And So the End Shall Be the Beginning

Before I took this class I was in a serious art slump. I hadn't done anything creatively since Winter Break and it was killing me. But then I got into this class and suddenly something opened back up. Within the first two weeks I was starting to get ideas and even execute them. For Pete's Sake I doodled! I drew something on paper with my hands. And it was pitiful and lacked finesse, but it was there and I had a creative thought or two while doing it.
And the the class went on and I found other ways to tap into my creativity, many of which were to just buckle down and do it. In short, I found I could art again. And it was such a relief because having gone six months producing nearly nothing was down right depressing.
I really enjoyed the Egg assignment (sadly my update remains at that fact that my roommate had no reaction to her alien egg) because it forced me to look at an assignment with "no" rules and to still do something with it. I liked the Bliss assignment as well because it purposely carved out time that could be spent in happiness. That to me spoke volumes because even though I get a lot of time to myself to do what I want, I rarely spend it doing what I want. I normally just squander it on internet fodder and although that can be entertaining, in the end I come away from it feeling empty. With the Bliss assignment I took the time to really examine what I wanted to do and then spent the time actually doing it. I came away from that feeling fulfilled.
It was the book assignment, though, that really stayed with me. I loved the therapeutic nature of taking something so negative and transforming it into something positive. Cutting and folding and tapping and sewing fishing line through JavaScript shit to turn it into a sculpture was extremely satisfying. And the fact that the sculpture took on a mind of its own with its sliding cubes and swinging strings told me that that project needed to be done. I took something so static and boring and difficult and made it into this carefree, kinetic, easy-going, aesthetically pleasing thing. It made me happy, which is a complete 180 from where I started with it.
So overall the course taught me to go with the flow and to buckle down and do what I come up with, that not everything has to be perfect as long as I like how it turns out, and that sometimes some "me time" can be very, very productive.
Signing off for the last time; may one tear be shed.

"Altared" book of the self

What is your opinion of combining technology and the human body as she did in the video?
I think tech and the human body can be combined to do good, such as artificial limbs or hearing aids. But I also think there's a limit; there comes a point where technology becomes invasive into the human body (like the swallowed perfume). We are organic and too much tech can rob us of that. For example, we feel pain so we take man-made pain killers. But then those medicines start messing with our bodies. Tylenol hurts your liver, Advil is hard on your stomach, and Excedrin is bad for your nervous system. So I think it's how you use technology in combination with the human body that gives it its purpose.  

What is your opinion of combining a media arts and science project with your own body?
I had talked about this in an earlier post, but one MAS project I'd like to try involving the body is painting in the cave (cave paintings?). It could be as simple as using the gyro mouse to get long, sweeping motions of large screens to create very wide and fluid images. Or it could get more complicated and involve sensors on different parts of the body and the individual could dance, leaving pixel-paint on the walls that mimicked the motions of the dancer. That would be awesome. 

What is identity of self in the digital world? 
 Identity of self is such a hard thing to accomplish in the digital world because you can be anybody you want to be. And that means you can lie to not only everyone online, but also to yourself. But it also means that your identity could reflect what you want it to be. If you believe in the ID you have online, doesn't that make it part of yourself? And isn't that technically your identity? So the digital world can allow you to explore who you want to be before you chose to become it. And that is power.

How will you change this book?
I will transform it from something straight-forward and logical to something organic and cyclical whist representing raster data. Plus circles are cool. 


How will this book change you?  
I think this book will change me by showing me that something aesthetically pleasing can come from something so negative. It will help me to look at the silver lining of things and to trudge on when it gets tough.

 

Don't Get All Up in My Bliss-ness

My altered book's first impression is"Whoa, that's not a book anymore." You would be correct. My book is no longer in cover-to-cover format and that has a purpose. I didn't want it to be a typical book when I was done with it because I'm not a typical person. As my aunt says, "Normal is just a setting on the dryer," and she, along with most else of my family, follow that like it's the eleventh commandment. So I'm not normal, I don't have normal roots, and I wanted to reflect that in my project.

