Tag Archives: Sharing

Share the Wealth

I have found that most artists are very generous with their knowledge. They are happily willing to share hard-won lessons from their studios, easing the road for others who are interested enough to ask. And with the internet making it possible to be more closely connected to an ever-wider creative circle, the task of addressing our own artistic challenges is eased through exposure to how others face theirs.

I have been working on this piece intermittently since February. The process seems to just drag on and on. I have definitely been in this spot before, so I know that patience and persistence are key. In the meantime, I’ve been grateful for other textile work and my drawing practice, which have provided a welcome reprieve. But that doesn’t solve the fact that I still have to finish this particular challenge.

Happily, two things this past week have contributed to getting me back on track. First and foremost, a lengthly and honest critique with a friend/artist whose ideas and feedback never fail me. I know I’ve said it before, but I can’t stress enough how important it is for all of us to have a solid bond with another artist, allowing for a frank back-and-forth about work in progress. The distance of an unbiased eye is invaluable. Hopefully you have that kind of artistic partnership as well.

Secondly, I fortuitously happened across this short, 2 minute video, recently uploaded to his blog by painter Nicholas Wilton. His suggestion to “listen to your work” speaks directly to the challenge I’m wrestling with at the moment. I was introduced to Wilton’s paintings, writing, and video clips last month by another artist friend and couldn’t be more grateful! His point of being fully “in” a work and truly listening to what it has to say hits the proverbial nail on the head. The more I read back through his archives, the more impressed I am with his ideas and generosity. Among other things, it is so important to know that certain issues are universal, no matter what level of achievement one attains.

So, I’m back at it — not thrilled yet, but finding a rhythm. We’ll see; this may be one that ends up, at best, as a good learning experience. But regardless, I am grateful for the unselfishness of others and the safety net to be found in a sense of shared camaraderie.

❖

And speaking of camaraderie, I can’t resist sharing this uplifting clip of the “Graffiti Grandma”, Luísa Cortesão in Lisbon, Portugal, who found joy in making street art by tagging walls with her buddies. Another reminder of the importance of community and to not take our work – or ourselves – too seriously.

Perched on a Cusp

One of the most challenging aspects of having an art blog is figuring out how much to share. It’s one thing to give readers a peek into the creative process after-the-fact, or while everything is going smoothly. But there are plenty of (if not more) failed ideas and experiments that one doesn’t necessarily want to make public.

My progress is rarely linear. I find myself regularly weighing whether what I’m doing in a given week is taking me in a concrete direction, or is merely a detour leading to a dead-end. And while I think it’s important to follow most ideas to see where they may go, doing so publicly can be pretty scary.

But I’m finding there are also advantages to this cyber-space version of opening the studio door before I feel confident about what I’m working on — or where it may be headed. Not only have I found it tremendously worthwhile to be compelled to collect my thoughts in a coherent, readable form as a means of articulating to myself where I’m going, but I truly value the insights that some of you have chosen to share with me.

The most fruitful project I’ve taken on this year has been my commitment to draw every day. After 9-1/2 months, I’m beginning to see an ever-so-slight crack of light that is pointing me in what I hope will be a productive new direction that will spill over into my textile work. The challenge is in figuring out exactly how to bring these two diverse (one relatively spontaneous, the other decidedly more methodical) disciplines together into something new that doesn’t compromise the unique qualities of each. With color and composition as guideposts, I want to find a way to capture the feeling/immediacy of a drawing while capitalizing on the textural qualities of fabric and thread. Another goal is to strive toward an abstraction of the subject so that it becomes more than a mere translation of what is in front of me.

Saucer & Spoon ©2015 Elizabeth Fram Step 3 There is a lot to be learned through the distance of a photograph; lessons that are harder to see up-close and in-person. This “sketch” is too literal and has lost the vitality of the preliminary drawing above. There are passages here that I find cringe-worthy, (but also passages I quite like). Most importantly, it was a worthwhile exercise of discovery through color and mark-making.

I feel like I’m on the cusp of something quite interesting (to me, anyway!) but the big picture is still pretty muddy. The only path toward figuring it out involves time and lots of practice. If you’ll bear with me, I’ll bring you along.

PS – I try to keep this in mind: Time is rarely wasted in the studio. Although the “positive and negative” pieces from this past summer are leaning squarely toward the dead-end pile, who knows when whatever I learned from them may resurface and provide some nugget of info that is exactly what I need for a future piece. It pays to take a long-term view.