Thoughts on a White Canvas: An Artist's Braintorms.

I am a woman who struggles with change. My most favoured prayer comes from a Canadian Tv show called 'The Red Green Show'.

The prayer goes:

Dear God,

I'll change- if I have too. I guess.

Below is a clip from the Red Green Show Live. The older I get the more his comedy rings as truth. It's lovely to have a laugh at the same time.

Above my raw beechwood easel, I have painted the words-

' I am rebellious until I am settled.'

When I sit down to paint, I am much like the antsy child I was while growing up, like a dog that must chase its tail three times before it can take lye down in its cushions to take a nap. Or a cat that feels compelled to wap at a skein of yarn. I must do the same.

You see, the thing is- It's all too stimulating. It is too exciting. I am the archaic version of the word overwhelmed—an overturned vessel submerged in a watery raging white foam sea storm.

Click the image below to your copy of this classic novel

Like a beluga whale named Moby Dick with a bad attitude, I come to the canvas. With a quick rage, I burst forth from the ocean of my chroma pallet and jump onto the canvas. I am smashing my prey into a froth of foamy paint colours, destroying the white canvas with the debris of shape. Only to swim away moments later- hunting my next mark like a shark circling at the scent of blood in the sea.

Like a catfight, I make a lot of noise about the fact that I will get you! Then when I make my move- it is short, violent, aggressive paint strokes. I bat at the canvas as if the canvass was another cat trying to bite me back.

Only to step back and yell at the canvas for another five to fifteen while I get my next cuppa' tea. Swearing 'I'll be back!' in an Arnold Schwarzenegger voice over and over again.

It seems I must forget about five to seven things before I am really in the studio. I get up. I get an item I forgot. Repeat. Repeat. Some habits are poor for productivity. I have yet to shake this one intentionally.

This rebellious unsettled spirit is because I have already made the marks in my head. The fact I have made the marks makes me impatient to get the moves on the canvass. This impatience is because I have ADHD Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.

Click the image to link up with your copy of the work book. I have found a few tips and tricks have made a bit of a difference for me. Maybe It will help you too stay organized.

My ADHD means I am in a vortex of thought. My mind is running at 1000 miles an hour. But my body is a slow worried puttering old granny. Who is driving 5 miles an hour because she is afraid of dinking her prized classic red caddy. Or she is scared she will get into listing to too much jass music. She remembers the good old days when a young whippersnapper will zing by in his tacky striped jeep Tahoe and scrape her cool wheelchair named Ruby.

My attention is easily distracted. I most famously said once in a terrifying thunderstorm while the lightning flashed.

(At this perfect moment that the lightning struck, we saw a rainbow over a meadow in the distance. It caught me off guard. I veered towards it like a bug to a candle at night while driving. The Light. The Light! the Light!! I was utterly absorbed and hypnotised by the sight before my eyes.)

I said, 'Oooh! Look! A Butterfly!' I pointed to it. I forgot where I was going. I forgot I was driving- until my husband reminded me of my task. Just in the nick of time too. Because I was over the yellow line, I nearly scraped midnight blue paint onto the Red semi-truck heading the other direction. We missed it by the morning drool scum skimmed off our teeth.

Blow is a shot I found off the internet that was quite similar to the one I saw while I was driving, minus the butterfly in the bottom left corner above the field.

Now, every time I get distracted, my husband will annoyingly declare at the top of his voice, 'Oooh! A butterfly!' He gets a well deserved one-eyed squinted glare. The flip-ard Fillabard deserves it! He runs—the little crass coward wiping out "the butterfly story". I now can no longer look at butterflies with pure joy. Now when I look at them, I feel edgy and willing to do or say something rash.

Click on the image of the book to purchase your copy.

What I am getting at is that I make a lot of stupid mistakes. I must be intentional. This settling is a life change; I probably will struggle with all of my life.

I want to talk about how and why I settle using the spot of my dream state as a means to describe my creative process...

Check out my blog post Habits the dream. Just click on the image below and it will send you to that blog post.

... Why it is my obligation to make changes and why I must be more focused. How do I achieve that concentrated state?

I never thought that I would be one to reference pop culture. I never liked writers who did. I felt it was a lazy kind of piggyback. They should create their own won characters, leaders and stories. But what I am realising is they are falling on the general public's comfort zones as pillars to lift their ideas. Maybe that is not so bad of an image.

I find myself doing the same, more so when I write than when I paint or draw. Maybe I am getting lazy, and perhaps I am conforming. Or mayhap, I am just experimenting with an old gimmick to find my version.

Pictured above is a sketch called, "Political Movements: Kiss A**".

My thoughts circle my projects progress, product, storytelling, what I want to say, and finding significance in the whole act of creating.

When I was a teen, I never thought about the story I was creating. It was all about me drawing out my feelings. I did not care about the message sent out to the general public. They could find their meaning in my work.

I like the words. I like stories, but I never thought about telling stories like narrative paintings. I am chewing on this idea. It's complex. I want to blend my sprit stuff and this narrative idea.

Pictured below is a concept drawing for one of my paintings called, "A Shot At life".

Drafting is so essential to any part of the creative process, even if it is not writing. The idea of drafts of work is not new to me. Of course, you're never perfect instantly! Yah' gotta' flip that clamshell open and work at it. You can't PA-TinK something with granny's nasty wand and have ready-to-use success. What is the fun in that?!

This novis non-creative thought disturbs me like bugs that have infested your house. You pull back the part broken skirting board away only to get the heebie-jeebies as you watch the pesky bugs scurrying from the light into the rest of your clean house. Ew!

Maybe it's because nobody wants to see the failed attempted. You are never glorious. Nobody cares how you made it. When you tell them how you made it- their eyes glaze over like a seven-day-old crispy cream doughnut.

Then they say something unintelligent like:

'Oh, wow! You're SOO TALenteD! I could never do that!'

I always think:

'Corse you can't, you putz; you wouldn't even try it. If you did, you'd never try it again, not unless you get it perfectly on your first go. Don't be such an instant gratification blind wiggle worm.'

Is this mean? Yeah. Yeah, it is. I guess it's not professional or tactful. But I feel its more honest than any diplomatic version of the same sentiment any public relations manager could develop as a better version of my words. But what the Heck? I am writing my thoughts to other creatives, students learning to become professional, and professors who must think the same thing at least twice a semester.

Side note, I have drafted My Discipline paper out. I know my significance is about my active need to make things. I found it easy to connect a few different books, which formed the draft of my thoughts.

Want to read my Essay? Check out my blog post: Go the Distance: An Artist’s Journey Towards Success. Just click on the image below.

Each time I come to the blank canvas, I try to find a way to put you, the reader, in my thoughts creatively. The images that pass my mind while I paint, draw, write, sculpt, bake or whatever other creative fancy I take on.

There is a bit of dialogue. A few stories, and as I read what I write, I find the end truth of what my shapes values.

I am an artist-Writing my thoughts on a white canvas.