seashells, paintings and books

Let each man exercise the art he knows. 

Aristophanes

hello lovelies!

Yes, you. 

Including the men who join me here.

(and i know there are a few)

I hope i didn't scare you all away

with my recent "I'm not married" rant. ;-)

I may not believe in marriage

but i do believe in love.

Big difference between the two (in my eyes).

Now let's get on to some fun stuff, 

shall we?

The little yellow birds above

are paintings i used to do a lot.

I began doing them for friends

and they kinda started selling well.

A little too well.

I was faced with the age old question

most artists are faced with eventually...

"am i doing this because i love it

or because i know it'll sell?"

These little birds eventually became boring for me,

so i stopped painting them.

I still think they're cute - i just do them much less now.

I painted these two for my mother,

who's giving them as a gift.

(she still loves them...)

On my regular walk on the beach over the weekend,

I found these beauties.

I watched as a huge seagull

cracked this open with his beak

and feasted on what was inside.

Whenever i see something like this,

part of me is in awe of the whole spectacle,

and another part wants to run towards the seagull

and scare it off

so i can save this little guy.

But then i remind myself that this is nature,

the way things are supposed to be.

So i just sit and watch instead...

with my eyes half closed.

Isn't it beautiful?

As for painting, i've done a little less lately,

only because work got in the way.

i hate when that happens. ;-)

Whenever i have left over paints,

i spread them on paper, like i did here.

No particular image or idea,

 just blocks of leftover color.

Then whenever i have a bit of time -

I add more paint to it and turn it into something

a little more visually pleasing.

At least for me.

I like this free form kinda painting

where nothing needs to make much sense.

Very liberating.

A quick pencil sketch... 

may turn into a painting soon - not sure.

A while ago, i ordered these books

and they came in last week.

It's like Christmas at the house

whenever i get a box from Amazon!

Soooooo exciting!

The Fire Starter Sessions.

A. MA. ZING.

Steal like an artist...

SUCH a good little book.

So many gems in there.

And yes, there's a difference

between good stealing and bad stealing

so don't go sending me any hate emails

about how stealing is bad, ok?

I already know that.

And i don't run with scissors either. ;-)

One of his little nuggets of wisdom.

On that note, i've had a few conversations lately

about what it means to be creative.

With today's technology at our fingertips,

and everyone else's masterpiece in our face 24-7,

it's hard not to feel overwhelmed and intimidated sometimes.

There's nothing wrong with being inspired by others,

but i think we need to set limits for

inspirational time.

If you often find yourself sitting in front of your computer,

thinking things like

"I wish i would've done that"

"I wish I was that good"

"if i had the money, I would do blankety blank blank blank"...

shut off the damn computer

and go make something.

The only thing you should be concerned with is this:

what fuels me?

What do i want?

What do I love to do?

And go do it.

Let others do what they are best at,

and you wow us with what YOU are best at.

I know you're all best at something...

I've seen it.

Go do that.

"Let each man exercise the art he knows". 

xoxo