1. I am finally on my 3 month break. Break from projects that pay the bills and now back to the project that burns the passion. I've been wanting to work on this for while, but I keep procrastinating. It's been a ride. A crazy four months of busy schedules and deadlines all around. That and a couple of bad health disasters. I've come out of that, survived the battle, and here I am all prepped and ready for a 3 month "play" session.
2. I have a couple of goals in mind, things that I wanna achieve, and in the next few days i'll get that started : The main mission of the break is to experiment with the styles I like, and work on my techniques. I want to learn more about using different mediums and tools.
I've been wanting to do all this for a while now but recently i've been SERIOUSLY playing around. Shopee has become my go-to playground. I've been buying a lot of stuff off them. Like embroidery needles and kits (which I've yet to touch) a DIY dollhouse kit, and a 3D printing pen.
3. I've been experimenting more with impressionism, and testing out new illustration techniques. I haven't been using my Wacom tablet in while. I've realized now that i've come to love the organic-ness of touching my medium and pushing it around.
4. I just love the way a brush feels on a new canvas.
A different brush produces a different stroke. Each unique in its own way. I could paint a whole A3 size paper with dots using a brush, and each dot will have its own unique print.
5. I recently cleaned my studio. It was what I consider "a beautiful mess" before, everything somewhat it it's place, but obviously, some organization needed to be done. Thankfully, I live with a Marie Kondo consultant, and she merrily Marie Kondo'd my space. We embarked on a full day journey emptying everything from my studio, putting it in the middle of the room, sorting it out in categories, finding jars and container things to organize everything in, and putting it back in a place that makes sense. It's been 2 weeks since I cleaned it and let me tell you this - IT'S STILL BEAUTIFUL. Through this journey I've realized 2 things : That I have an extensive collection of tapes. I have masking tapes of all sizes, washy tapes, electric tapes, painting tape, sellotape, double sided tape, double sided tape large, small, and medium, magic tape, and I kid you not, once I even dreamt about my tapes. Safe to say I am a tape hoarder. The second thing i've realized is that I have SO MANY UNFINISHED PROJECTS.
I really enjoy playing around with mediums and tools and testing out different products, from different brands. The past few months i've been building a paper house (a mini DIY paper dollhouse thing) i've been making sculptures and earring using a 3D pen, and putting together my embroidery kit.
6. As much as I love those crafty projects, I really must remind myself that this break is about painting. There will be another time for me to play with those (Although i'm already half way with building the paper doll house. It looks awesome can't wait to show it to people! It's just taking so long!)
7. What I really need to do is work on my color. I need to do LOADS of color studies. It's really my favourite part of the process. I genuinely enjoy playing with blue, and making 100 different hues, shades and tints of blue. I also need to figure out my subject matter. I usually paint what I "feel" but honestly i'm getting pretty bored of that. And I definitely have not spent enough time working on still life, nature and scenery. I've been doing a lot of textures, which I still feel I haven't reached to a level where I can safely say i've tried everything. Nothing really reeled me in with that, so i'm going to put "textures" back into my waiting list.
8. I also need to work on a new swatch book. This is going to be exciting! So many new prints to be released. I am not sure why it has been taking this long.
9. I've made a mini plan for this ~ j O u R n E Y~ and I want to blog along as I discover things I learn, like and dislike. I will journal more on my thought process as it usually helps me figure out my next move faster.
10. Tomorrow i'll be starting on a new commissioned painting. It will be a big one this time so i'm pretty pumped. I've been working small scale for a while now and i'm getting restless. I'll be working on some mockups tomorrow to put it on instagram.
Tomorrow's schedule
Wake up
meditation
coffee
read a bit
paint
I will update this post in a couple of days with what i've managed to do with my paintings!