Tangled Up In Dreams

It's remarkable to think that I am packed and ready to make my trip to Hambidge for my residency which begins tomorrow at noon. Since before Christmas, when I received my acceptance, I have thought about what I want to do while there for two glorious weeks. This past week I began the process of putting together my supplies and the answer was very clear. I want to draw, to work on paper, to freely work on projects as they create themselves through me.

My decision not to work in encaustic was an easy one because I need time and space to renew myself with my art, to once again get acquainted with myself. If this sounds like a lot of "me me me"...I think it is. There comes a point in a career where you feel you may have lost a little of what you are. Maybe it doesn't happen to everyone but I think that renewal is often the answer when the work starts to come more slowly to feel not so exciting..or relevant.

So in my car trunk is a wonderful assortment of beautiful drawing papers, all imaginable mark making tools and mediums...charcoal, lith crayon, India ink and so much more. I have even thought that I might use some smaller pieces of paper for beginning an artist's book, a project that I've had on my mind for quite some time.

I started reading Twyla Tharps book on creativity and have included in my working tools some of my favorite books of poetry: Mary Oliver, Frerico Lorca, T.S. Eliot...The new memoir by Joyce Carole Oates, and the lovely Louise Bourgeois, Drawings and Observations. The Bourgeois book is always at my side. The Deep Song...resonating with me now.

No cellphone or internet to disrupt my days of musing and drawing. Now, how wonderful is that.