Tag Archives: Austin Kleon

Who’s Really In Charge?

I have to wonder sometimes, who’s in charge – the artist or the art?

When I began my latest portrait, I thought I had a pretty good handle on how it would progress. Having already stitched the white background pattern (shared with you in my last post) I fully expected to layer more paint and stitching both on top of that area and within the house shape surrounding the finished portrait.

Preliminary sketches provide space to try out possibilities

Experimental practice sketches like the one above nudged me toward a rich stew of color and texture, brought to life by painting over the stitched white pattern, adding brushstrokes to mimic stitching, and finishing with another layer of colored thread embroidery.

The next 5 photos follow the progression of this portrait at various stopping points. I take these images because they give me a bit of distance after each session, allowing me to see where to go next. Plus, I’m usually so tied up in a piece during the making that it’s a treat to go back later to revisit its evolution.

It’s all well and good to have a plan, but you also have to be willing to let it go. This turned out to be a classic example of thinking I knew where the piece was headed, but ultimately the work itself had the final say.

Winter Garden 2

Once I had removed the masking from around the house shape, I had to acknowledge – despite all my plans – that the white-on-white stitching didn’t need my interference. It seemed to say everything I needed it to, just as it was. In fact, overlaying the background with more color and texture felt unnecessary and superfluous.

Winter Garden 3

Often, both the easiest and the hardest part of the process is to step away, trusting that sleeping on an issue will weed out any uncertainties and allow for deciding what will be the right call. After taking an overnight timeout I felt satisfied that my instincts were correct. Sometimes the best approach is to just get out of the way and listen to the work.

Winter Garden 4

All of this leads to two contradictory nuggets of wisdom that have proven, many times over, to be invaluable to me:

When you think a piece is finished, keep pushing deeper, and
Less is more

Of course the tricky part is figuring out which is called for, when.

One last word on the subject of portraits…I received the happy news this week that I received an Honorable Mention Award from Teravarna Art Gallery in their “6th Portrait” competition.

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Substack is quickly becoming my new favorite reading spot.
In his “10 Things Worth Sharing” newsletter on Substack this week, Austin Kleon linked to an “Open Letter To The Next Generation Of Artists“, written by jazz greats Herbie Hancock and the recently deceased Wayne Shorter. Give it a read; it will give you a lift in return.

You Win Some, You Lose Some

Ai, yai, yai!

This week is as close as I’ve come to crying “uncle” during the selfie project. No matter what I do, I just can’t seem to capture my dear friend Dianne in a satisfactory way. Sometimes only the eyes and nose pass muster, sometimes it’s the mouth that is okay. And every single time I’ve struggled with the overall shape of her face, partially because in the photo her mouth is open, making her chin look unusually elongated.
This is the inherent danger of drawing people I know. I so desperately want to get it right.

I can’t even tell you how much courage it’s taking for me to post these images, especially since I know many of you who read this blog know Dianne personally and will immediately see my missteps. However, I think it’s important to highlight that rough patches are a given. They test our resilience and are also the secret sauce that moves our work forward.

The picture she sent was not meant as a selfie submission, but rather to share the beautiful hat her granddaughter had made for her for Mother’s Day. She looked so tickled and proud that I asked if it would be okay to use the image for this project and she graciously said yes.

Dianne 2

The result is I have felt doubly responsible to both Dianne and her granddaughter, so my shortcomings and inability to do them justice cuts deeply. Four unsuccessful iterations later, each new version cringe-worthy in its own way (I’m not even going to share the 3rd attempt with you), the process has left me feeling more than a bit beaten up.

Dianne 4

To say I’ve been frustrated doesn’t come close. The next best (and only) step was to just shake it off and to start completely from scratch, this time using a bamboo reed pen and a bottle of ink. No expectations, just the joy of line and the buttery feel of the pen as it glides across the paper.

Red Ink

This latest may not be successful in a formal way, but it’s not a total loss because I can finally see the slightest glimmer of my friend Dianne as I know her peeking through. Even more importantly, I am going to celebrate the fact that this little drawing represents a fight survived. Not one that was won, or even one that was escaped without a few mental scrapes and bruises. Rather, it marks a battle that honors persistence and stands as a reminder that the real reward is in the process, not the result. That realization in itself is more than enough for today.