Post-Bliss, though, it hit me just what I wanted to with that "non-book-ness."
My art teacher in high school said to me once that all of my art has a pattern: circles. Now, personally I blame that on the fact that my name begins with an O and I've had to make that shape over and over again throughout the years. But it has become so much a part of me that apparently all my artwork shows it. So a circle it shall be.    

So did Bliss help me have creative thoughts. A little bit, but it more or less left me in tears because I chose to read issue 19 of the best comic series ever and it was really sad. Thank God I had ice cream to help comfort me. But it did leave me feeling a bit pampered and that was nice. And I did reach my word goal on my story, so, okay, I'll count it as having helped creatively.

Part the Third

I really enjoyed Tiffany's project. She had a great concept and I think failure is something that every artist has to face. The idea that she didn't think her project was "good enough" or "didn't meet the criteria enough" only goes to show that other people have the same train of though as I do: is this going to suffice? Is this good enough?
I like that she had us write down what were were afraid of failing on her poster because it helped show that everyone has something they are afraid of failing. As well as that failure (and the fear of if) is a very real, constant thing in many people's lives.
I connected strongly to her project because I have a very strong sense of fear of failure. I always second guess my work and ask "is it good enough." In some ways that can be helpful. For example I might go back and put more shading on an object in a painting because I found that it didn't have enough. But it can also be a hindrance because if I'm always asking, "is this good enough?" then I'm not focusing on the bigger question: "do I enjoy this?"
That's the part of this that impacts my creative self. Focusing on "am I failing this" isn't nearly as productive as asking "am I having fun with this?" Because when one is having fun then the really creative ideas start to come out.
So thank you Tiffany for helping me face my fear of failure and for letting me know I'm not alone in it. I shall try to use it to my advantage.

Part the Second

First off, mad shout-out to the class for being so supportive and helpful! I took into consideration your suggestions and as an update the roommate thing is working out okay.

My original hypothesis was that the class would agree with statement of taking a stand and not allowing myself to fall back into the role of "victim." And people did agree with that, but it went further with suggestions of actually interacting and engaging with my roommates.

So that's how I'm adjusting my experiment. Instead of just participating in a group dinner, I'm going to do other activities with said group. For example, go to the movies - and in case you're wondering, yes, Guardians of the Galaxy really is that good - or just hang out in the apartment with for an hour or two. In doing so, I will get more information about my roommates and also about myself. This will allow me to make a better decision about how much interaction I have with them as well as to find things we have in common. So that's my main adjustment.

And lastly, this assignment was tough, but thanks to my classmates, I'm getting through it just fine.  

What'd'ya Think'll Happen?

I dunno

But if I had to guess:
I think they will agree.

Class Take-Away 8

Let's talk about time.
There's a quote that has gone around the inter-webs that says: "Try to imagine a life without timekeeping. You probably can't. You know the year, the month, and the day of the week. There's a clock on your phone, your wall, and in your computer. You have a schedule, a calendar, and a time for dinner. Yet all around you, timekeeping is ignored. The birds outside are never late. A dog does not care for time nor a cat check his watch. Man alone measures time. And because of this, Man alone suffers a fear no other creature endures. A fear of time running out."
That has always stuck with me. Time is something humans came up with and yet it governs our entire lives. We have schedules and time zones and clocks everywhere so that we know the value of something that isn't real. It's like imaginary numbers. One by itself doesn't exist, but if you multiply two together, suddenly they do. One person could believe in time, but until someone else does too, it has only an imaginary value. Creepy, huh?
Now the class seemed to have a mutual complaint about our previous assignment: that it was too short of a timeline to do something really creative in. But as we demonstrated, that wasn't necessarily the case. There were a lot of neat ideas that floated around and they were upped only by the fact that we came up with them on such a short timeline. So what's this say about time and creativity? I'll get back to that but first I'd like to add that it was a noticeable trend in high school that during the time of the annual musical, many performers' grades would actually go up. This seems strange considering that we were putting in a lot of time and effort into the production, leaving homework to take a backseat. But what it really did was force us to buckle down and get our assignments done since our timetable was much shorter. We didn't dilly dally or putz around online or watch four more episodes of the Simpsons on Netflix.
So where is this going?
Perhaps one of the reasons we all did so well creatively was because we did have a shorter timeline. We were forced to come up with something quickly so our minds were constantly spinning the project around in our grey matter(s?). The point is this: because we had very little time the idea stayed fresh and we profited from that creatively. Quality may have been in issue, though. There were some grumbles about not being able to MAKE what was thought up and that's understandable. But the assignment, I felt, more or less dealt with the idea verses the thing.
So how will this help in my creative future?
Well I now have evidence to suggest that a shorter timeline to conceptualize can produce some highly creative thoughts. This may suggest that I should try thinking about what I want to do less and actually doing it more. It would be a fun experiment to try.
Time may not actually be real, but the rest of the world seems to think so, and therefore, I have to go. Breakfast awaits.

