Category: creativity

Posted in Alzheimers, Courses, creativity, Drawing, Drawings, life drawing, portraits, portraiture, Proko

The Start of Creativity 2020

Posted on by selina

The start of 2020 has been full on for me. I’ve had the challenging experience of making a difficult decision (with my brother) to admit our mother to permanent aged care. It was a very difficult and emotional time but mum seems to be doing well and I can only hope that she enjoys her time in the beautiful homey residence we chose for her.

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My mum in her new residence. Love her so much!

So in between rushing to Canberra to do all things aged care I’ve also managed to injure my lumbar spine and have a bulging disc. It’s horrifically painful and is limiting my ability to do art and write. I have to write a sentence and walk around as I don’t have a standing desk and the only comfortable positions for my back to heal are laying flat and standing up.

But over the first two months in between all this change I have managed to go to life drawing once and do more portraits as part of my portrait practice challenge.

Here’s a few photos of the portraites I’ve been working on:

And a couple from my January life drawing class:

I’ve also signed up to learn more about figure drawing with Proko. I would love to develop my drawing of the human figure and have less perspective errors in my drawings. So it’s going to be a fun year of creative exploration. There are so many great drawing tips from Stan Prokopenko on YouTube too. So if you love drawing and want to get better at it, you may want to check him out as well.

I hope you have a creative day no matter how you like to approach your creative expression.

 

Posted in Alzheimers, creativity, healing, life drawing, portraits, portraiture

Celebrating Art in 2019

Posted on by selina

I have been delving into a daily art practice since May this year and I want to share with you the joy that this form of creative expression brings me. To do this, I have put together a six minute video showing a lot of the portraits I have done and some of the creative ways I have drawn people and random things that interest me throughout this year. I have learned not to be so precious about my art and to be okay with unfinished drawings. I’ve learned to be self-compassionate and to enjoy being fully present in the moment.

When I am doing life drawing or sketching random people I am practicing my observation skills and my hand-eye coordination. I’m seeing and recording what catches my eye and details that are important to me. When I am doing portraits I am attempting to get a likeness, to develop my own style and most of all, I am trying to capture a sense of their spirit through my drawing.

This year, I have written my novels sporadically and I felt awful that I couldn’t write the way I wanted to. I have two novels in various stages of editing and it’s been too much for me to focus on that while also dealing with the pain of my mother’s Alzheimer’s disease,  and the flow on effect this disease has on my life. My brain has felt like cotton wool every time I have come to write my stories so this year I turned to my art practice as a place of solace and healing.

2019 has been an emotionally difficult year and I think 2020 may have a bit more of that to offer me but I am going to continue my writing and my art practice because that’s my way of living a creative life.

So, I hope, if you take the time to watch the youtube video below, that you enjoy it and that you are inspired to create, write, draw, paint, sing, dance, make music, do whatever creative expression muse calls you to do on a daily basis from now on. Because, making art is a celebration of life as we see it and relate to it. That’s what I believe.

It is also my belief that creative expression brings out the best of humanity and can call attention to important topics and causes too. So if you have something to communicate, please don’t hold back on expressing yourself through your chosen medium. Let yourself out to play, move away from judgement and into self-compassion. Move into acceptance of where you’re at and know that with every step you take you are making progress.

This is David, my partner. He is a volunteer fire fighter and last week he was out on a strike team fighting fires in Bundaberg, Queensland. These people are volunteering to save crops, animals, people and property while dealing with smoke and heat and harsh weather conditions. They don’t get paid and many of them take annual leave from their day jobs to be there for those in need.

Dave’s portrait is number 44 of 100 of my portrait practice challenge. It’s a portrait but it is so much more than that. To me, it is about honouring the volunteers who put themselves on the line for our community every time a fire threatens to devour whatever it in its path.

He sent me this photo when he had a chance. It was meant to be confirmation that he was safe and well. But I looked at it and saw a man doing his best to care for those in need and I wanted to honour that through my art.

I hope Dave’s portrait inspires you to make art that comments on the good work people do in this world too.

I may not blog again until early 2020, but before I sign off, I want to share with you that I am grateful for you touching my life, for the positive and supportive comments made and I hope that creative living provides you with a safe place to play and be yourself without judgement too.

Have a great end of 2019 and may 2020 bring you many hours of creative fun and joy! 

 

Posted in Alzheimers, creativity, Cross Hatching, Drawing, Drawings, Gratitude, portraits, portraiture, Uncategorized

Creativity Keeping Me Steady

Posted on by selina

I’ve completed 39 of 100 portraits in my 100 portraits challenge. I have no time frame to do them in. I just want to practice and keep learning how to develop my own creative expression on paper.