Note: Austin Kleon’s latest book Keep Going: 10 Ways to Stay Creative in Good Times and Bad is a welcome shot of inspiration for navigating minor rough patches like the one outlined above, or for finding ways to keep your creativity intact through bigger challenges, such as the uncharted territory of a pandemic.

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On the flip side, there was also a bit of a win last week.
I’m quite happy with this new little house – an offshoot inspired by the Shelter in Place project. It’s an expression of the dichotomy of feeling both hemmed in and safe at home – one I know we’re all experiencing these days.

Lessons Learned

These past two weeks I’ve been on a mission to finish up this piece that I’ve been working on since September. With so many other irons in the fire, I haven’t been reporting on its progress regularly, but I’m happy to say I am finally finished and feeling richer for the lessons learned along the way.

The first, and sadly unsuccessful, version of the chess king

To bring you up to speed: The two halves (the king and the queen) were worked separately since the whole piece is larger than the frame I use for stretching cloth while stitching. The king was completed at the end of October, and the queen in the beginning of December. I was not able to see and compare all parts of the piece while working, so it was a bit of an ugly surprise to discover that the king on the left (which had been stitched first and that I was quite satisfied with when completed) just didn’t hold up next to the queen on the right. In fact it seemed to almost disintegrate into its background. So many hours of work! What to do?

Tools of the trade, along with a big pile of removed stitches.

Lesson #1: Take a break. Time away from the studio during the holidays provided the necessary breathing room to figure out a solution to such a discouraging challenge. With fresh eyes, I could easily recognize the hard reality of what was needed to pull the figure out from its background. Note to self: a hazard of working so closely and in such fine detail is forgetting to get regular distance from the work to be sure it reads as correctly from afar as it does at close range. Always step back mid-process.

Picking out stitches is a painstaking and delicate process, but ultimately worth the time.

The way to fix it lay in two things:
Lesson #2: Contrast. My original intent was to keep the king’s side red – hoping that the threads I chose were dark enough to suggest the black pieces of a chess set. But unfortunately, the colors were so analogous to the background that it just became a muddle. However, even though this iteration didn’t work out in the long run, I made some unrelated but fruitful discoveries along the way that will carry forward into future work…i.e. a benefit of deliberate practice (keep reading).

The piece with all the stitches removed except for (look closely) that one red section on the middle-left of the figure. Leaving it in place seemed right.

And Lesson #3: Let go – or “murder your darlings” as advised by Arthur Quiller-Couch.* It seems a no-brainer now that undoing the original, and re-stitching the figure in blue, was the proper answer.

With this small bit done, I can see I’m on the right track.

In relation to these points, two things come to mind.
First, Austin Kleon wrote a post in 2015 on the relationship between “input” and “output” There are many ways that his theory can be stretched to serve whatever issues may currently challenge you in the studio, but I think the most cogent point is that we need to continually feed ourselves with input in order to strengthen our output. Answers lurk in unexpected places.

Blue king, finished

Its partner, the white queen

And secondly, with that fact in mind the other idea that has resonated for me as I’ve been working my way past this particularly sticky wicket comes from the book Talent is Overrated, one of my best picks from 2019.
In it, Geoff Colvin outlines the importance of “deliberate practice” as a necessary ingredient in the success of any professional standout. He discusses exactly what that means and how it is applicable before, after, and during the work itself. “Meta-cognition” is the fancy term he gives to the art of close self-observation while one works, identifying it as the path to pushing oneself forward. Discoveries are sometimes serendipitous, as written in Making it Work, but I think repetition through practice (as I have seen by completely reworking this chess king) remains the gold standard.

House Divided (Mitch & Nancy), ©2020 Elizabeth Fram, 18 x 24 inches, Stitched-resist dye and embroidery on silk. Granted, this is a working photo, but boy does it point out how important it is to hire a professional to capture the best image (shout-out to Paul Rogers Photography). Even so, you get the idea. A bit of back-story on the chess pieces: They are part of a wooden set I discovered a number of years ago that belonged to my grandfather. He died when I was very young, so I have limited memories of him. Lovely (to my eye), while a bit crudely made, I took a lot of photos at the time, finding the shapes and their shadows quite intriguing.

