Yesterday was my first official day back at the studio.  Yup, my brand spanking new studio- beautifully arranged complete with a new plant.  I got in there ready to work through some ideas I have had the last few weeks.  And these last few weeks I was itching to get in there and make this work.  I should have known better- especially as I described it to Kelly on Friday and I wasn’t seeing the clear picture anymore.  I sat down at my table and started to sort out my ideas visually and the thought of doing one more truss/scaffold-y work thing was so daunting.  I do have some ideas on how to apply that mark in ways I haven’t yet and I think it’s a statement I would like to make and perhaps that statement isn’t the one right now.  Or maybe it was that I couldn’t focus over the Enya playing next door when all I wanted to hear was my own music- but that is the challenge to having a studio in a community space.

So I sat down and I drew.  And everything I drew was contrary to the truss work, in fact it was ovular.  So I found some balloons in my studio and began blowing them up to act as cheap paper molds.  I think before I really go any further with this thought, I need to think about it more but I do treat this idea as having an idea.  And I feel comfort in the fact that I have something to work with and I know myself well enough to know that while I work, things start to make sense- so I guess I am doing a little exercise on how to get back into the swing of things and make sense of the forms or marks that have come to me.

In addition, I gave myself a summer assignment.  Actually this is an assignment I give my students so that they develop variations on an idea throughout the semester and work on their sketchbook practice.  I call it the ‘precious object project’ which is a sketchbook assignment.  I’m doing it this summer however instead of my student assignment of filling 5 pages a week in the book- I am filling 2 pages a day until the end of Labor Day.  And if you are lucky enough…. I will show you a few things along the way.  The theme is: self portrait.  I bought a sweet little 6×6 square sketchbook with a cute orange cover to dedicate to this.  I love that I found it.  It’s so cute.