The images above are the my three most recent drawings. Two are cross hatching with a micron pen and the one in the middle is charcoal and white poc marker pen. Each one took about a two hours to complete and I am quite happy with them. I’m learning how much shadow to lay down, how to capture the light on the page and how to follow the form with each cross hatching stroke. It’s not always easy and I make mistakes but the act of drawing takes me out of the critical mind and keeps me steady in life.

In November I went to Canberra, where my family live and I was born, to see my mum. She has Alzheimer’s Disease and it was time to go back to collect more precious memories and to touch base on a face-to-face-heart-to-heart level. The day I arrived my mum seemed unwell and by the next day she was in emergency. She had an infection and so I spent the week at the hospital. My brother has been mum’s main carer and he is doing a brilliant job of caring for mum and it’s difficult to stop infections from happening when the person you look after can’t tell you they are unwell.

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It was a difficult and precious week.

I took a photo of us holding hands, even though mum didn’t know who I was.

At one point as she started to recover, the nurses had lowered the bed to the floor and I sat beside her. My hand held in hers. She rubbed my fingers with hers, smiled for the first time in a long time and whispered, “You’re lovely. I think you’re wonderful.”

Tears welled in my eyes. I choked them back and said, “I think you’re lovely too and I love you.”

Her blue eyes turned to me once more and she said, “I love you too.”

And then she receded into whatever space one goes to when they have Alzheimer’s Disease. Her eyes grew distant and she stared around the room once more.

That is a moment I will treasure for the rest of my life. Even writing this now my heart is aching and tears are making my vision blurry.

My mum is teaching me all about living in the moment and how to appreciate the smallest murmurs with the deepest love.

Mum was still in hospital when I had to return to Brisbane but I knew I’d be back in a few weeks time to see her once again. Her light is still strong and I have more precious moments to collect when I am there. Moments that will be locked away in my heart for the rest of my life.

So, once I got home and was greeted with lavish licks from my dogs and a semi-tolerant stare from cat, I knew it was time to start capturing moments that held meaning to me through my art practice.

David, my partner, happened to be sitting down watching TV and I noticed his foot. Strange as it might sound, I knew I wanted to draw his foot and catch an impression of him in my big green chair.

Dave_FootI got out my micron pen and sketched his foot using extreme foreshortening and then his knee and then his other foot and leg, and then I added the rest of him at a distance.

When I finished this drawing I was delighted. It has become one of my all-time favourite drawings. It is not perfect. In fact it is filled with imperfection, but what it captures is love and life in action. I also hold a memory of this moment that I can relive every time I see this drawing. To get David to sit for me to draw him, I bribed him with an ice cream and an episode of Star Trek Deep Space Nine!

And this is how creative art has been helping me to stay steady in life as I deal with anticipatory grief over my mother’s health conditions.

I also had a glimpse of creative writing again and in that moment I took to my novel with renewed interest and care.

Staying creative – drawing and writing what is in my heart and what I find precious – during the ups and downs of life brings solace to my heart.

I’m learning how important the ordinary is and how extraordinary the ordinary things in life really are.

Until next time, with gratitude for the time you have spent here reading my blog, I wish you creativity in your day. 

Posted in Creative Writing, creativity, Journal, mindful art, mindful writing, mindfulness, Uncategorized, Writing

Mindful Creativity

Posted on by selina

I’ve been exploring mindful creativity through my art and journal writing practice. It is way of connecting with my inner creativity and continuing to learn that art and writing are tools which bring me completely into the present moment.

My portrait practice has slowed but I am continuing to make progress both in creative expression and accuracy. The images below include portraits 30 and 31 out of 100. There are also graphite drawings of eyes with glasses which I did as part of the Sktchy course with France Van Stone.

As I draw a portrait, I have found that I am looking at what is in front of me and my mind is engaged in seeing the tones and values, the contours, the various shapes and I am no longer labelling what I see. It is as if my mind enters a space of surrender to what is before me. It is a sweet space to occupy and it allows my subconscious mind the space to unravel things that need to be contemplated.

I have also been writing a daily journal with the prompt, ‘today I noticed’, and I what I have noticed is that I am more in tune with what is happening inside me but not in a self-aggrandisement way. Reflection on my inner self through this journal exercise has given me space to explore who I am in the moment and to learn to allow the thoughts that float in and out of my mind to pass through while I only catch the threads I choose to connect with. It is a mindfulness skill.

This writing exercise is also helping me to be fully present in the moment. One day in recent weeks I found myself jotting down how the swallow-like birds zoom around me as a walk to work in the morning. They race each other zooming around in ever widening circles. They movements filled with playful joy. Their inverted ‘V” tails flashing past as these tiny  blue-black birds whoosh past my legs, hovering two feet above the grass and dancing on the air currents.

