January Review & February Brief

Wow what a month! I feel like it's been a year already by the amount I have learnt. This month has really been fantastic for creating the freedom I've been longing for to just paint, to feed the urge to paint and how much it's opened me up and given me a new found confidence.

One of the biggest lessons I've learnt is that the more creative I become the louder the inner critic starts to shout.  This makes sense that they go hand in hand so leaning to battle this has been the biggest unexpected roller coaster!  This is also what makes the journey so rewarding and I'm loving every minute of it!

Overview of January;

* Number of Layers= 23
* Number of different techniques used= 9
   - mark making
   - stencilling
   - painting with a brush
   - painting with found objects
   - sprays and splatters
   - line quality
   - brayering
   - collage
   - sgraffito
* Number of mediums used: 7
   - acrylic paint
   - gesso
   - gel medium
   - typeface (book pages)
   - biro
   - charcoal
   - pencil
* Number of total transformation layers=3
* Number of happy painters= 1! :-)

February brief:

So far throughout this project I set myself the brief of having the freedom to create and paint through expression and experimentation. This has been a fantastic as a way to begin. To open myself up and make the time to create every day.

I now want to dive deeper. I'm ready to go to a new level so February is going to have its own focus. I don't want this project to become stale. What I mean by this is that I don't want it to become a chore, something I feel I "have to do" therefore I have decided to allow this project to change and evolve over time along with my creative drive. To follow the twists and turns of intuition to guide this adventure.

So the focus for February is;
To play with positive and negative space.  To work with the overall image as a whole as well as the fine detail.  It's all about the balance and composition.

I'm also introducing "patterns everyday" which will enable me to practice mark making, colour combinations and patterns as separate artworks on separate pages. I will then cut/tear shapes out and collage these on the canvas to experiment with placement and composition. This should allow me to focus on the bigger picture when working on the canvas whilst developing the fine details separately.  This will mean that my pages will now become the daily focus whilst I will work on the canvas a couple of times a week. I can't wait to get started!