Tuesday, March 27, 2012

obsessions



I have spent a lot of time this year building on my art practice to include daily sketchbook hours, and I like to believe filling a journal with drawings, musings or rants is all for the good of my art.  In one of the many creativity treatises I have been reading, I was encouraged to obsess about something I was making, and that that kind of obsession is good and will keep drawing you back to the studio.  All too often I obsess and worry about things that have no place in the studio:  my kids, vacuuming, laundry, the roof that might leak( it was fixed three years ago), the basement that might flood( it gets a little damp after a rain), my kids' school projects and sport schedules, my husband's meetings and sports schedules, the mess in the mud room, when will I have time to see my family, what to plant this spring, exercising enough, sleeping enough, am I out of coffee or chocolate and again, always, my kids.

My Dad once told me whatever it is you do in life, be the best at it. Unfortunately, sometimes I think I am just the best worrier in America...





But,  back to the work at hand. I am trying to embrace this new obsession of nests and leave some of my other 'bad' obsessions at the studio door.  Here's what I am up to; you may have seen some of these before- some journal pages, some painting, some drawing.  Yesterday in the studio I had the most profound thought (that may be a little dramatic, but it felt that way to me).  I was getting sore in the back and crampy in the wrist while working on one of the three big nest drawings I have in progress, and beginning to feel impatient with the process, when it occurred to me: It probably takes me just as long to draw a nest as it does for a bird to build one....and I don't have to use a beak to do it.




2 comments:

  1. The right kind of obsession can lead to some wonderful outcomes (like your nests). I like to think of it as working out an idea or theme...there are so many ways to solve the "problem" of "how do I portray a nest?" While I really like the last three drawings, I am drawn to the collage version.

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  2. You described the worry-factor so beautifully. It is hard to leave all those crazy thoughts at the door when we step into our studios! But now your obsession is fabulous - no worries there. I love how you've worked out the nest in so many different ways.

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