Taste the sound of a second - Hear the Smell of a Moment

I'm going to admit that I had a really hard time with this assignment. I ran through several thoughts before I finally settled on the one that I did and even then, I feel like more could have been taken away from it. 

Every day I go on a two mile walk along the White River Trail. Usually on this little jaunt I mold ideas for my stories or art or ruminate on any issue that may be dragging me down. However, yesterday I decided to take that time and dedicate it to my assignment. So instead of spending the trail in my head, I concentrated on how the walk felt. I began to notice the position of the sun, the strength of the wind, the tightening in my chest from seasonal allergies beginning to affect me. I noticed the way my shoes rubbed on my feet and how my right leg began to pull (because technically that leg is crooked, but that's another entry). The end result is mapped:

So I got the "use another sense" thing down, but the whole "experiment  with time" aspect was kind of neglected. Unless you count that the trip is a circle in which case I both started and ended at point A, putting a circular path in a linear timeline. But I feel like that really doesn't count. So instead I have another example of playing with time.

Electro Swing is a music genre that takes music from the Swing era (1940-ish) and adds a dance beat to it. This video illustrates that well since the dance style is also a hip hop/swing mix. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FALYmqt-7TQ

This shows time play by taking the style of the past and remaking it to fit into today's atmosphere.

So touch and anachronisms: that's my "Tasting the sound of a second." 

 

Class Take-Away 7

In class we talked about needing new friends, and while a few people laughed, I took it to heart. Because not to long ago I had to do the same thing.
My high school friends were known to my family as The Pound because we had nothing in common except that none of us had any friends. So we adopted each other. But it's hard to have friends who have nothing in common and try to still hang out and do things and on top of that, none of these people - myself included - were good at communication. I was left to plan everything and then wait and watch as some of them showed up late or not at all, or would have to leave in the middle of something, or never get back to me period. It was frustrating. And I hated that that was what my only friendships amounted to.
But then I came to college and something bizarre happened. People came to what I planned, they wanted to hang out, and we all communicated what our problems with the plan were. It was amazing! These were real friends. So to anyone who is in that boat, I want you to know that it is possible. It is absolutely possible to make new friends, and believe me, it's wonderful when you do. I know it's tough, but try not to be scared. And it will take time, but it's a relief when it happens.    
How will this help creatively? When you have people around you who are true friends, who support you, you become willing to try new things, experiment. I had never done a digital painting before college and when my friend let me borrow her tablet, I instantly fell in love with it. If I hadn't had made this new friend, I would have never found what I want to do for the rest of my life. And that's a pretty big help creatively.

And yes, sometimes it can feel like this.

Breakin' Rules

During freshman year I began to write what would later become the first book in a trilogy. Now when I committed those first words to paper, I had no idea that it would blossom into this thing encompassing years of my life and endless ideas to fill over nine hundred pages. However, the point is not the book; the point is that during those years and multiple pages, I became tuned in to grammatical structure. In short, nine hundred plus pages makes you a grammar Nazi. Now I carry a pen with me everywhere to put commas in where they are missing and harp on the usage of semicolons.
Grammar became hardwired into my brain.
So for my "breaking rules" assignment, I decided to break something that is close to sacred to me. I wrote an entry that purposely breaks some of the fundamentals of grammar: punctuation, capitalization, verb-tense agreement, and proper uses of homophones such as there and their. 

