Self portrait of a recovering artist

Who are you? Who are you really, not the face you present to the world, but your innermost person. The one you really are, instead of the one you really do. I always say to people that I do projects, I am not a project manager when they ask me what I do for a crust. The reason for that distinction is that I don't want to measure my worth according to the title I have. I want to measure my worth according to my humanity and my flaws and my gifts and the things I do and create. Since New Year's Eve I have been committed to a program called The Artist's Way, which is a book and a 3 month process for recovering artists with creative block. As that is who I am, an artist, a creative being, but it is time to rediscover that inner person. It is not easy to do this program, many days I have wanted to give up because it seemed easier. If you want to know a bit more about it, have a look at the writer's web site - The Artists Way.

One of the things I tend to do is to censor some of my ideas with an internal Oh don't be silly. You can't make that, that idea is ridiculous. You want to make WHAT? A wall hanging, upholstery, a book, shoes? Where did that come from? Maybe that is why I found myself with some form of creative block, I'd been saying things to myself a few times too many. I am unearthing a lot of lost ideas, forgotten creative activities from my childhood. It is a satisfying yet unsettling process, unearthing means that worms may turn up, or weird little critters that scurry all over the place to hide themselves under rocks. In the past few weeks, since I started the program, a little voice has been piping up in me to create a self portrait. Some form of documentation of who I am and how I perceive myself right at this moment. It took a bit of time to dig out what that needed to look like but when I remembered that I used to love making dolls as a child, the decision was made.

There is a little story behind this self portrait, I visited my favorite news agent a few weeks ago to look through magazines. A lady was standing next to me, my age, nice looking, and she said to me: can you reach out for that issue of Cloth Paper Scissors as there is an article about making dolls I want to read. I gave her the magazine and took a copy for myself and we started talking over the articles. She said to me you know, I have wanted to make something fun like that, but I just can't seem to be able to do it, I am too serious, life gets in the way. Ah, that I know well, I said, the answer is to just show up, just do it, not overthink it all, it does not have to be perfect (I had learned that lesson recently). Just show up. She looked at me and said I really needed to hear that today, thank you. And I really needed to find something about making dolls, so I bought the magazine. Synchronicity. I should have given her my contact details, so if you have heard someone tell this story from the other side, let my fellow doll maker know I am on the web. It would be great to compare what we made.

My self portrait is the way I see myself - Nature Girl. My favorite colours and textures, holding my head such that I can hear the whispers of the Spirit and the crashing of the waves. Nature Girl wears a dress of hand dyed olive, teal and green silk and a leaf necklace of course. The hair is a funny mix of brown, caramel and grey blonde, just like mine.She has a copper cuff, as that metal suits her, and she carries a stick.  This could indicate the fossicking temparement of Nature Girl, looking through flotsam to find bits to use in the art works she makes. Or it could be because once in a while she likes to use that stick, to prod, to point or to hit someone gently over the head. You, cut the crap! I've also included a close up. Fatally flawed and nobbly, but oh so human. It was difficult to take a decent picture of my self portrait, I had to perch her on a piece of rio wire on the steps in my living room. She doesn't have a stand yet, I am dragging her with me through the house at the moment, so she can sit next to me when I write or bead. Or make a friend for her, I have an idea for another doll already.

This was great fun. When I was making her body and arms, someone asked me why on earth I was making a doll. Because I can, I said, and because I want to. Not every piece must be serious, we must listen to what we hear in the still of the night. Make me, put me down on paper, paint me, bead me, create me. I'm learning to accept that I don't always have a choice in the matter, I am only the conduit. That is part of the gift of creativity, I think. That sometimes what you think you want to make isn't really what you need to make.

So what do you think of the Self Portrait of a Recovering Artist?

Hand It Over Dot Com

I've been thinking and I just thought it might be interesting to try to write it down. It has to do with why people blog, and pray and go to therapy. Or maybe it has to do with why I blog, and pray and well, I don't go to therapy much anymore, but art is my therapy. I am probably assuming some global need, instead of an individual's compulsion to write and subject the world to her own introspection. Sounds much more social, doesn't it. Social networking sites and blogs have really exploded in the past few years. Every artists, celeb, company, group, network, concept seems to have a blog. Even the catholic church is online, presenting a strange mix of preaching and religeous mores, Search-an-angel and online merchandise, actually it made me cringe when I found it. I've always understood that religeon is marketing of an idea, but to see it so blatantly displayed as a shopping portal made me feel very uncomfortable. You see what I missed was the Open Door, in the olden days, the church was refuge, sanctuary, come in, we are glad you are here, what are you looking for, searcher? What have you lost, what are you missing in your life and how can we help you. I didn't see that. I didn't see a permission to hand it over. To hand over what ails you, what troubles you, to hand over the load, to hand over your thoughts and get feedback that what you think is okay. I also didn't see any values on this portal except politicised church position and I believe that is a telling sign.

