Creative Play Time

One of my New Year's Resolutions is to be a bit more spontaneous and carefree in my creative process. I have always been a serious, thoughtful person, not given much to frivolity. Everything I do, I do with an intention. This sometimes prevents me from actually being creative. If I don't have a clear outcome for what I am thinking of doing, I tend to dismiss it. But over time I have been learning that it is more about the process than the product. It is the time spent being creative that feels so good. But the time (or desire) to work on a specific piece isn't always available and as a result, I don't spend time in my studio. I want to change that. I want my studio to be a place to have fun all the time! I spent a few days cleaning up and clearing off counter space. There is much more to do, but for now I am taking a break from that and working on a few things. A few just-for-fun or just-because-it-interests-me things. Not creating for the sake of selling or exhibiting.

This morning I had the urge to create something large. As it was snowing quite heavily, I could not go out to my husband's workshop to get a large piece of Masonite to use as a support, so settled for a 20x30 inch piece of foam core. To this I taped a sheet of drawing paper. Wanting to work quickly without having to set up, prep and clean up, I decided to work with dry media - colored and graphite pencils, crayons and oil pastels.

Listening to a "mental" recording of a favorite song, I closed my eyes and drew, with long sweeping movements, how the lyrics and music felt. Then I began coloring in the resulting shapes. This is so different from what I usually do, but so freeing as I have no plan and no desired outcome. It will become what it will become. I may like it. I may hate it. It doesn't matter, as long as I continue to enjoy the creating of it. There is much to discover in the actual doing. 

In Progress

In Progress

Update: I worked a few times more on this but decided I wasn't enjoying it. I didn't like the way my hand and arm were smearing the graphite and I didn't like the tediousness of coloring in the areas. I was looking for something spontaneous, but I guess pencils and oil pastels don't offer that when trying to color in large areas in a short time. So I ditched this. But I learned from it!

As far as this progressed