(Because of spell check and the like, I had to put it on paper. Sadly the end result just looks like the average post on Facebook.)
This experiment nearly killed me, and I failed it the first (and second and third) time. I capitalized letters at the beginning of sentences and added periods and commas. Grammar is so second nature to me that breaking it was not only painful, but a real struggle. Now obviously a repercussion of this is that one has a wicked hard time trying to read it; there's no structure to it to give the reader any flow. However, it was a good exercise in that, because I kept messing up, I know that my grammar skills are still sharp and honed.      
   

Good news, everyone. Class take-away 6 is here.

From a first look, sneak peek, at Age of Ultron, to finding out the Fraction's Hawkeye series is ending, to seeing Futurama's skyline re-imagined in beautiful 3-D, the past twenty-four hours have been a geeky, emotional roller coaster. Coupled with a reaction to Facebook post I received yesterday, and I've been all over the map.
But I'd like to talk about that Facebook post and how it connects to the class.
Critical thinking came up once or twice yesterday and I'd like to make that my class take-away because I applied it. To me, this class is about asking why, about going deeper into what makes us tick. And in the case of that post, it was more like ticked off.
You've probably seen it floating around on your feed: one girl tags some friends to post five pictures that makes them feel beautiful and then they're supposed to tag others. My newsfeed was littered with these particularly patterned posts, and when I got tagged to do it, I became furious.
But instead of just logging out and sulking the rest of the day, I applied those critical thinking skills and the mindset of the class and asked myself "why." Why did this post make me so angry? Was it because I'd seen so much of it all day long? Was it the idea that all these girls (and it was like 95% girls) were following a trend like a bunch of sheep? Was it because I didn't have any pictures that I thought made me feel beautiful? Answer to that:  Maybe...
Now, I'm not very photogenic (and I say that in the sense that I think I've taken maybe three good pictures in my life - excluding professionally done senior photos) and being the photographer in the family meant that I spent far more time behind the camera than in front of it. So I don't have the "selfie" gene that seems to be manifesting in my age group. And is that why I was so pissed off? Yes. Because these girls were posting pictures of themselves. Some had friends and family in them, but the main subject was THEM.  (Please do not take offense if you did this on Facebook. If you have photos that make you feel beautiful, awesome! Don't let me stop you.)
Okay, so, I didn't post my five pics, but I got thinking about it, and if I did, I probably would have posted pictures of my art. Because that's what makes me feel beautiful. My art is my soul and as long as I keep making things I genuinely love, then my soul is happy, so my work is good, and the cycle goes on. And that's the part I want to keep in mind for my future artistic endeavors. That it's okay to make something that's awful, as long as I don't let it get to my soul too much. Because I know I've made some pieces I've very proud of. And those pieces are the ones that make me feel beautiful. So thank you, critical thinking, for allowing me to arrive to that conclusion. And thank you, Seeing Sideways, for nurturing that skill.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go attend a funeral for the best comic book series ever. (You may leave condolences in the comments below.)    

50 "What Ifs"