Technology progresses at a frightening rate, the quality of life is ever increasing, consumption is ever increasing and yet what you see is that human beings make use of that technology to exercise very basic needs. The emotional quality of life I believe has been impacted a lot, and sometimes facing eachother appears just too damn hard. We've resorted to expression of self, expression of opinion, expression of ideas, expression of sorrow on the WWW; creating a GlobalSearchEngine for kindred spirits. We have created a connected, growing, multiplying www.handitoverdotcom. Some of that functions as the digital version of the worry beads and personal diaries. Online confessionals have been in place for a while, on twitter and personal blogs and allow everyone to observe and participate in the rise and fall of the Britneys, Paris' and Tigers of this world. This almost makes it sound like I don't agree with the level of internet information sharing and social networks. That is not the case,  I am a proponent of handing it over. In fact, in this time of the year, when looking back and looking forward is almost a natural state of mind, I have come to the conclusion that I need to improve on my handing over technique in 2010.

I would really like to have an online help website straight to the Universe, or God, or Buddha or the Divine or whatever you want to call it. Point to point interaction, without having to resort to using the many brokers on earth professing to have the ear of the One and the Only. A web form with a receipt function. Handitover.com. Hello God, it is me. It's been a while since we spoke last. Hey, did you ever do anything with those suggestions for improvement I made? Sorry? Get to the point? You're busy? Okay. I need to tell you some stuff, I need to hand it over to someone. It's in my head and it's gotta come out. Nah, I don't need you to fix it, what a typical male thing to say, just shut up and listen. Or Here is my wish for next year.  Or Here is something that has been bothering me. Maybe Can you ask Uncle Morty where he put the key to the safe before he left? Or perhaps Am I doing the right thing? What is the meaning of this? Can you make it quiet inside my head. And potentially this I am so lonely, there is nobody to talk to. See now that would be something wouldn't it. Workflow in an agreed format. And an automated receipt for your service request to an email account of choice. Your request has been received, and has been placed in the qeue. You will receive a response as soon as possible.

And maybe this is why people blog, and write online in journals. We hand it over to eachother and the information super highway. The stupid, the interesting, the creative, the joyfull and the sad, the inspirational and the mediocre, the questioning and the response. What led me to this jumble of thoughts, and the subsequent project plan for a service request system to the Divine? I've had a strange week last week. One where I have tried to break old patterns, a week where a barrage of motherloads came at me - OPPs, Other People's Pressures, Other People's Pain, Other People's Problems. It is in my nature to want to take these things on board, to try and fix them, architect a solution, or suck it up and believe the problem is me. Not this week. I set some boundaries and handed over the rest to Spirit to fix. And it was hard, cause the old pattern would be to lie awake at night to break it down to the nth degree and ponder and hand over my peace of mind. What I did was write it all down in my journal, and kept on seeing the beautiful day that was. And it worked. And Spirit didn't want to sell me morals, or opinions or Bibles or tshirts with slogans, all that happened was that It listened and took part of the weight. There was a lightness in my step this past week, I experienced a lot of small abundance and pleasures, and reached a realisation that shared trouble is really halved trouble. Even if I share it only with another version of myself.

I still believe my online request idea is a good one, but until Spirit hires me as an IT consultant to make that happen, I will just stick with my written journal.

Silent all these years

For a significant portion of my life I have had a tussle between what I thought I should be doing and what I really wanted to do. This tussle expressed itself in bouts of dissatisfaction with life, just beneath the surface, causing conflict between Daytime Bianca and Selftime Bianca. You see for years, decades even, I blocked out the creative person inside. I knew she was there, I knew it as a child, when I was writing articles for the school newsletter I created at 9, I knew it when I sculpted in clay, I knew it when some of my poems were published in a book when I was 12. But for some reason this artist child was silenced, I don't think it was ever articulated clearly or maybe life events functioned to gag the creative soul inside, but it was silenced for a long time. Or maybe not silent, dorment, surpressed, over shouted by responsibility and career and demands on the logic mind that left one exhausted. Existing on the shallow top layers, not able to see or pay attention. But the tussle was there, and the little artist's voice became louder in my mid 30's - what about me, have you forgotten me? Have you forgotten what it was like to create, the delight and joy in the process. Have you forgotten that sense of connection with the universe and the earth and some ancient force that has always driven human beings to great achievements. Have you forgotten your destiny, little girl? You have always known this drive, this need, this must do, this gift.

