Accountability really is a big deal and I hope it will help me make it through. It really does look like it will be a lot of work but I’m excited. It was hard not to go ahead and start week one last night. I did get up and write what Cameron calls morning pages this morning. I figure it won’t hurt to go ahead and start getting used to that. Though right now my biggest concern is how I am going to manage to find a 2 hour block of time each week to take myself on an artist’s date and where we might go. Though The Funky Chicken Art Project is still on my list of places I need to visit, as is Matilda’s in Alpharetta, and then there is that gourd place on the way to Ellijay. I guess I’ll figure it out.

IF: Sail

“Though she tried to keep herself grounded, her mind still found ways to sail away on her.”

 For Illustration Friday: SAIL 

perspective

So my friend Jenn has gotten a facebook account. That’s not really news. It is mildly interesting that I had one before she did as she is usually the leader in such things, but she probably knew about it way before me and has just now deigned to join up. Most of her profile is exactly like her myspace one but I skimmed over it anyway. When I got to the books she likes part I noticed she listed Garden Spells by Sarah Addison which I read a few months back and really enjoyed too. Our reading tastes are usually very very different so I was a bit excited and started to write her a little note on her wall expressing my shared enthusiasm for the book when I noticed that in the same book section she had also listed, “Any book by Anne Rice (well… any book written before she found God). ”   My enthusiasm ebbed. I’m sure I sighed out loud. Sometimes it’s hard for me to believe just how different our perspectives have become.

When I was in high school Anne Rice was hands down my favorite writer. I couldn’t get enough of her vampires and then later her witches. Her fascinating characters and the intricate weaving of their present and past not only kept my attention but mesmerized me. As a sophomore in high school I wanted nothing more than to leave my actual life behind and go live with Lestat and Louis, but by the time I was deciding which few precious books would move to Mexico with me not one of hers made the cut.  They got left behind with all my The Cure albums.Though I spend plenty of time thinking about the past and wondering why things turned out the way they did and what I might have done to make things better I didn’t spend much more time thinking about Anne Rice. At least not until I heard she was writing books about Jesus.

I’m pretty sure it was Jenn who told me about the books themselves and about the amazon reviews and the whole deal. I remember thinking at the time that Anne must have been like the boys at art school who when they first come out of the closet have to become flaming queens for a while before they settle back down to just being themselves but openly gay. I think its a pretty natural reaction and probably common for a lot of born-again Christians to come on overly strong at first before they learn how to be just themselves but Christian. Anyway, I was anxious to read the  books.

I read the first one, Christ the Lord, Out of Egypt,  last September and thought it was okay. It held my attention all the way through but was easy to move on from. Then just this last month I listened to Christ the Lord, The Road to Cana on a road trip and I can not get the story out of my head. I thought it was excellent. I thought she did a great job of presenting Jesus as fully human yet fully divine, just as tempted as any human yet sinless. I think her experience in writing supernatural characters such as vampires and witches perfectly prepared her for this. She wrote a interesting fictional story of her own creation yet it seems to me that both her theology and history are sound. I was especially captivated by the way she described Christ’s 40 days in the wilderness and the subsequent temptations from the devil. She made it all come alive for me and I’m still thinking about it several weeks later. In fact I read The Shack right afterwards and even though it was a powerful little book itself I think The Road to Cana had a stronger effect on me.  But I think as a former Vampire Chronicles aficionado and current intentional Christian its no great surprise I’m in to these books. I would be interested for both my secular and Christian friends to give them a chance and let me know their perspective.

More cool art…

It seems like lately every which way I surf I’m seeing great artwork on the internet. My coworker Jon just showed me this site full gorgeous illustrations.

IF: Poof

 The morning ritual was as follows: curl half up, curl half down, spray, then run a comb through and POOF!  spray once more and ready to go.

For Illustration Friday:POOF!

I was looking at one post from the UK that was wondering if they needed to explain what Poof meant there to the rest of the world. I didn’t get it so I suppose they do. I’m not sure how far the reach of this hair style was. I saw in plenty in the south of the US and I’m pretty sure it was in the midwest as well. I’ve even seen it quite recently in the south of Mexico. I wonder did it make it to other continents?