What if I…

1.       Bind it up with twine

2.       Chew it up

3.       Wash it with the laundry

4.       Wash it with the dishes

5.       Cook it in a skillet

6.       Put it in the dryer

7.       Doodle on it like a kindergartener

8.       Watch TV with it

9.       Use it to silence my roommate’s dying fire alarm (BEEP!)

10.   Write a radio play about it on it

11.   Microwave it (is it safe to microwave this?)

12.   Turn it into a flip book

13.   Put it in the freezer (Like Captain America)

14.   Put make-up on it

15.   Burry it next to where some dog buried a bone

16.   Leave it on the bus

17.   Make paper cranes out of it

18.   Dunk it in milk like an Oreo

19.   Hack it into pieces

20.   Spit on it

21.   Fold it up with the laundry

22.   Make it into mini books

23.   Hang it on the laundry line

24.   Mail it to the president

25.   Drive over it repeatedly

26.   Wipe it down with bleach

27.   Sew the pages together

28.   Post it online

29.   Cover it in glue and put it on the ceiling

30.   Make it into a greenhouse

31.   Cover it in glitter

32.   Weave it into the blinds

33.   Use it as an umbrella

34.   Make it into a sandwich

35.   Make it into a necklace

36.   Stomp on it

37.   Clean the toilet with it

38.   Vacuum it up

39.   Hand it out like flyers

40.   Give it to a homeless man

41.   Let it swim with the fishes

42.   Put it in a hole with seeds and let plants grow from it

43.   Scatter it over the floor of an elevator

44.   Make it into a ton of paper airplanes

45.   Turn it into business cards

46.   Make it into a parachute

47.   Use it as Kleenexes

48.   Cover it in smiley faces

49.   Melt crayons on it

50.   Give it away page by page at Halloween

Taketh away the number of five

The cave of wonders! Or something like that.
Despite having seen it before, the Cave is always cool. And with some of the new stuff that has been done on/with it, it just keeps getting cooler. And yes, the other stuff was incredibly neat too (and the reactions from those who tried it amusing) but the Cave is truly something that holds my interest. And while sitting there, watching people race and explore hunted houses, I got an idea…
I love digital painting. It's the amalgamation of what I've been taught about fine art + my admiration and interest in technology. It's fun and easy and it would be incredible to take a shot at this on four floor-to-ceiling surfaces. Imagine being able to paint on all surrounding surfaces. I guess you'd use the gyro mouse. But you could have three paintings next to each other, not just displayed, but done right there. You could have a preset pic of a sidewalk on the floor and then do chalk drawings on top of it. There could even be a level of performance to it. Paint to music, your body's motions captured on the canvases behind and below, layering it, changing color. And when it was all over, you could save or delete it.
So yeah, the Cave is what stood out to me today, and I might just get ahold of Chauncey (spelling isn't my strong suit) to see if this could be possible.

Who am I and why am I here?

Who am I and why am I here?

I find it funny that as soon as we are given an assignment that looks at our self-identity, I find a TV show to watch that deals with a man who knows everything there is to know in the world, but not one thing about himself. He calls himself John Doe (also the name of the show, 2002) and he knows everything from the current Yellow Pages to the first lines of Hamlet. But he doesn’t even know his own name, favorite color, what he likes to eat. He just woke up on an island off the coast of Washington state with all this knowledge and no idea where it, or he, came from.

A quick Google search comes up with several movies and TV shows about identity, whether it be mistaken, stolen, changed, or crisis, it seems that identity is a huge concept in storytelling. There were even both a movie and a TV show entitled Identity. Holes, The Giver, Charlotte’s Web, Diary of a Wimpy Kid, they are all listed as books that have a central theme of identity. Even the X-Men comics dabbled into the subject.  

So are we obsessed about finding out who we are? Do we feel that if these characters can achieve some sort of “found ID” that we can too?

I had a teacher in grade school who told us all that basic human needs include food, water, shelter, and the need to belong. Is that why we are so set on finding out who we are? What if when we find out we’ll know how to belong…

But that’s the catch. We can look out at other people and wish to know who we are so we can belong like them, but chances are they’re staring right back thinking the same thing. Who we are is not a destination; it’s a journey. Everything that happens to us helps shape our identity. And what happens to us later down the line will change us yet again.

For example, I was bullied in grade school and some in middle school. I spent most of high school without any friends. So today, I have a hard time believing that there are people who want to go and do something with me, to hang out with me. And I’m petrified that I’ll mess it up. So I try to be as receptive and supportive of my friends as I possibly can because I can’t afford to loose them. I also get a little jealous if I find out they spent time with someone else. I feel forgotten then. And I know it’s irrational and petty, but it's part of who I am. My past made that part of my identity. And there’s a good chance that something in the future will change it.

So the questions “who am I and why am I here” can only be applied to a single fixed point in time. Because if you ask me tomorrow, something could have happened that altered my identity even the slightest, but it still renders my previous answer as false. So who am I and why am I here today?

At this point in time I am a pioneer, and I’m here to travel along a path un-blazed by the masses. I’m here to belong to the few that are combining old and new. I want to bring together the ease of digital to the techniques and the looks of fine art. I want to paint with pixels, sculpt with wires, write words on a blank screen instead of blank page. And most of all, I want people to recognize what I do as real art.

Who am I? A digital artist.

Why am I here? To let the world know it.

But ask me tomorrow. You might have a totally different answer.        

