One thing I’ve noticed in my years of teaching is that many of us think that success as an artist lies in acquiring the perfect tool, the latest technique, or the magic ingredient you have yet to discover. I know how you feel because I was once stuck there too.

I wasted a lot of years waiting to learn more. I wanted to be sure I knew everything there was to know about a craft or technique before I would actually begin. I thought having the right tools, the perfect paint color or exactly the right fabric would unlock magic from my hands. I remember once, back in my dollmaking days, I spied a famous doll artist I admired shopping for fabrics. Aha! If I watch her pick and choose then I’ll know her secret and I’ll have a chance at my dolls being as good as hers! In my attempt to unlock the mystery of creativity, I would take classes with teachers whose work I admired, not always to learn their techniques, but just to see how they worked, where their magic came from.

I was looking everywhere – books, magazines, classes – and never finding. It turns out that I, like Dorothy and all the characters in the Wizard of Oz, had the power with me all along. I was searching out when I should have looked within. I had everything I needed to be the artist I wanted to be except the most important art supply no artist can do without – READ MORE

Another walk down memory lane. Originally posted on SUNDAY, MARCH 30, 2008

23 years – It Cannot Be True

 

I was talking with Cindy O’Leary about computers today (she just got a new MAC). And I realized that I have been working on a PC computer for 23 years. That fact right there makes me feel so old. I think of my computer days as starting when the Internet became the WWW or World Wide Web in the mid-90s. I remember another conversation I had with a fellow artist Lynne Oakes. Back in those early days she asked if I thought people would ever buy art over the Internet. I answered “no”, thinking it was too emotional a purchase and that art is too tactile to appreciate on a monitor. Then I went and created my website in 2000 and proved myself wrong big-time, for I sold my art left and right, hundreds of Fragments  through that website…back in the days before Ebay, Etsy and Blogs.

And now it has all changed and I am an old-timer. My website is old-fashioned, my HTML lacks CSS, my graphics are tired and my website traffic is down. Well of course all my efforts go into this blog now too, but even that is tired looking compared to what’s out there now. I have always been one to focus more on READ MORE

In a continuing effort to bring you more art, here again is another blog post from 2008 regarding a Fragment from 1999. On the back of this Fragment  I had written:

OK, I’ve been working (playing) at writing down these thoughts about each Fragment and I’ve just had a really moving revelation. I still can’t put it into words yet, but something important is happening during this process. Strangely enough, this physical feeling occurred inside right before I laid eyes on this piece and when I saw it, it really expressed visually what I was feeling at that moment. I may need to keep this one. It may have more to say.

Now, almost 10 years later [13 years at this writing], I know what that feeling was. I know what this Fragment was trying to tell me. I had found my voice. I had found what I had been searching for for over 40 years and it was staring me in the face. I had created what was in my soul.

Now, after 10 years, this voice wearies, has grown hoarse and weak. I still love what it says but I am ready for more. I know that it will not take another 40 years for my voice to emerge again, but it does take time. I think I am doing exactly what needs to be done READ MORE

Second in a series of reprints from old blog posts. Synchronicity was chosen because what I wrote on May 30, 2008 could have been written today. The words ring just as true for me. 

Looking back on your words and actions is one of the most valuable exercises I know to help you find your place in the present. Whenever you find yourself thinking or say, “I just don’t know,” look back. The answers have been with you all along.

SYNCHRONICITY from May 30, 2008

This book appeared in my email box this morning - Standing at Waters Edge. It was in an email newsletter I get from Creativity Portal (excellent, BTW). Like I need another book. But of course this one was very timely and the fact that it appeared right after yesterday’s blog post, well I had to investigate. So I read an excerpt on the Creativity Portal website and there it wasWHAM! - words meant just for me: 

“I suppose that I have sacrificed my career somewhat by choosing to prioritize my wife and kids. Maybe I would produce more art if I isolated myself into my work.”

“Loren,” I said, “maybe you have chosen to prioritize your family because you have the strength to connect with them as well as with your art. Some artists seclude themselves in their studios because they are unable to immerse in relationships. They are too frightened of intimacy. I view your lifestyle as a sign of your strength, and I believe that your relationships with your wife and children support and enrich your ongoing capacity to create”

It brought tears to my eyes. 

