knots

I can't believe it's been a month since I last posted anything. This blog is supposed to be a record of my MFA experience, instead it feels like yet another thing I should do but I'm not.

I'm feeling very unsatisfied/agitated by the "work". I feel a little stuck and don't know how to push forward or if I can push forward. What if this is it? What if there's nothing more, nothing better to come from me? Or another way I guess I can think of it is...What does the next level look like? feel like?

I imagine feeling free and more than that I imagine feeling courageous. What would I do if I wasn't afraid? Make art. Make more art. Make bigger funkier messier art. Share my art. What would it feel like to be an artist? It would feel important. I would have something to say. I would know what I want to say. What does it mean to say something through making art? How do you make a statement using just color, shapes and lines?

What am I afraid of? Failure. What's the worse thing that could happen? I would make art and show my art and people would hate it and laugh at me for thinking I could be an artist. What would happen after that? I would feel awful and I would feel mad. But worse than that is I would make art and share it and everyone would say it's nice but really think it was sad or pathetic and no one will tell me the truth so I never know how truly awful my work is. That's the worse thing that could happen.

I know the enemy is me but still I can't get me to shut up in my head and keep it steppin' sister.

They've arrived!

This weekend new visitors came. The books finally arrived and James my youngest invited himself to stay for a week. Just him and me and the books.

I've been looking forward to having him over. I can't say the same about these books. I really did not want to read anything. But now that they're here I'm glad.

Float on...

Newspaper, color paper, felt and beads on thread

Felt and pony beads on thread

"Cut from the same cloth"

Look what I found on Pintrest?

I can't believe it. I'm so excited! I feel like I finally found someone who speaks my language.

http://andreamyersartist.com/home.html

I also saw an exhibit by Emily Payne at Erica Tanov.

http://www.emilypayne.net/index.html

When I looked on Emily's website I remembered she'd done an earlier installation with Erica Tanov similar to this:

And this work reminded me of Ruth Asawa.

evolving idea...

Two new directions

Alma Woodsey Thomas and Joan Brown

I'm going to spend some time reading about and being inspired by their art.

Alma Woodsey Thomas

Joan Brown

Notes on the animations

1) These animations and the imovie all look a little blurry. I think this is the transition from SAM to quicktime movie. They don't look blurry on my computer before I export them.

2) On my next experiments I'll put titles and credits.

3) Here's my favorite animation by one of my favorite animators/filmmakers. i love the simplicity of the images.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qpunQZ4cUyI

Animation practice

Colormotions. Another experiment with the SAM software. I tried duplicating and reversing the frames. I'm not sure why the light flickers so much. It looks like an old school TV. I don't mind it but I'd like to have control over these issues. I think I nudged the lamp slightly each shot.

Animation practice

This not strictly an animation. I'm testing uploading photos to imovie, changing imovie to Quick Time, uploading Quick Time on to blog.

Animation Practice

Animation pratice

Getting grounded

After feeling like I've been free falling I finally touched down and started working. And just like that the first packet is due in one week.

My daily journal practice is moving along. I bought a very nice little moleskin watercolor journal. Since I bought it I've done a quick sketch every day. It's amazing how much peace and calm comes from those 3-10 minutes. Shoes and plants? What was I thinking? I've also been walking and running every morning. At last! It feels good and helps me with the rest of day and feeling more energy and focus for work (both teaching and making art).

My teaching jobs are going nicely.  I feel calm and confident when teaching. I really enjoy it. I love my University class. My adult students are wonderful. It helps me to be more patient with myself as I watch them be so hard on themselves. It's also exciting encouraging their creative explorations. They started out so timid but now they're really going for it! I'm wondering how teaching plays into my identity as an artist? When I started this process I wanted to put my "teacher" identity aside to focus on my "artist" identity. But I am a teacher. I need to bring all parts of me together not separate or compartmentalize parts of me.

The work - going slow but going. I'm having fun playing with the SAM animation program. The "Fish" animation was fun to make and I learned a lot. I need to pay more attention to the background, lighting and be more precise with my work. I'll keep working on it.

I'm playing around with forms. We'll see what comes from my experiments with fiber fill, gesso and paint.

It's hard to just play with materials with out feeling guilty. I feel like I need a plan. Things have to be heading toward something. Staying open is harder than I thought it would be.

Researching my ladies has taken a few fun turns into the unexpected. I'm in love Xenobia Bailey.(Thanks Seitu for the recommendation) I think I will be able to interview her. I think she'll be cool. I also discovered Mad Museum and new artists through that sight. I'm still exploring Art 21 which has so much to offer.

The best part of researching contemporary African American artists is finding others who simply look like me. It's surprising how important this still is to me even as an adult. I just feel less lonely seeing these faces and bodies that look like mine. I also find it interesting that in many ways I'm not connected to these other African American artists. We're the same but very different.

Frozen and scattered

My goal is to start developing my identity as an artist. This is proving a lot harder than I thought. Since coming home from residency I've been consumed with three things: 1) getting my boys back on track with school. 2) getting work in order 3) figuring out how to start this study plan.

I just want to reverse the order of my priorities - me first, then boys, then work.

What do I need to make art? Time to space out, alone time, dream time, play time, work space, clean work space, a glimmer of a direction or a specific goal.

So far I've made this blog. I'm writing this first post (hopefully I post it). I downloaded the full SAM animation program and played around with it a bit.

And yet...

I'm searching for a "daily routine" to kick-start my artistic practice that includes "reflection and documentation." I'm hoping I will develop the practice of drawing in a journal every day. That's a good habit. I think I will give myself the assignment of drawing the same thing everyday, that way I don't have to think/stress about what I'm going to draw. I'm going to draw a plant or a shoe every morning.

Ah, feeling more focused already.

The thing I need most is movement. I need to walk, run, and stretch in order to think. I need to get back into my morning routine of walk/running the lake and I want to go to a yoga class once a week. I can do that.

In the meantime, here's a beautiful animation I found in my online hunt aka "online research."
http://vimeo.com/12155835