The Artist's Way: Week Two Wrap Up and Artist Date

I’m just going to jump right in to answering the three questions, though not in numerical order.

Question 3: Were there any other issues this week that you consider significant for your recovery?

           

This week I did notice that I attempted to put more creativity into my every day life. Even if it was a small thing, like choosing a pink pen, I found that creative choices came much more to the forefront of my mind. Also, I’ve been paying more attention to how I spend my time (much of it wasted) and trying to change that little by little.

Question 1: How many days this week did you do your morning pages? How was the experience for you? How did the morning pages work for you?

I did them 6 out of 7 days. My goal for this coming week is 100%! I’m actually finding them enjoyable. (Though my penmanship is atrocious since I try to write as fast as possible. I'm a busy person, after all.) I just make myself keep writing, even when I don’t know what I’ll write next. It’s kind of surprising to see what comes out of my head because I’m writing fast and without much thought. I go from what I’m worried about to what I hope to accomplish in the next year to what I’m having for lunch to how much I hate going to work to how I want to start a painting, yada yada yada. Thus far, after writing for a total of 12 days, 36 pages, I haven’t been out of something to write. Maybe that will change at week 10? We’ll see. But, I’ve liked venting and being honest with myself. It’s been illuminating.

Question 2: Did you do your artist date this week? What did you do? How did it feel?

I’ve decided to organize my artist dates into two categories: 1) things I go and see, and 2) things I stay and do. Since last week I went to a new museum, this week I chose to have an Artist Child Saturday. 

First, I got all the pesky adult errands out of the way. Then, I indulged in something that I actually remember (miracle!) doing as a child: watching re-runs of H. R. Pufnstuf (thank you, KCET for broadcasting!). Do you remember that show? By the time I watched it as a kid, it was already re-runs, and so to watch it again, some 30 years later, was fascinating. 

Everything was familiar and I remembered the introduction. It made me feel nostalgic and silly all at once. But, it touched a place I used to live as a child, where trees could talk and houses had smiles and magical flutes were my friends. For a half-hour, nothing seemed impossible. (And then I made the mistake of looking up the little kid in the show to see what happened to him and got bummed out. Don’t look! Child stardom is a curse.) 

After watching the show, I took some time to jot down any idea I had, no matter how dumb, in regards to the two short stories I’m attempting to write for competitions. And I have to be honest, some ideas were really lame. It’s not like after touching my childhood imagination the inspiration fairies paid me a visit and all I had was fabulous ideas. But, I did think of a few possible starts for one story and came up with a whole new idea for the other. 

So, that was my artist date. Exactly what Julia recommends: “artist dates are a necessary frivolity” (p. 59).

Now, as I mentioned in my last post, I had some exciting news of sorts. I’ve decided to create an Artist’s Way painting, something that will represent the journey that I’m taking. And I’ve decided to let you in on the process (even though it makes me kind of want to pass out).

What I decided I would do is post a picture at the end of each week so you can follow the many transformations/incarnations the piece will take. Some weeks it will look horrible, other weeks it might look okay, and other weeks it will not look like anything it had the week before. But, I felt it was important to document it, if only to show myself how far I’ve come.

So, I thought I’d start by showing you a picture of where I keep all my art supplies and then the first two shots of the painting. [As a side note, this is the largest painting I have ever worked on to date: 18 by 24 nerve racking inches!]

This was a cheap MDF cupboard I bought years ago, and last year I decided to make it pretty with a painting technique and inspiring words.

Here's the inside. You can see I painted it a rich blue and have my art supplies crammed in it. (And two more boxes in my closet.) And, yes, that's Shakespeare on the bottom shelf. It's my extra copy that I use for projects.

If you recall, last week I put gesso all over the canvas. Step One complete.

Step Two is to add the first layer of color. Will any of these be seen at the end of the process? Who knows!