Class Take-Away Four (Four for Fore)

Instead of five for fighting in hockey, they should have four for fore in golf. Like four points get added to your score if you forget to say fore or something. 
Anyway, thank you, Frank, for sharing your dream and making me feel better about mine. Yes, my class take away is Frank's wonderful retelling of Dav-Kid Spade and him on Mario Karts and high-priced diners. You see, I too have bizarre dreams: Harry Potter worshiping a toilet, my neighbors hiding under my bed because they are confused about carrot cake, my dad being an international pop star. So it's very nice to know that others experience the oddity of nonsensical dreams.
How will this help in creative endeavors? Well, many artists get ideas from dreams. In fact, one assignment we had in high school was to make an illustration to accompany one of our dreams. So in the future I could experiment with adding elements from my crazy dreams into my art. Although, drawing my dad as a pop star could be a little much. But maybe I could focus on the colors used or the emotions felt in my dreams and try to incorporate them into my artwork. You never know; maybe my rendering of carrot cake could strike fear into another soul. MWHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!

Is the Joke Too Much if I Call this Pillow Talk?

Sleep on it. Literally sleep on your book. Well, I did. Kind of. It was strange, really, but I kid you not, my subconscious refused to sleep on this book. Any time I would wake up in the night, I'd find that my head was on another pillow, on the tippy tip edge of the book pillow, or just flat out on the mattress. My mind refused to sleep on this book. The idea of Java being anywhere near my head just freaked my brain out enough that I couldn't sleep on the book.
Is this why Beth told us to do this? Did other people experience this weird disconnect from their pillow because something of true hatred lay beneath it? I'm going to go with YES until proven otherwise and say that that is why Beth asked us to do this.
Or maybe she just asked us to enjoy our neck pain the next day; I don't know.
 

Class Take-Away the Third

This post begins with a self-help book. Or rather a discussion with my mother about self-help books that, sparing the details, ends with her positive review of one called Life Doesn't Have to be a Struggle. (Or something like that; I don't actually remember the title.) From there a memory sprang forth of a most likely fake self-help book read by Detective Jason Walsh (played by Jeremy Renner) in a very underrated cop drama called The Unusuals, in order to stall a criminal they were holding so that they could wait his accomplice out and get him to confess. That thought then connects to my mini, purple, Swingline stapler. I ran out of staples in it months ago and finally decided to reload it. I tried and tried to get it to open, keeping an eye out for helpful arrows - that never appeared - until finally I just pulled up on the top of it. Voilà! The stapler opened and I reloaded the thing. 
So where is all of this going? Well it goes back to the idea that life doesn't have to be difficult. A stapler can just open. A criminal can just confess. An egg project can just be a fun connection to one's childhood. So yes, dear Mr. Yoshi Egg, you where what I pulled the most from in this particular class. You proved that painted dots, though simple in concept, were actually a wonderful reminder of times spent having fun as a kid.    
But what does that mean for my future exploration into creativity? Easy. No seriously. Just the word easy. Life doesn't have to be difficult. And I'm not saying it won't have struggles and downs and whatnot, 'cause it totally will. But it's how we handle the shit life throws at us is what makes the struggle. So when something isn't flowing creatively, I'm going to try not to force it. Now this doesn't mean that if I'm on the clock I won't try to meet deadline (I believe there was a discussion about that also). What it means is that, come a creative project that is solely mine, deep-core mine, then I will try to let it just organically come to fruition. It doesn't have to be difficult. It can just be a Yoshi Egg.  

Egg-traterrestrial

I could go into this saying that there's a long standing joke in my family about me being an alien (as in ET not Jose). I could choose to say that there's meaning in this, that since the egg represents life and is a temporary home for a living organism, and that we are made of stardust, perhaps we all come from outer space. I could delve into the thought process of why I did this and come up with some BS about how I'm connecting to my own home seeing as we raise chickens. But none of that would be true. I did this simply because my roommate brought home a carton of white eggs and the temptation was too much. Yes, what I did with my egg was switch it out with one of my roommate's. But I took it a step further and wrote on the egg that it was from the place above our clouds. Who knows; maybe it is…
(No, she hasn't found the alien egg yet, but as soon as she does, I will post an update on her reaction. And yes, the photo has been edited. But, damn, it looks cool.)

