Tarot, Quirky Bird, and Stillness…

When thinking about today, my first thought was that I hadn’t accomplished anything. Then I was struck by what lay in front of me. I had three, yes, three completed pieces of art. Completed today.

Isn’t it funny how our minds trick us? I woke this morning with one thought on my mind and that was to work on the next lesson in Pull, Pen, Paint. When the evening came to a close and I had not worked on it, I immediately rated the day as a failure and tried to convince myself I hadn’t accomplished anything.

Only one of the pieces of art in front of me had been on my list of things to do today. After reading a post last night about creating a Tarot Journal and why the author also creates a sketch to go with the Tarot card, I changed my mind on what I would do in my Tarot Journal.  I decided to also create a sketch. I know this can be challenging for me. When I first thought about it, I thought there was no way I could create an accurate sketch of the Tarot card. Then I realized it doesn’t have to be of the whole card. I could pick out what resonated strongly with me and incorporate it into a sketch. In doing so, I hope to make a meaningful connection with the card and eventually the whole deck.

Here is my first entry in my Tarot Journal, a journal meant for studying each of the cards. I will use a Tarot Diary for recording any readings I choose to do. My first entry is of the Ace of Wands:

I made some choices. The ink I will use will be the color which is representative of the suit. In this case, the color for the suit of Wands is red, so I used red ink in journaling about the card. I also decided to include a small picture of the card. This way, I can look at the image along with the artwork to get a better feel for the card whenever I need to review my journal entry.

For me, the wand stood out from everything else, probably just as it should. Even so without looking at the image of the card, I remember there are hands on either side of the wand in a position of protection and reverence.

I’m not doing a Tarot card pull and then studying the card I pull. I am going systematically through the deck to learn each card in the order they are in the guide book (I’m using the Easy Tarot Gilded deck). This way I’ll journal about them in their suits and my journal will have them in logical groupings, which satisfies my very logical mind, for when I might want to add more to my journal for a particular card or just look up my journal entry for a particular card.

The second thing I did was watch the recording of a live stream of Tamara Laporte. She does some amazing whimsical artwork. Her live stream is public on her Facebook  page if you are interested in watching it. While I watched, I arted along with her. Here is what I created:

I didn’t use the same supplies she did. I just improvised with my supplies of Art Crayons, White Acrylique paint, Prisma Premier Color Pencils, black Sakura Gelly Roll pen and Signo White Pigment Ink pen. Oh and Uniball Gold gell pen.

This technically is my first quirky bird as Tamara calls them. I love her style, although I don’t think her style is anything close to my style. I do love the freedom I feel when drawing whimsical people and animals. It helps alleviate the feelings I get about being perfect when I’m doing art.  Learning in this way first, has helped me to feel freer when attempting realism.

The next thing I did was complete a journal spread I had started a couple days ago. This one was in response to Journal52 prompts. I’m woefully behind on the prompts but I’m not worrying about it. Having them available to work on for fun, is great for those times I want a break from some of the classes I’m taking. This one was for week 8. The prompt was Stillness, here is my journal spread:

I started this by using Craft Smart acrylic paint and just finger painting. No brushes, just my fingers, for the sky, grass, flower and bee. Next, I did the words with a Permapaque Pigment Marker. I then embellished the bee, flower and water drop using Prisma Color pencils.

All three of these were completed after my daughter and I went out and ran errands today. Renewing my car insurance was top on the list, then groceries. We didn’t get home until around 4:30pm.

Prior to going out, I had spent some time writing my morning pages, and watching some videos on art but mostly one on organizing art supplies. I’m in much need of organizing things around my house and need to do so on a shoestring budget so I’m trying to find ways to organize and create neat storage using what I have already around the house. It is rather challenging to say the least.

Now, back to what I didn’t do. I really wanted to do the next lesson for Pull, Pen, Paint. I had tried last night to do it. In fact, I tried at least 3 different times. A portion of the lesson is a meditation and last night every time I tried, I fell asleep and would wake up, finding out I had missed a major portion of the meditation, so I would start it over again, to only have it happen again.

