Getting My Head Around it
Detail of Gayle's collage, Sacred, in progress
Something is going on. The ground is shifting. I see it on the faces of the people on the news stories about the Middle East; I see it in my friends faces; I see it in my face when I look in the mirror. For awhile, I just couldn't get my head around it.
As an artist, I have trained myself for decades to try to stay in the moment and to respond to what is in front of me without knowing where the resolution lies. It is part of trusting the process, a deeply personal way of trusting oneself. The way I tap into that part of myself is to just keep working, because much of the creative process involves problem solving, asking the "what if" question, remaining open to the answer. When I am fortunate enough to be fully engrossed in this process, I continue to work on the problem at hand even when I am sleeping. My journal is full of dreamed notations waiting for action.
This is where I find myself right now: working, thinking, dreaming, working. This process has never failed me, and serves as an anchor for me when the ground beneath my feet is shifting.
Detail of Gayle's collage, Lady Blue
Detail of Gayle's collage, Blue Landscape
I have spent months feeling blue, discombobulated. Fortunately, my trusty journals remind me that this is also a cyclical part of my process. It doesn't keep me from working, usually, and this is fortunate as well. I am designing like crazy, as I focus with renewed energy on my line of Magic Baby designs. I hope to start a separate website and blog for that work as soon as I have some time to sit at the computer all day.
I am also itchy to do free painting, so hope to get to that soon. In the meantime, I am finishing up the three collages shown here. I will be offering all of them for sale in my etsy shop as soon as I finish stitching and mounting them. Stitching away by hand, which is what I do most nights, is my preferred form of meditation. My thoughts are freed up while I work to think and dream, to get my head around it.
Detail of Gayle's collage, Sacred, in progress
Something is going on. The ground is shifting. I see it on the faces of the people on the news stories about the Middle East; I see it in my friends faces; I see it in my face when I look in the mirror. For awhile, I just couldn't get my head around it. As an artist, I have trained myself for decades to try to stay in the moment and to respond to what is in front of me without knowing where the resolution lies. It is part of trusting the process, a deeply personal way of trusting oneself. The way I tap into that part of myself is to just keep working, because much of the creative process involves problem solving, asking the "what if" question, remaining open to the answer. When I am fortunate enough to be fully engrossed in this process, I continue to work on the problem at hand even when I am sleeping. My journal is full of dreamed notations waiting for action.
This is where I find myself right now: working, thinking, dreaming, working. This process has never failed me, and serves as an anchor for me when the ground beneath my feet is shifting.
Detail of Gayle's collage, Lady Blue
Detail of Gayle's collage, Blue Landscape
I have spent months feeling blue, discombobulated. Fortunately, my trusty journals remind me that this is also a cyclical part of my process. It doesn't keep me from working, usually, and this is fortunate as well. I am designing like crazy, as I focus with renewed energy on my line of Magic Baby designs. I hope to start a separate website and blog for that work as soon as I have some time to sit at the computer all day. I am also itchy to do free painting, so hope to get to that soon. In the meantime, I am finishing up the three collages shown here. I will be offering all of them for sale in my etsy shop as soon as I finish stitching and mounting them. Stitching away by hand, which is what I do most nights, is my preferred form of meditation. My thoughts are freed up while I work to think and dream, to get my head around it.
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