21 Days to Creative Abundance - Day 13

Sisters

Today, Sebastian Michaels is challenging us to go deeper into our art projects.

I have mind mapped a bunch of projects and chosen two. The first will be a picture book, titled, for now, Trees: Known and Dreamt filled with real and digital art trees combined with a poem I wrote years ago about trees I’ve known.

 

The second is a longer term project for my granddaughter who will turn thirteen about a year from now. It will be a picture and word book focused on Mexico. Her father is part Mexican but they don’t celebrate that heritage so I want to show her some of the beauty and magic of Mexico.

Book #1 can be done rather quickly and could even be Christmas presents. I am going to the states in early October so I could have them ready to deliver or ship by then. First Deadline: rough layout of pages, words and images: August 15.

Book #2 still needs the concept worked out. Mexico is big. What part of it do I want to capture and how? My first deadline will be to have that scoped out by September 1.

I love Sebastian’s key project question:  

“What would make this SO MUCH cooler?”

And, as I was thinking about that question, the thought hit:  what if we went on a trip to a few places in Mexico and took photos along the way that could be put into the book … hers as well as mine? The title could be Reyna Meets Mexico. Thank you, Michael, this just got way fun.

Ernest Hemingway on big projects:

"You will ache and you’re going to love it. It will crush you and you are still going to love all of it. Doesn’t it sound lovely beyond belief?"

Sebastian says, “Projects are going to challenge you. They’re going to push you. Count on it. If they’re worth a damn, they’re going to be hard."

Challenge #13 asked us to split a long canvas in half lengthwise and work with the idea of summer and winter. I tried. I really did but summer and winter wouldn’t stay in their places and I wound up with the image above. By the time I reached what I thought was "done," I had far more layers to be deleted than I did active ones.

BTW, a note on inspiration. Years ago my friend ReAnn Scott, an amazing world traveler, and I went to San Francisco where she wanted to see a museum show on Gaultier, the designer. I didn't really want to go. She's a clothes person and I'm not. I barely knew who Gaultier was but did remember that he designed Madonna's  cone bra, not an accomplishment that impressed me much. Reluctantly, I went.

OMG! It was the most fabulous exhibit I've ever been to. Not only were his designs completely outrageous and beautiful, but the exhibit itself was technologically amazing. The mannequins talked. Their mouths even moved and they had expressions. It was all done with cameras, but it made my head spin. I took hundreds of pictures and the two sisters in the image above came from that exhibit.

The lesson I learned was to notice my resistance and do it anyway. Over the years since then I've often noticed that if I will just do what I was resisting, gifts are waiting.