It isn’t enough to capture a likeness or create a pleasing image. We need to continually study, not just others’ work to try to figure out why they made the choices they did and how it added to their success, but it’s important to apply equal curiosity to our own thought processes and decisions along the way. Think of it as another route to learning the necessary lessons that ultimately elevate our individual output.

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Threads of Truth

If you will be in Chicago in the next weeks, consider a trip to the Zhou B Art Center to see Threads of Truth, curated by Sergio Gomez. My piece “Hell Freezes Over” will be among the work in the exhibition.

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Finally, three resources for your listening pleasure:

Margaret Sheridan and Louise Fletcher of the Art Juice podcast ask and discuss the important question How Do You Define Success?.

And, since most of us can’t get to Berkeley, CA very easily, check out Slow Fiber Studios’ podcasts recorded from their lecture and event series. Among other things, the topics covered include natural dyes and textile conservation by some of the world’s top experts.

*Check out Darlingside, who coined their name from Queller-Couch’s quote. For wonderful music to work by, filled lush melodies and superpower harmonies, give a listen.

Technical Trenches

If only my days were just drawing and stitching!

This past week I have spent way too much time on the phone with my server, trying to get things straightened around so that I can once again set up automatic delivery of my weekly blog posts to your inboxes. Let’s just say it hasn’t been fun, and I surely hope that with perseverance I’ll get it figured out one way or another. I guess the upside is that I’m learning digital technicalities that I never bargained on…although it’s all very superficial and, frankly, there are ways I’d much rather spend my time.

Scott ©2019 Elizabeth Fram, 18 x 23 inches, Graphite and colored pencil on paper. Love this paper – Canson Edition. It has both a rough and a smooth side to choose from. This is the smooth side. It takes varying pressures of line beautifully and erases cleanly. It also picks up color easily.

In the meantime, these images will give you a taste of what I’ve been doing both textile and drawing-wise. It goes without saying that I’ve been grateful for any and all work that gets me away from the computer!

Making progress on this latest…

On the brighter side, consider a visit to the The Grange Hall Cultural Center this month to see their new exhibit Body Beautiful which runs through October 12th. Two of my life drawings are included — a first for me since I haven’t shown any of them publicly yet, except here at Eye of the Needle.

And finally, because it’s always a treat to be inspired by the natural world, take a look at @pottersarms on Instagram for photos of such color and lyricism that they will at times take your breath away. Keep scrolling for her magnificent photos of flowers, both alive and dead.

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I’m looking forward to heading to The Netherlands soon to finally see the 2019 Textile Biennial at the Rijswijk Museum. It’s been a long wait. I was overjoyed to learn that both Alone Together and Respite will be remaining in that part of the world with their new owners!

Laws’ Laws: Awareness, Creativity, Curiosity

I know that one of the biggest challenges people often experience when beginning a new sketchbook or art journal is taking the first step. I get it; it’s hard not to look at a book of blank pages without feeling a certain amount of trepidation about how it’s going to materialize.

John, detail ©2018 Elizabeth Fram, Graphite on paper Many of our life drawing models come with props or costumes. John was leaning on a baseball bat in this pose, which explains the tilt of his body.

In order to get around that fear, I’ve found it helpful to take the perspective that each new page in my daily sketchbook is just another opportunity for pressure-free learning. There’s no point in worrying about the inevitable drawings you won’t want anyone to see, or how unlikely it is that it will end up as a polished product from start to finish. That isn’t the point.

It’s much richer to have a sketchbook that is a true mirror of my day-to-day reality (successes and struggles alike), recording the things that, to some, may seem so ordinary they don’t merit a second glance, but which, for whatever reason, caught my eye in the moment and hold onto that meaning when I look back over those drawings later.

With that in mind, I loved reading about John Muir Laws on Austin Kleon’s blog this week. Laws is a nature journalist and the illustrator of a comprehensive field guide to the wildlife of the Sierra Nevada. He is enthusiastic about sketchbook journaling and promotes it as a way of being more attuned to the beauty that surrounds us and as a weapon against the ennui of familiarity. It’s a strategy that has merit regardless of whether you’re trying to capture a scenic vista or your breakfast dishes.