Taking a moment of time to notice these gifts of nature helps my creative life to expand. I write down what I notice and my imagination expands. My vocabulary for writing expands and so does my visual vocabulary of symbols increase.

Being creatively mindful isn’t about the end result or producing something that I can sell or show off. It’s about the moment, the journey and the experience within.

I am loving this mindful creative living through art and writing. I love that I can learn and grow and play. It is refreshing and positive.

If you have read this far, then I hope what I have said here inspires you to develop your own daily mindful creative habit. And it is my hope that you will find the richness of the universe in those moments too.

Until next time, happy creating and being in the present moment.

 

Posted in anxiety, Creative Writing, creativity, Cross Hatching, Drawing, Drawings, portraits, portraiture, Uncategorized

Art and Writing Practice

Posted on by selina

It’s been some time since I last wrote a blog post. I’ve been continuing my art and writing practice while also working.

Below is my latest portrait. I’m continuing to practice my portraiture skills and my crosshatching skills. This is portrait 29 of 100.

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Portrait 29/100 of my portrait practice challenge. Created: 13/10/2019 Artist: Selina Shapland

Below are some progress photos of my most recent portrait.

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The inspiration photo came from the Sktchy app and this is another artist in that community. I had a lot of fun capturing his squinting eye, practicing proportions and capturing the way he looked at the camera with one eye open.

Below is another pen crosshatching portrait practice piece.

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It’s the first one where I’ve drawn teeth and got them looking like they are sitting inside her lips. The green pen was fun to use and gives her a soft quality. The inspiration photo also came from Sktchy app.

Around all of my other drawing, I’ve been learning to use procreate and draw animal portraits.

Here’s the iguana I did with the Sktchy School class.

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I’m so looking forward to developing my digital art skills and seeing how my creative life blooms with the mediums available on this excellent creative app.

I’ve also been writing a daily journal with the prompt: “Today, I noticed”. It’s a ten minute exercise where I either write in a paper journal or on my scrivener file and allow my daily experiences to flow through me and onto the page.

One of the excellent things about developing a daily journal practice is that it frees up my mind allows my creativity to flow. It’s really helping me to move through writing blocks and plot knots. As a result of daily journaling, my novel writing has sprung into life and I am thoroughly enjoying fleshing out the areas that need to change from telling to showing because I am not bogged down by mental thoughts.

Living a creative life means that I need to be willing to empty the mental and emotional bucket through writing and art. Creative living is a sanity saver for me and it reduces anxiety in my life. My brain has time to process other events happening in the background of my life and I am more in tune with life in a way that flows when I willingly come to writing and art.

I’m also touching on exploring memoir writing and personal essays of memories in my life. I love that writing gives me such a safe place for self expression.

If you’re interested in seeing my portrait art and my life drawing progress, I post most of my photos on instagram now. It’s a way of sharing without using up all my google space for photos. So I am choosing to only show select art here now. My instagram feed is on this blog if you’re interested in checking it out.

Thanks for dropping by and for checking out my blog. I’m in a weird place right now as I deal with some emotional home life stuff so I may not blog as often as I would like. Sometimes I wonder if I have anything to say that is worth reading… But maybe that’s anxiety talking and not the reality of the situation. I don’t know.

Anyway, I hope that as I explore creative living that I inspire you to explore your creative life too.

Until next time… have fun!

Posted in Alzheimers, Courses, creativity, Drawing, Drawings, life drawing, portraits, portraiture, skillshare, Sktchy, visual diary, water color, Water Colour, Water Colours, watercolour

Arty fun has been had

Posted on by selina

In recent weeks, I have been diving deeper into my art practice.

My writing brain is having a holiday from the pressure of editing my novel. I’ve felt a bit burnt out with my writing lately and needed to give myself permission to do something fun where I have no pressure to be at publication standard. No-one has ever put pressure on me to write to publication standard, but I have and I’m a harsh task master.

I have been on holidays and it has helped me to fill up my creative bucket through art.

Below are some of the portraits I have done as part of my portrait practice challenge. These are all black pen and one of them I used yellow and orange pencils to make the flower pop.

The portraits below include a self-portrait I did which is now the basis of my next Skillshare course, called Draw a Self-Portrait in Graphite.

I also experimented with black brush pen to create the quickest portrait I’ve ever done of the young man in half shadow. Then it was back to graphite to capture eyes.