Class take away 2. Class, take away 2. (Oh, the importance of commas)

Despite the title, this is not actually a post about commas; I just wanted to point out how one can change "class" from an adjective to a noun by simply placing a comma. Yay, English!
I really enjoyed the short little tidbit we got into about subliminal messaging. Sadly, I think the term "subliminal message" gets a little lost under all the government conspiracy theorists and alien gurus claiming to have been controlled by the kitty litter commercial containing a code in the signal. But subliminal messaging can be a legit thing and artwork most definitely can reflect it. For example, say I don't want to draw a flower because it's boring and repetitive and too pretty for my mood or whatever. So I go on to do my piece and in the end it comes out with an overall pattern of five rounded shapes on top and a long oval on bottom - a flower shape. Because I told myself over and over again that I didn't want anything to do with a flower, one appears anyway because it was on my mind.
So how can this help in future art endeavors? Well, it's certainly something to be aware, if not cautious, of. If I really don't want to do a flower then I can remind myself that one could show up and try to think of other things instead of concentrating on not doing a flower. It can also be used positively; as in if I want the viewer to feel sad I can put the image in tones of blue.
I think it would be interesting to think of something but not paint it and see if it still shows up anyway, be it in the negative space around objects or in shared colors. That's most certainly worth a try.                

Doodle all the Day

I wasn't sure where to begin on this; I mean, when someone says, "Doodle! Now!" it's kind of difficult to think of something. So I started with just making S shapes since we're concentrating on the 4 Ss. Mentally I repeated the words serendipity, synchronicity, spontaneity, and surrender over and over to myself. And when I started writing them, I found that, as per the norm, my terrible spelling got in the way. But then I decided to go with it (surrender) and found that I if I spelled the words phonetically, they took on their own lives. "Sarendipity" is Sara, one of those birds that perches on the rim of a glass and then dips it's head into water. "Sirrender" is a posh English gentleman, complete with a monocle. "Spawntiaity" is a rock in a pond that gives life to ideas. And "Sinkronicity" is a boat that goes below the deep over time. [Located on far left of image]
I continued with the S shapes and kept repeating the words over and over in my brain (and maybe even out loud). Synchronicity stood out to me so I made a clock with numbers all over the page (spontaneity).
So how did these 4 Ss help my creative process? Well, like I said, when I surrendered to the fact that my spelling leaves much to be desired, I came up with four doodles that had personality. I wanted a clock on the page so I made it happen and then scattered the numbers around haphazardly. To me that showed spontaneity. Synchronicity came through in the fact that a lot of the doodles had an S shape so they fit together. And serendipity sort of just arched over the whole paper in that when I let things happen, they happened.       

Take Away 1 (but not as in subtraction)

I've been in many a class that dictates the first day's first half hour or so be dedicated to the seemingly mandatory "Getting to Know You" session. But never before has the session included the question, "Why are you taking this class?" and that really stuck with me. Why am I taking this class? Well I'm taking it because I needed another one since my first summer class got cancelled, I liked the teacher in another class I'd had with her, and I'd heard a lot about it. Now I'm in it to reclaim the soul that a class last semester stole from me. See, I didn't have a lot of "creative classes" last semester and coupled with a course that took up too much of my time, energy, and spirit, I lost track of my muse - or something like that, I guess. I haven't done any art since Winter Break and it's kind of killing me. So that's why I'm here.
But what about the rest of the class?
That's why that question stood out to me. Each of us got to examine something that we should really look at more often. Why take a class? Is it mandatory? Will it help you? Do you just need a blow off class? I can honestly say I've never really thoroughly looked at why I've taken a class. This was the first time anyone had asked me.
Now, how will this examination of "why" help me in my creative endeavors? I think it presents a great mindset. I need to ask myself "why" more often. Why do I want to create this? Why am I stuck on that? Why is Nutella better than Hershey's Hazelnut Spread? Because when one asks oneself "why," he/she looks for a purpose in that something. And everything needs a purpose to exist (even if that purpose is to just exist - like that sticky patch on my carpet from some past leaser's spilled cola). So by asking why we are taking this class, I've slipped into the mindset of asking why about my own creativity and that can help it grow because it now has a purpose. Pretty neat when you sum it all up like that, huh?