“We live in a world of beauty and wonder. Train your mind to see deeply and with intentional curiosity, and the world will open before you. Keeping a journal of observations, questions, and reflections will enrich your experiences and develop gratitude, reverence, and the skills of a naturalist. The goal of nature journaling is not to create a portfolio of pretty pictures but to develop a tool to help you see, wonder, and remember your experiences.” ~John Muir Laws

Mermaid ©2018 Elizabeth Fram, 18 x 24 inches, Graphite on paper I regret that the model’s facial expression looks so dour here – as she was decidedly not so. Sometimes, just the slightest change of line can affect the whole expression, but unfortunately I didn’t see the need to adjust until after I’d gotten home. As I mentioned in last week’s post, a bit of time and distance can make a huge difference in assessment. She was wearing the most beautiful mermaid costume that she had sewn herself, covered in green sequins. With the flowers in her hair, she was a force!

Laws suggests a three-pronged approach to have in the back of your mind as you tackle your sketchbook/journal. He is a naturalist, so his purview is wildlife and flora, but his principles apply no matter what you choose to draw. They also serve as a reminder that there is a greater significance to drawing regularly than solely capturing a likeness:

Awareness: “I see…”: You notice something, draw a picture of it, make notes about it.
Creativity: “It reminds me of…”: You consciously seek out analogies to what you’ve seen and make notes about those.
Curiosity: “I wonder…” You ask questions or create hypotheses about what you’ve seen.

Additionally, he recommends that each page contain three different types of notes: drawings, words (descriptions), and numbers (measurements). I think this is an especially smart framework to lean on if you’re having trouble getting into a rhythm with a new sketchbook.

Nefertiti ©2018 Elizabeth Fram, 24 x 18 inches, Graphite on paper This model doesn’t shy from dressing up either, although she didn’t have time in preparing for this session. Still, I couldn’t help but think of regal Nefertiti as I drew her silhouette, her dreadlocks enclosed in a beautiful head wrap.

Take a swing through Laws’ website –he has a page filled with free online lectures, classes, and step-by-step lessons. I’m not a naturalist sketcher, but the I got a lot out of his talk about his drawing process and practice while knitting by the fire a couple of evenings ago.

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Hard to believe that Thanksgiving is already upon us! With that in mind, I’d like to just take a moment to thank each and every one of you who make the time in your busy lives to check in with me here, whether faithfully each week or just sporadically. Your support, interest, and comments (both public and private) are the meat of the conversation I was seeking when starting Eye of the Needle, and are what keep me coming back week after week.

May you have a lovely holiday!

Copycatting

I sorely miss my group life-drawing sessions which have been on hiatus for five weeks. Figuring I didn’t have to factor in drive-time, I had high hopes for all the drawing I would accomplish during those extra hours over the break…wait, what extra hours? In fact, looking back on my recent “free” Mondays, it has become starkly obvious that the structure of a set schedule is a better formula for accomplishment in the long run — for me anyway.

Copy from Studies of Two Apostles and their Hands by Raphael (1483-1520) Hands are my greatest challenge, so that is where I need to concentrate my efforts.

I know I could make much greater leaps in my life-drawing skills if I were able to draw from a model daily for a series of weeks, rather than only once a week for however many months. Unfortunately, that option isn’t available. However, one of my fellow Monday drawing attendees reminded me that there is much to be learned by making copies of master drawings. So that is what I’ve been doing.

Copy of drawings by Abraham Bloemaert (1564-1651)

Considering the garden is popping and there have been plenty of other things vying for attention during my “extra” hours, I haven’t been as diligent as I should have — or certainly to the degree I would have liked. But these images are a few examples of my stabs at practicing, thanks to the work of Raphael, Abraham Bloemaert, and Bernard-Romain Julien. Jon deMartin’s book Drawing Atelier: The Figure is another excellent resource about copying master work. Follow this link for a list of drawing references I’ve mentioned before and am glad to have in my personal library.

Copy of Head of Wounded Soldier by Bernard-Romain Julien (1802-1871)

For another testimonial on the benefits of copying, read this wonderful blog post by Austin Kleon, author of Steal Like an Artist.