Working and Overworking

Tangles: a variation of Hollyhock by Jason Lau CZT (variation partially by Annie Reiser CZT and then I added my own take) and ICanToo by Hanny Waldburger CZT. Strathmore paper with graphite and chalk pencils.

It's curious, the parallels I often see between meditation and drawing.  In meditation, we might call what happened here, "striving."  That is such a common issue in meditation--the idea that one has to get somewhere and work harder and harder to get there.  It truly doesn't help.  At all.

And here in this drawing I did the equivalent.  I was using a smooth tile and chalk pencils.  The paper, surprisingly, wasn't loving the chalk.  It was the combination of the two, not something I could control.  But I kept thinking if I continued working, or rather, OVERworking (a form of striving), I could make it better. 

Well, uh-uh.  Instead, it just got muddier.  It would have been better if I'd used colored pencils rather than chalk pencils. 

I realized this at the start of the tile but was having too much fun to make the switch.

I like it anyway because it was fun and involved one brand-new tangle and one that I forget to use.  I often say this about the drawings i am not enamored of, right after I finish.  Sometimes when I look at them later, I really do like them.  Often, in fact.  And sometimes I don't.  But the reasons I'm happy anyway are:  1) just the act of drawing brings joy to me; and 2) learning art--and I most certainly am a learner--is all about quantity.  Practice, practice, practice.  As I said in my last post, any practice, even practice that produces something "meh," is bound to build skill. 

Bring it on.

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