I had not forgotten.

Creating was what I reached out to when life was not quite unbearable but survival was the only action I was capable of. At first it was to stop the thoughts and repeating the same things over and over again, but then I recovered that sense of incredible wonder and excitement at the process and what came out of my heart when I was quiet long enough to tune in. Aahhhh. For several years, I indulged, hungry and trying to catch up on what I thought was lost time. I was prolific, I was driven, I produced one piece after the other, tried one medium after the other. But the conflict was still just beneath the surface, and I could not understand why. It wasn't until I started to examine my own assumptions and perceptions that I heard it, it came back to what I should be doing. I should be making work to sell, I should be producing, I should be perfect. Oh my gosh, there it was, underneath it all, this sense of perfectionism. Having to be perfect, the work had to be perfect. Lightbulb moment - this is where all my procrastination stems from, and the conflict. Because it has to be perfect, I just don't start it. Or if I start it, I don't finish it.

But that is not my job as an artist.

My job is to show up, my job is to step up to the plate and play, create and experiment. My job is to be the conduit and the channel, my job is to listen to the spirit, or the muse or whatever you want to call the force that whispers to us. My job is to live the creative process, to pay attention and to focus. And for a moment, it is all quiet inside, and them my little artist yells out - I told you so! I told you but you didn't listen. You made me silent all these years, and you only heard the other voices. We all hear the other voices - critical voices, telling us we are not good enough, our work is not good enough. We should be cleaning, we should be working, we should be doing the washing. But we are doing our job, when we focus, and pay attention, and work the process. When we show up to create.


When I show up, sometimes all I make are elements. Components, snippets, quantity, bits, bobs - elementary, my dear Watson. Like the ones below, they are just elements, but I work the process, and delight in the act of creating. But I show up and that is all that matters, it is good enough. That'll do, Pig (I loved that line from Babe). Last week, I enrolled in a creative writing course starting in February, I walked away from the work a year ago of writing the book I had in my head for a while, and I am going to put some crumbs in place to find my way through the forest. The course focusses on non fiction books and how to structure them. I think Spirit approves, I heard laughter and giggling in the background, I am sure of it. Or maybe Spirit arranged it, who knows.

How are you dealing with the influences that tell you that you should be doing other things but creating? It is not always easy is it? Are you hearing Spirit giggle and laugh? I try to reclaim an hour for myself every day, Selftime in Daytime.

I'm showing up.

Point of View

What is real is a matter of how you look at it. As an artist, attention and mindfulness and seeing things that nobody else sees or finds interesting are important “skills” to have. One of my new year’s resolutions was to be still a lot more and see what happens. There is a wondrous sense of delight and joy in observing. The grey green of the plants near my house. The two faux magpies swooping the insects from the surface of the pool, before they notice I am watching them. The berries on the shrub, the lone tree on the cliff. What do you see? Do you see anything? How does that help you with your art? I’ve started to take some time out every day to be alone and to see, and I do that by getting up at 5.30 and going for a walk to the beach. I usually get followed by some birds, I call them my sentinels and imagine they are sent by the Spirit to keep me safe. If you notice a more spiritual tone in my posts lately, you would be right. I want more meaning in my life and it is not the big things that give you that, they are the small joys.

Every little thing on earth can be a sense of wonder and you can look at them through the eyes of a child. On my morning walks I hear the song of the birds, greeting eachother in the pine trees, I also hear the wind in the tree tops. Whispering. Galahs and small lorikeet communicate like they are spruiking their wares in a produce market in their gossipy, penetrating, screeching voices. If you are really still, they might even forget you are there and appear from their secret hidaways between the branches. You can see them backflip when they spot you. You can smell the sea air, flowers, and other fragrances carried on the gentle breeze. I stop sometimes to admire the bark on the trees, the different textures and the colours of lichen.

Happiness is a point of view. Inspiration is a point of view. What is real is a matter of how you look at it. And when you look at it. I find solitude to be an essential condition to my walks. But that does not mean you can’t connect, it is through seeing and observing that we connect with nature, our spirit and soul and our artistic abilities. What you see you can call upon when you create, your minds eye will recall all these images and impressions for you. Such as the crocheted nautilus shape below, which I made from a beautiful blend of silk/merino yarn in seashell colours, a Christmas present from my friend Anne Dundas. Isn't that shape beautiful? God, or Universe, or Spirit or whatever you want to call it is the greatest artist of us all.

So what do you see? Are you looking? You may find small pockets of sheer delight to brighten your day and improve your artwork. Happy watching.