A Studio in My Pocket

Well, not really in my pocket ...

We went camping a couple of weeks ago, I took some great photos, and I took along a tiny, portable studio. Enough stuff to paint or draw on the run.

I like my travelling 'studio' to be compact and organised, so I packed my equipment into a tiny lunch box.

Here you can see the lunch box, pens, watercolour pencils and my paint box. There are two paintbrushes in the paintbox. There is my sketchbook, and two beautiful leaves that I found. I love to paint leaves. Oh, and that is a mini water container, in the front.

Look how everything packs neatly into the little lunch box, and on the right, I have even  squashed in my wallet and cell phone - nifty!


I packed this little back full of stones and leaves to bring home. It would have been nice to have a few zip-lock bags.


I have been quite extravagant with this travelling studio, I have packed a large set of paints and 24 coloured pencils, but there are plenty of compact painting materials suitable for travelling (or to keep in your hand bag or glove compartment.)


Take a look at this great  video on the Pocket box by Guerilla Painter. I'd love to have one of those!

And here is  the Winsor and Newton Artists' Watercolour pocket plus traveller. Very swish!

I have a new sketchbook, a birthday present from good-painting-friend-Judy, and it is an unusual format. It does not fit into my lunch box, so I have bought a 'sketchbag' from a second-hand shop to hold all my supplies. I have done a drawing of it in my new sketchbook:

I can now grab my sketchbag and run - oh - better remember to put in some zip-lock bags!

Do you have a studio in your pocket?

True Confessions Sunday...

I am writing all of this excellent advice, (and thank you so much to the 3 kind people who have let me know that they have been finding it helpful), but I am not following it myself, so I need to get some things off my chest:

I Confess:

• I haven’t painted anything in ages!  Ouch! It hurts to say that! I want to paint, I think about painting – I have recently tidied out my painting area, but I seem to get caught up in mundane chores, and before I know it, the day is gone.
• I have spent more time in front of the computer this week, than I have spent on my art work in the last month.  Ouch again!
• I suspect that I may never be more than an artist –wanna –be.
• Some of the things that I paint and draw, I think are rubbish.
• Some of the things I paint and draw, I think are fantastic, but I am so mightily shocked that I made them, that I am sure that I can never do it again.
• My current sketch book is empty.

·      

Does this sound like you? Is there hope for us?

Fortunately I always think there‘s hope and I am ready to kick start my creative routines and get working again.  In fact, I quite like a little shake up and a fresh start.  So where to begin? Here are some ideas that I am working on.

• Accept your feelings. It’s OK to feel that I have no talent.  It’s OK to feel that my work is rubbish.   I need to accept these feelings, but not be overwhelmed by them.  Feel, but work anyway.
  
  
• Find a place to work and make it your own. 

• Set your working hours. Just knowing when my work time is, helps to get me in the right frame of mind.

• Set a quantity goal – so many hours a day, one small sketch or painting a day, something that you think you can manage – be realistic.  There are great examples of artists who are working on daily projects that over time add up into interesting bodies of work.  You might like to look at Karin Jurick’s 100 Faces, or Kirsty Hall’s Diary Project or look at Matt Kish’s fascinating images on his blog, One Drawing for Every Page of Moby Dick.

• If you are finding it really hard to get going, get someone to work with you – at least some of the time.  I have set up a painting date, once a week with my good friend and fellow artist Judy, this is a great way to get me working again, and it doesn’t feel like work!

• Dust off your sketchbooks and journals and carry them around with you.  These always make me feel like a real artist.  Look out for future posts where I discuss different sketchbooks and notebooks and ways of using them.

• Get to work.

Some Great Resources

• The Creative Habit , by Twyla Tharp
• The Creative Person's Hierarchy of Needs, by Cynthia Morris

Quote of the Day

"Most people aren't as creative as they wish they were, because they haven't mastered strategies for creating while life is going on around them."

Eric Maisel 

A Place to Work

Every creative person needs a physical workspace.  Not every artist has the luxury of a studio, but everyone can find a corner to make their own.

I have a 'studio' - a store room at the back of our garage - it's hot, narrow and dark, perfect for storage, but not good for painting.  I keep my paints there, ready to go, and then set up in the garage with the door open when I am painting.

I have a $5 portable card table (a junk shop find) that I use as a painting table - it's the perfect size, its legs fold away for easy storage and its very light.  It's my favourite piece of equipment.

Painting equipment in the storage room, ready to go.

My portable painting table set up in the garage

And here is me painting in the garage.  It really is no trouble to set up and pack away after each working session - but you do need to be organised, or you may spend all of your time running to fetch something .

This is me painting in the garage - the light is good when the doors are open.

I do a lot of reading and writing about art, and I collect articles and clippings and scraps of paper that I constantly refer to.  I feel happiest when all of my paperwork is close at hand.  Here is my desk, It's near the computer, in the study, right next to the kitchen.  I can quickly grab something to read or jot something down in the middle of making dinner.  This is my 'think tank', the nerve centre of my creative life.  (It is not normally this tidy - I have recently done a clean out.)

The think tank - all my note books, sketch books, books that I am reading etc.

 

This is what it looks like when I am working - I spread out all my things on the study table and work in a rather messy way.  Because I have to share the study with my family, I pack all of this up when I am finished, and it goes into the storage boxes on my desk.

What all my notes and books look like when I am working

When you have chosen the environment that works for you, and made it your own, you have cleared the first hurdle, you are ready to begin.