I am not alone on my journey. I am beginning to realize READ MORE

I am trying to reconnect, or shall I say recombine, myself into a whole again and have fallen in love with some of my old blog posts from way back when. In this attempt toward wholeness, I am sharing these posts with you as a way of reminding, re-introducing, or exposing for the first time to many of you, where I came from and how and why I am who I am today.

This post was originally written in May of 2008. I am amazed and enchanted by the similarities READ MORE

Reposted with permission from Carolyn Dube from her wonderful & COLORFUL blog A Colorful Journey

Let’s start the New Year off right. What’s the first thing that comes to mind when I say ‘take your time?’ Slow down, right? Good advice for sure. There’s nothing to gain by rushing through your work or your day. But that’s not what I’m referring to here. Here’s what I’m talkin’ about:

Know the true value of time! Snatch, seize, and enjoy every moment of it.
No idleness, no procrastination. Never put off until tomorrow what you can do today.
Philip Chesterfield

Take your time, don’t throw it or waste it away. It’s yours for the taking yet we treat time as if it is out of our control. The #1 problem I hear from artists is that they don’t have enough time for their art. You are not alone in that feeling. It’s the #1 problem on everyone’s list – there’s never enough time for all the things you want to do.

We are all allotted the same 24 hours, the same 1440 minutes that everyone else has each day. What it all boils down to is how we choose to use the time we are given. Cherie Carter-Scott, in her book, If Success is a Game, These Are the Rules, says that, “Using your time well is a skill that is developed with practice.” To that I want to add discipline, practice + discipline.

One of the perks of growing up and being on your own is that your free time is yours to do whatever you wish. There are always obligations: family, friends, the job you do for money, a home to tend to, etc. All those “must-dos” make you feel even more possessive of your free time. Unfortunately, by the time the “free-time” rolls around you are usually exhausted and stressed out and being creative feels more like work than fun. “Tomorrow,” you say. “I’ll get to my art tomorrow.” And tomorrow never comes. So what’s the solution? READ MORE

Life is one long continuum. We need markers in order to assess our progress. January 1st is one of those markers.

I’m somewhat of a rebel. I don’t like to do what everyone else is doing. That means I don’t want to talk about new year’s resolutions, setting goals for 2012 or how to make this your best year yet. I have already received way too many emails along those lines. How about you?

It did get me to wondering though, why there is so much focus on new starts and fresh beginnings at the beginning of a new year. January 1st is the universally agreed upon time, a convenient reminder for us to pause and assess. Rather than focus on new beginnings (which let’s face it are very hard and doomed to failure) let’s consider this a time for course correction.

The first question you should be asking yourself right now is, “Am I headed in the right direction?” Whether you admit it or not, there is something you want to be doing with your life that you are not doing….yet. The dream may be so far off or seem so out of reach that you’ve been going about it in a roundabout way, if at all.

Or, if you are at all like me, you have more than enough ideas to last 10 lifetimes and you just can’t figure out which one to take action on. You are creating a tight zigzag stitch of your life, back and forth, side to side, with very little forward movement.

The second question you need to ask is, READ MORE

It’s a bit cheeky of me, I know, but I’m throwing myself a virtual birthday party and you are invited. It looks like you’re here, so Thank You for coming! I have lots of calorie free virtual cake and ice cream for you, skads of balloons and…. 

Oops! Are you afraid you have come empty handed – no fear. There’s something you can give me to help me celebrate my years on this planet, my years as an artist, my years of sharing and contributing to this most wonderful world of art & artists.

I fear it may sound like a selfish or conceited idea for a gift, and I’ve given it a LOT of thought before even asking, but hey – it’s my party and I’ll cry if I want to. (Not really, but I had to put that in here because it’s a song by Lesley Gore and it’s kinda been my birthday song since 1963 when it hit the charts, especially since we share the same name.)  

So back to my gift idea. I actually think it’s a rather brilliant idea READ MORE