Eyes, eyes, eyes. All one eye studies which I did as part of a Sktchy course with France Van Stone. I’m still doing this eyes course and loving it. I’m about to move on to pen drawings, so I’ll keep you updated when I get those done. The eyes below are of my family, partner and friend as well as one of my own eyes.

Then it was time to tackle one of the most emotionally difficult portraits I have ever done… my mother’s face. She has Alzheimer’s disease and is often lost and confused. The day I drew this portrait (below) my heart ached and I shed quite a few tears as I processed the grief I feel time and again as I come to terms with what is happening to my mum.

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I learned how to combine ink with watercolour and pastel pencils to create the two portraits below.

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These portraits were quite a lot of fun to do. The one above is my boss. It’s not an exact likeness but I caught the fact that he loves bright colours.

Below is the one I did in the mini Sktchy course with Margriet Aasman. IMG_0789

This one below is my latest portrait. I did it yesterday as I completed an online sktchy course on how to draw a portrait using charcoal medium. This was quite a challenging medium to work in and I had to get used to pushing around the willow charcoal to create the features, and not go too heavy on the compressed charcoal when I went back into bring the eyes to life. I thoroughly enjoyed this class with Neil Rogers.

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I’m going to keep developing my portrait practice. I’ve done 18 portraits so far and I have been adding to my understanding of how to capture the face as well as get a likeness, then how to allow my own style to emerge. I’m looking forward to what the next eighty-two portraits look like as well as seeing how my preferences for mediums change.

Of course, I haven’t only been doing art classes, I have been learning how to draw in my visual diary and use watercolours to enhance what I want to capture. Above is a sketch of my dining room, multiple watercolour (in graphite watercolour as well as colour) mushrooms, an apple that I ate and painted one bite at a time, three pears.

And to top all this creativity off, I went to an Archery for Authors event where I learned to use a bow and arrow. I’m not the best aim but I killed a balloon and when we went outside to play with long bows, I hit the bullseye!

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It was a fantastic morning. Now if I choose to have a character in one of my novels that uses a bow and arrow, I’ll actually know what I’m writing about.

Until next time, I hope you are living an inspired and creative life.

Posted in creativity, Cross Hatching, Drawing, Drawings, life drawing, portraiture, visual diary, Water Colour, Water Colours

Artistic Playfulness

Posted on by selina

It’s been another busy period of artistic playfulness. Here’s my next arty update for anyone who may be interested.

Last Sunday, I tapped into the inspirational photos of people on the Sktchy app and found a photo of a fellow artist. She had a beautiful face to draw and I was inspired.

The above photos show how I moved through the stages to get to the final image, which I am pretty happy with.

I started drawing a sketch of her face in graphite, then added a layer of black and brown crosshatching marks and followed up with watercolour pencils, indian ink and white marker pens to capture the light and shadows.

Prior to that I played around crosshatching and adding watercolour pencil to a sketch of my own hand. It was from a photo so that’s how I managed to capture my right hand (which is the one I use to draw).

I also spend a couple of days creating a watercolour portrait of this Mexican Hairless Dog. It’s probably not accurate to the image since I had to shorten the ears to fit him on the page, but I like him. This one painting was created with watercolour paint and watercolour pencils. I had a great time creating a glaze effect on this one. I probably could push it more, but watercolour is a new medium for me so I am in the learning and experimenting phase.

Last Wednesday night I rushed over to life drawing class and here are some of the sketches in various mediums. The drawings are not all accurate or in proportion but I like how my drawing is developing. I especially appreciate that I can now capture the whole person on the page and draw what I am seeing rather than what my brain thinks it’s seeing.

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This one (above) is probably my favourite sketch from the night. It took 20 minutes to do and gave me a challenge with foreshortening as well as capturing the form with crosshatching. I used black ink pen to do this one. There’s only one part of it that irks me as I think I didn’t capture it as accurately I would have liked, but that’s the process of drawing – learning to see and draw exactly what I see. I’m still learning and I’m grateful that I can continue to do that too.

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And just for fun, I’d seen this horse sitting in a shop window, and I liked him so much that I snapped up a photo so I could draw him in my visual diary later. After a long day at work, I decided to chill out while on the train home and that’s when I drew the horse in water soluble black ink pen. Then I used brush pen to get the shading and I’m totally in love with this sketch.

I’m also still writing… dun dun dun. Yes, one day… eventually I will finish my fiction story and I am still clinging to getting it published, even if I do that myself. It’s a long road from concept to first draft to editing to polishing to publication. I will get there – one word at a time.

Both art and writing are about establishing and maintaining a regular practice. It’s tough to do with a busy life but because I love living a creative life, I continue to return to my passions.

Thanks for visiting and I hope you have creative day whatever you are doing.