The mystery of art

There are times when making art is SO hard that I wonder why I keep on persevering. But then I have a day like yesterday and I know.

It's for those moments when the art seems to make itself. When I'm merely the medium through which it comes to be. I have an idea for a Journal Quilt, based on a theme produced by someone else. And all of a sudden there it materializes. My hands grab silk fabrics, then a pencil to draw the design out of graph paper. Seemingly effortless the colours come together, the idea in my mind takes shape under my hands, and it is somehow more and better than I had imagined it to be. A whole long day has passed and at the end of it what I have made almost in a trance is amazing, even to myself.

Those are magical moments, to be treasured and remembered when the going gets a lot tougher. Those are times, the memory of which carries me through all the difficult moments of my life by simply knowing I had them and will have them again.

Such is the mystery of art and it can be compared to the mystery of nature when you plant a bulb and then, one wonderful day, the flower appears such as this pink hyacinth. Both leave me wondering about the forces at work there. Religion is one of the answers but not for me, but if not that, what?

I need to art!

I spend the whole day today just being in my studio and beavering away. The large quilt will shortly have a binding sewn on (this was the quilt that should have been finished by the end of last year but didn't quite make it!) and then I can continue the embellishments. I did some work in my Sketchbook Project and put the last touches (as in beads) on another Journal Quilt.

Very satisfying as the rest of the week was more or less a lost cause. What with driving to Edinburgh for my Artist's Way class (I'm realizing that I'm less and less in the mood to do so even though the book is proving to be more and more effective), escaping to graveyards when the electricity is off and to do my Artist Date, and a dental visit, my art came a poor last in my activity packed week. That has the almost inevitable result that my mood dips and I get more and more fraught with artistic frenzy.

For for next week, more arting and stitching is on the agenda, even if that means missing some of the things I planned to do. I might have to do that anyway as snow and ice are apparently on the way. We will again have no electricity on Tuesday, but that should hopefully be the end of all the electricity poles being replaced in and around West Linton and Carlops. I seem to be able to handle the unexpected failure of the supply a lot better than these planned outages. Last Thursday when we had no supply I did the washing up by boiling the kettle for hot water till John came and asked me why? As we had an entire tank full of hot water left over from the day before. And there was me, proud of exhibiting a real voortrekker attitude!

On a more positive note the snowdrops are out already. I don't think we saw them last year till the middle of February but that could have been because they were covered in a thick layer of snow! Our courtyard is full of foxgloves that self-seeded themselves there and put on their greenery during last summer so that this year they will be flowering (they're bi-annuals). Something I'm so looking forward to, even though they looked splendid today in their frozen state.

Motivation

While driving back from giving a talk to the Montrose Embroiderers' Guild yesterday I started thinking about the similar ways I motivate myself, both for driving long distances by myself as well as for making quilts.

On my way to giving a talk or a workshop the time usually flies, while I sort of rehearse what I'm going to say, worry about how long the drive will take (specially when I encounter roadworks!) and towards the end of the drive paying attention to where I have to be. Usually the adrenaline makes the time go very quickly. It's a completely different matter on the way home. By that time I'm usually tired, the adrenaline has disappeared and I know where I'm going and I just want to get there. So to encourage myself I break up the journey in 10 mile segments (Montrose was a 120 mile trip) and I allow myself one Revel every 10 miles. For those of you not in the UK Revels are small chocolate covered treats. Inside there can be solid chocolate, raison, nut or caramel. I line them up (12 for this journey) on the dashboard and when 10 miles have passed I allow myself to take one. I seem to be quite disciplined as I never take 2 or exceed the ones I have put out. And it does make the journey go a lot faster.

I do the same thing when making a large quilt. I break the process down into smaller steps such as piecing the top, tacking, machine and/or hand quilting, hand embroidery, beading and embellishing, and finally adding the binding and the sleeve. After I complete each stage, I give myself a reward in the shape of making smaller stuff such as skinny pages or ATCs, or even just making a fabric-paper collage. When I finish a big quilt I gift myself a few days to do all this and also allow myself an away day trip.

Somehow this works for me. It's the carrot and stick approach but without the stick. It really isn't a good idea to beat yourself up as an artist! We have enough negative feedback from our inner voices already, no need to add more!! The most I ever do is tell myself to grow up but so far that hasn't worked yet. If anyone has an idea of just exactly when you become a laid-back, relaxed, wise adult person, let me know. I suspect I'll go to my grave, still anticipating adulthood!

The illustrations on this blog post celebrate the lovely spring weather but also in a way further add to my point. After all, most gardeners are also motivated by the fact that after all their hard work they will be rewarded by gorgeous plants and flowers in the end!

Because I finished a quilt on Friday you can look forward to a lot of art on this blog in the coming days!