TRANSCRIPT from my interview with filmmaker Sidharta Pascual. The Artist’s Journey is similar to the Hero’s Journey. In both cases, you’re answering the call of your creative journey. You’re living your life and you yearn for something- meaning, aliveness or a sense of adventure. And then one day you finally answer the […]
Don’t Lick The Paint: What Artists Can Learn From Mozart & Other Artists
I was in rapid fire communication with my editor Yolande McLean this morning. I told her that I needed to read through the entire manuscript of my forthcoming book The Artist’s Journey again. This would be the zillionth time I’d pored over it since I began writing it eighteen months ago. Yolande’s […]
Keeping It Alive: Moving Past Repetition In Your Art
Keeping It Alive: Moving Past Repetition In Your Art Have you ever had the experience of creating a painting you love only to be afraid that you won’t be able to create a painting like that again? That it’ll be a one hit wonder?I remember years ago painting oil landscapes on panel at the Palo Alto […]
The Magic Of Expressing You In Your Art
There’s wisdom that lives in your body waiting to be released and seen by the world. For abstract artists, these truths become visible through the magic of expressing you in your art through gestural expression. Within you resides your personal signature, your own lexicon. It’s like your fingerprint or the architecture of your retinal blood […]
Embracing The Struggle In Art
Embracing The Struggle In Art An artist was experimenting in her studio with mark making when a surprising image emerged unbidden. It was unlike anything she’d created before and she loved it. The painting had arisen effortlessly and she felt euphoric. She couldn’t wait to create more paintings like this one. And that was when […]
The Power Of Simplicity & Constraint In Art
The Power Of Simplicity & Constraint In Art There’s power and potency in working with simplicity and constraint in your art Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication – Leonardo Da Vinci Multum Non Multa There’s a Latin phrase multum non multa which translates to much, not many. In employing much, not many in your art, you go deep rather than wide. You explore […]
The Hero’s Journey & Art
The Hero’s Journey & Art Our lives are a hero’s journey of moving from the known to the unknown and returning back again, transformed. As artists, we continually step into the unknown and evolve our work. We search and find our way, lose and find ourselves in our paintings and explore and experiment on our […]
The Crossroads Of Conflicting Voices In Your Art
I want to share with you some thoughts about how working with and finding yourself in unknown territory in your art can open you up to deeper experimentation.At first, when you try something unfamiliar, it can feel scary and intimidating. You may feel frustrated because you don’t know exactly what to do. Your usual marks, moves and […]
The Holy Grail of Creating
There’s a secret to fulfilling your destiny as an artist To express yourself in your art, to search for your truth, you must first master yourself – a never-ending wrestling match with the dark angels of self doubt. It’s similar to the biblical story of Jacob wrestling all night until daybreak with an angel by […]
How To Get Unstuck In Your Abstract Paintings
I am finding ‘what to do next very challenging These are the words one artist I work with used to describe one of the biggest challenges most artists face. As artists, we face this problem of how to move past feeling stuck in abstract painting, in the middle of the painting, each time we […]