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The topic this week at the Bluestocking’s Meeting is: “What are your sources of inspiration? Is it from within? Or without? Is it divine or not so?”
This topic is so timely for me. There is more synchronicity happening in my life than I know what to do with! And, it’s all thanks to the Artist’s Way, the ritual of writing morning pages, practicing Yoga, and learning to manifest my own artistic journey.
During my first college art class, the professor -a petite and enthusiastic woman with kind eyes- imparted some amazing advice to me. Our objective was to draw a still life -including shading and shadow- both of which I felt wholly inadequate to learn.
(Shading and shadow had always been hard for me. But, during the course of the class, she taught me to “see” in new ways. “Follow the line,” she’d say. “Just follow the line. Is it darker here than there? Why? Where is the light? Where is the shadow? Pay attention to the chiaroscuro,” she taught us. And, it worked. I saw objects in new ways –literally. I saw light where before I’d noticed none, I noticed the patterns it made across the Humboldt Bay at sunset while I drove to art class. I’d see the way the grays and greens would soften, as my perspective of the red- wooded mountains would increase in distance. I noticed the way a shadow appeared to ripple across the glittering fresh water lagoons of Northern California while the idyll ocean mist made its footfall on land.)
The advice my professor -herself an accomplished artist- imparted to me: “A piece of art is your own creation. You are allowed to take whatever artistic liberties with it that pleases you. The point is NOT to make the still life an exact replica of itself. The point is to create the still life the way YOU see it –the way YOU interpret it.”
Because of her words I know that Philip Sydney’s quote is true “”Fool!’ said my Muse to me, ‘look in thy heart and write’.”
Outer sources of inspiration -no matter how profound- are in every case filtered through the being of the artist and through the eyes of the beholder. It is the gift of the artist to allow the world to see life through his or her own eyes. While inspiration abounds and the muse plays her coy game of hide-and-seek, the heart and soul of the artist actively participates in the formation of inner landscapes. Do I believe that inspiration comes from within? I believe that interpretation comes from within. As for inspiration –it lives everywhere!
My son has the cutest laugh.
It’s so accessible,
so readily available and contagious.
When he laughs,
he laughs until he can’t breathe!
His face turns bright red and his eyes sparkle
as if the greatest joy in the world is his.
It’s music
–echoed only vaguely by angel’s song.
Literary Bohemian
Synchronicity is so amazing sometimes. This is my very first time I’ve participated in Illustration Friday and it happens to compliment this weeks topic at the BlueStocking meeting. The topic for Illustration Friday is “Sprout.” But I think what I drew signifies a growing and healthy hope, also.
Literary Bohemian
p.s. This is just a thumbnail. if you’d like to see a larger version, stop by my blog.
I’ve been doing quite a bit of research into the Blue Stocking society in order to write a short story about them. But I’ve found that this project has really taken on massive proportions for me. It’s no longer a short story but seems as if it could be a novel. So I’m excited about that. And at the same time, I’m sorry I’m not able to share what I’ve written so far. I’ve realized that in order to understand the significance of The Society, a person needs to understand the historical atmosphere they lived in. It was a time of social upheaval. I’m very interested in it, and I see many parallels to today’s society. I had really hoped to share a short story with all of you on this first meeting, but as I’ve mentioned, it is a work in progress. I highly recommend, to anyone interested in history, the period of time that the Society began is worthy of an in depth study.
-Literary Bohemian
I was just browsing through some fashion images (my secret passion) and i found this. It immediately reminded me of the Blue-Stocking Society.
-Literary Bohemian (ninjacat)
“We need ta go grocery shopping,” her roommate Shannon’s voice called out as Aohkii walked in. Her words dropped in the matter-of-fact way she had of holding her statements in front of her like a shield. Shannon was a Taurrean woman. She was lonely, shy and needy, but when she smiled, a thousand ships were launched in her honor.
“Yeah, I know,” Aohkii replied and giggled. “God, how long has it been since we last had enough money to go on an actual grocery shopping spree?”
“Too long,” Shannon moaned. “But come on! I’m soooo sick of Top-Ramen and peanut butter sandwiches. When do you get paid,” she asked as she slammed the cupboard doors and shuffled towards the kitchen table where Aohkii sat.
read more at http://www.literarylady.wordpress.com/
My interpretation of a beautiful and admirable humanitarian
-NinjaCat
Literature is art, is beauty, is life. That was Aohkii’s motto. She stuck to it too; come rain or, well, more rain. That year, the rain had seemed endless. After the first week of it, dripping and drizzling its constant rhythm, she began to notice the intricate patterns it made while pirouetting down from the sky. At times, it would drift this way or that in the wind, racing. A month since the sun last shone, she had got into the habit of making room in her book bag for a set of pants, a scarf, hat, and an extra pair of socks. Her bike ride to work was more than a mile away. Often, a large car driving by would spray her with a combination of rain and mud. It never lost its humiliating quality, but she would have been soaked no matter how far from traffic she rode. Her workdays at the bookstore habitually began with a trip to the bathroom to change into dry clothes. They ended with a shower to wash away the cold drops of moisture her hair and clothes had diligently gathered during the ride home.
“Art is beauty is life,” she thought as she glanced around her small tiled bathroom. She stepped out of the shower and rubbed the steam from the mirror. Her self-reflected gaze triggered a different emotion for every mood she contained. That afternoon, it shone brightly. There was none of the usual angst. She brushed away the taste of cigarettes that had accumulated on her teeth and tongue during her afternoon lunch-break.
Once upon a time, Aohkii had started smoking as a self-challenge. “I want to know what its like to be a smoker,” she’d declared while in her last year in high school. “I want to know so that one day I can put it into a novel. Its research,” she mused to her friends. Before long though, the nicotine had taken its hold on her soul. Smoking had grown from research into habit and then addiction. The one-year-plan to smoke had come and gone, as had the year after that. Now, in her third year of smoking, a cute guy she’d met at one of many campus parties had, after hearing her reasoning, replied, “Well…. now you REALLY know what its like to be smoker,” and had laughed and lit her cigarette for her. The experience left her feeling chagrined and yet, even after sleeping with the man, she lit up a cigarette and pushed the feeling to the back of her mind.
The sound of rain continued its fantastic lullaby. Inside the little bathroom, Aohkii secretly admired the constancy of it and the talent it had to bring people together. Olympia certainly would not be the same without the rain. The little college town was full of writers, artists, punks, bull-dike lesbians and general all around creative types. Because of the rain, students would crowd into various coffee and bagel shops, bookstores, and seedy restaurants to write and read or sketch while drowning proletariat troubles away in chai-tea lattes or espressos.
They weren’t pretentious arty types. They were hopefully pessimistic arty types. Kurt Cobain had died, or was murdered, depending on how you saw it. The end of an era had come. Grunge was on its way out and cell phones were on their way in, as were children whose toys were computerized and adults hungry for the war machine to begin again its locomotive roll across the planet. Generation X had begun to streamline the way to fast becoming millionaires. Generation Y was still in elementary school. “What about those of us stuck in between,” she wondered as she dried the remaining moisture from her body. “Generation X.5” Aohkii wrapped the towel around her head and wandered naked into the dining room.
-ninjacat
www.literarylady.wordpress.com
***Due to the fact that children might view this work, I will not be posting the rest of this story. However, if you’d like to read it please visit my room at wordpress (see above address). I would love to have you over to sit back and read, or just to leave a comment.
Deep within midnight’s hour, her story consumes her.
-ninjacat
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