Let me explain something. Yesterday, I had an upper cervical adjustment. Whenever I have them, I generally feel very tired later after I’m home and take a moment to relax. This is what was happening with the medication. I would become so relaxed, I would fall asleep. I finally gave up and went to bed with the intent of doing the lesson today.  That, as you have read, didn’t happen.

I’m okay with that. I don’t have to be on a set time schedule. The course is available until the end of the year, so I have time. And once I re-evaluated what I had done today, I gave my inner critic a virtual bitch slap for trying to deceive me into believing I hadn’t accomplished anything today.  Quite the contrary. I was quite prolific in my accomplishments.

These are things our inner critic just loves to do to us. It is all supposed to protect us from the unseen horrors of our life. Even now, I can hear her telling me, the poem I wrote on my Stillness art journal spread is crap. It doesn’t follow the rules of a haiku so it isn’t a haiku.  I try to tell myself, I don’t care. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t.

The important thing is, I’m doing my daily art practice. And, I’m learning. As I practice, as I learn, as I get better, that voice, that inner critic, isn’t quite so loud, doesn’t speak as often. And sometimes, sometimes she even applauds what I do.

~Patti

Hope

Below is my latest art journal page.  I came across Journal52 which is a challenge run by Effy Wild. Once a week a prompt is given. When I came across Journal52 they were in week 3. At this writing they are still in week 3. Their week 1 prompt fit my previous art journal page to a tee so I counted it as week 1. Week 2’s prompt is HOPE. I wanted a fitting affirmation statement so I went on the search for one. As soon as I found “I look towards my future with hope and happiness.” I knew it was the right one. Coming across a photo to use as reference for my focal figure of the woman with a shaved head was also perfect for the message I wanted to relay.

I’ll talk about the message in a moment. First, I’ll describe how I created the art journal spread.

I did a rough sketch of the layout with graphite, some of it changed as I went but mostly it is as I intended it to be. I painted the girl, starting with an Art Crayon in flesh tone, then laying with acrylic paint until I had her the way I wanted her. I then used some prisma colored pencils for finer details and to adjust some shading.

Once the girl was done, I collaged in tissue paper in green, yellow and blue using watered down glue. I used watered down white glue to reduce costs. If this was a commission item I would use collage medium or gel medium. I crumpled the tissue paper to give more texture to the page. I also used red and green for the center of the large flower.

Once the page was dry, I used a brayer to apply acrylic paint over the tissue paper to give it more visual texture, then I used my homemade stamps to stamp in the flowers. The rabbit is a commercial stamp. I added Faber-Castell PITT pens for color and details on the flowers and rabbits. On the large flower I used Prisma Colored Pencils.

After stamping in the flowers I realized the original position for the dove was going to be all wrong. This is the only alteration to the original sketch. Placing the bird much higher has given the spread a more balanced appearance. If the bird had been where I had originally intended it to be, the painting would have been bottom heavy. I then added in the lettering using my black Painters permanent marker.

There are a lot of things I love about this art journal spread. First and foremost it is completely my own. I wasn’t following a video, or in a class, I only used the prompt to help inspire an idea. It isn’t whimsical and it is about my life.

This is where we come to the message. The affirmation statement is how I need to look at my life and future right now.  Since 2014, it has been a long and difficult road. The woman with the shaved head represents me two years ago when in 2014 I was diagnosed with breast cancer and yes I eventually shaved my head when my hair started falling out. In 2016, I was laid off of work after 33 years of devoting my time and expertise. Finding another job has been difficult and I’m still looking.

So this is very much about me surviving cancer and the blow of losing a good job I had devoted my life to and trying to maintain hope and happiness in the midst of it all.

I am doing what I love…. being creative… taking care of my daughter. These are things to be happy about. I see this in my painting.

~Patti