When you can do anything - what do you?

I tried to think of some commentary for this but it speaks for itself. Finding a direction and a place in art is so difficult and exhausting. I love this video and the message (and not to mention, the beautiful setting and paintings).

I'm facing a little of the "when you can do anything* - what do you do" myself lately and it's one of the most challenging things I've faced. Where do I want to put my focus and my energy - and my creativity? Still figuring it out and basking in the glow of inspirational art messages every chance I get!

xo
Sarah

*within reason and art/craft/job-related

Motivation Loop

So far unemployment is weird. It's definitely a learning experience. I still feel strange and a little bit lost and definitely a touch overwhelmed at times. But I also feel positive and optimistic and un-stressed. I think everything balances out to a nice comfortable neutral with potential.



The ups and downs are still catching me by surprise. Yesterday I slept a little later than I intended and felt pretty gloomy most of the morning. I half-heartedly tried to get some things done and take my daily walk around the pond but made it only as far as the grocery. I bought ingredients for vegetable stew and came home feeling pretty deflated. But I made the stew and felt a little better.



Today was entirely different. I woke up on time and immediately got to work. I finished the second draft of a custom illustration and went for my walk. Now I'm here, typing this post. I feel good and inspired (that walk always does the trick!) and I'm ready to do some more things. Being left to my own devices is a little unpredictable.
I'm definitely discovering that my motivation only comes if I get something done first. It's like I have to work to earn the inspiration to work more. I have to make the first move.

We'll see how it goes...for however long this no-job-thing lasts.



xo
Sarah

Keep Moving

Forward.

I can't stop watching these swimming reindeer I came across on tumblr.

Making for Places

Beaming down - or up.

So autumn-time production-time is in full swing. I am currently planning/making things for:

-Craftland, Providence RI
-Concord Handmade, Concord NH
-Artworks!, New Bedford MA
-BBB2011, Boston MA

It's a little daunting but I got a great, inspirational email from my friend an colleague Marissa yesterday. I was complaining about not having enough TIME in life - time to do things and earn a living and make things.

To that Marissa (who is prolifically productive) said:

I think the thing that helps me be SO productive with my time is that I know my time is limited. Weekends and the few days I can take off are precious, so I'm careful to make good use of them. Same goes for time before work, time between work and swimming, time in the shower, time when I should be eating meals somewhere other than my drafting table, etc. It sounds insane but I am always working on something. I think if I had more than a week off from regular life, I probably would get bored and start watching a lot of daytime tv. And you know what happens then? I make a shitton of zines about A Baby Story, and nobody wants that.

(Confession, I WOULD read zines about Marissa watching A Baby Story but that's just me.)

Every year around this time my list-making gets furious and I plot out things to do each and every day after I get out of work and my weekend calendar days that are not filled with fall-time festivities are blocked off with with "MANDATORY WORK DAY."

I'm going to have lots of new things for this year's season of giving. New postcard set, new holiday and birthday cards, a new tote bag design that I am super excited about, some pillow covers and some more regional onesies. Exciting!

Make make make!
xo
Sarah

Your reward for reading that whole post, sleeping Hanni:

On motivation and priorities.

Hello internet!

First, let's have this...

Ahhhhhh.

I hadn't really planned this post (not that any of my posts are planned) but my good friend and partner/colleague in art, Marissa, sent me this link and it got my brain-wheels turning. Not about jealousy (which the article is about) but about motivation and priorities and things that keep me working and happy with what I'm doing.

Last night I finished painting and framing the pieces I'm sending down to Roger Williams Park Zoo for their Party for the Planet event. Looking at them all, finished and pleasing to my own eye, I started thinking about why I had had so much fun with them.



I realize I did them FOR ME. Yeah, they're for RWPZ but I didn't make them expressly to sell or print on tshirts or mass produce. Maybe I'll offer the originals and/or prints if folks are interested but if they never sell, that's ok.

While I was in school I was told to hone my style and find a focus. Make myself marketable and my work recognizable. I respect that to some degree but every time I let myself take a detour I find exciting places for my work to go. As a business I think my branding/name is pretty set but as an illustrator/art-maker I like to be all over the place - college crits be damned. I work in whatever media inspires me and, to be completely honest, I work in whatever way I have time for. SHOCKING NEWS FLASH - I, like every artist I know, have a life and need to live it. I would love to just lay about, chatting with my muse, painting whenever I feel like it but I have to go to work, cook dinner, clean the litter box, do the laundry, buy things, and watch Law and Order. It's a pretty awesome existence but art is only part of it.



So back to these paintings in particular. It helps that they are for a zoo show. I paint animals. I have no shame in my game. I'm not big on humans. I like plants and animals. Paint what you know, right? The structure of animals makes sense to me and my right brain. Again, during school I felt like I had to apologize for what I preferred to draw/paint/print and usually had to go in uncomfortable directions - but that's what happens when you're learning with structure I suppose. No problem, that only lasted four years.

I love these paintings. I love that I'm using watercolor again. I love how quickly I was able to turn them out to meet the deadline for this. I love how they look all together. They make me feel really proud and satisfied.

In many drawers and boxes I have a dozen or so half-started 'products' - drawings for new silkscreen designs, sketches for funny tshirts, color palette ideas for stationery - and I'll probably get to them eventually. But there's no rush. I love Egg-A-Go-Go, my shop, that aspect of my art-life but my focus seems to be wanting something different. I won't be abandoning my little biz but I think I need to explore some paths I had seen/mapped before but passed by on my way to a market or fair.

So here's to exploring! Here's to making making time to make what you love! Here's to swishy watercolor animals without backgrounds!



Focused and inspired,
Sarah