Art Blog: Modern Stuff

I recently read an article that was really inspiring. It said that artists—writers, potters, painters, musicians, etc.—should create their own inspiration, rather than waiting around for inspiration to come to them. It’s a very practical idea, especially for people looking to turn their hobby into a professional career (where waiting around is not usually an option).

I decided to put this idea into practice on a day that I was feeling very uninspired. I didn’t feel like drawing or painting, or doing anything of the sort, but I decided that I would get inspired! I assumed that getting inspired should not take a huge amount of effort. So I took a quick glance around a room of my house, saw a funky lamp that I liked… and that was my inspiration.

I decided that I would paint something really simple, and I really wanted to use primary colors (red, yellow and blue). Think kindergarten! So I first drew a very basic line drawing of the funky lamp.

Then, I thought, paints are getting boring! I want to do something totally different that I’ve never done before! So, I looked through my closet of art junk and found some oil pastels… I had never really used pastels before… or since I was in grade school at least. So I chose that as my medium.

The painting did not need to look perfect; I’ve found that striving to make things perfect (which is not possible anyway) can suck out some (to all) of the fun. So, I painted my ‘kindergarten’ picture, and it was fun.

I also posted to this blog a picture of a bunch of eyes, and a face, that I painted years ago, to add to the modern art theme. They have less kindergarten flare than the lamp painting, but were still really fun to paint.