18 MayWhen It’s All Breaking Down

How the Souls Rose Upwards by Nicole Margaretten. Painting.

Sometimes it isn’t sunshine. Sometimes it’s darkness. Sometimes we just break down.

Getting out of a breakdown, revealing the light in your life once again, is a two-step process. Simple to explain, not as simple to enact.

First, wallow for a while. It depends on how deeply you’ve dropped into this darkness whether it’s wallowing for five minutes or six weeks. But take some time. You’ll know instinctively when it’s time for the second step.

Then, return to your creative home. Where is it that you first discovered your creativity? What medium or material set off your inspiration? Who taught you that one little thing about your work that changed you forever? Whatever moments in your creative past have seriously shaped you… those are where you go when you’re down. For me, it’s the ballet barre, preferably with pointe shoes in tow. Instantly, my soul feels full.

This is not a speedy process.
It takes time. It takes a gentle touch. It takes understanding. And it takes forgiving yourself fervently.
But if you can treat yourself softly and give yourself time, there will be a slow transition back to a joyful, enlivened you.

11 Apr6 Trends I’m Seeing Right Now

Hanging Lightbulbs by Studio Impressions Photography via Events Beyond.

Hanging lightbulbs are pretty popular. Various versions are popping up in the handmade world and tons are seeping into mass homegoods stores. How you decorate around a single hanging bulb that has to be plugged in somewhere… I don’t know. But it’s trending seriously loudly.

Glitter by Obaz via Brittanie Pollard.

Of course, glitter is popular. That’s pretty common in popular culture, but I’ve seen a slight resurgence lately to put glitter into everything. And I think it’s more “sparkle” than anything else. So anything you can do with ideas like “shimmer”, “sparkle”, “glitter”, “sequins”, etc could catch on.

Shareable Text by Studio Wonder via Tyler Thompson.

This one takes a little more explaining. By “shareable text” I just mean cool fonts and images used to share quotes, big ideas, or even just a single meaningful word. This is done to make things more shareable on sites like Pinterest, where your content needs to be visual. This also provides for some great creativity in the graphics, fonts, and even sizes of the words. Plenty of opportunities to make something unique and captivating.

Stripes by Anthropologie via Bridgette Marsh.

Stripes! Enough said.

Clean and Simple by Steven Alan via Ange-line Tetrault.

Clean and simple forms are really popular, especially in interior design. Marble seems to be playing the biggest role in this trend, but I’m also seeing simple raw or dark-stained woods, slick metals, and neutral paint colors. Capitalizing on this trend is as much about the lines as it is about the material.

Bunnies by Karine Daisay via Tracy Files.

Bunnies! They’re hopping up everywhere! (Couldn’t resist that pun – sorry.) Seriously, though. I’m seeing rabbits all over the place (in fact, I’ve spotted a particular little fella in my backyard, upsetting my dog to no end). I’m not sure what sprouted this trend, but it’s gaining in popularity quickly on the heels of a fox fetish. If you’ve thought about using a darling little rabbit in your art, now would be the proper time to get it out there.

What trends have you been seeing lately? Let me know in the comments!

04 AprColor Widgets

A friend found some very helpful (slightly addictive) widgets in Wolfram|Alpha this week. I thought I would share my favorite color-related ones with you.

NOTE: This page does take a while to load since there are 6 widgets to call up.

This first one is called Random Colourand delightfully provides a totally random color. Just as described, huh? I think it’s really great if you’re needing some sudden inspiration. It will also give you info about the color including some close paint shades, the nearest Pantone values, and complementing colors. Pretty useful!

Next is Complementary Colors, which of course provides a complementary color to the one you’ve chosen. You have to input the color’s actual name, but it takes really weird names like “chartreuse” and “eggshell”. It gives you a nice swatch of both colors and what they look like when mixed together. Plus it gives their RGB values. You might need to tweak the RGBs to get exactly what you want since “teal” can mean a different shade or tone to the computer than you thought.

I also like CMYK Conversion. You input a CMYK value and you receive the color swatch and tons of info about the color. The color triad is my favorite! It’s like an instant color scheme.

Next up! Get Related Colors, of course, grabs similar and complementary colors. This can be insanely helpful for providing you with more than 3 colors for a palette and it’s nice if you can’t quite find the color you’re looking for, but you’re not sure what to do to get it. The Analogous and Monochromatic sections can help you tweak that color until it’s perfect.

If you’re having trouble getting the perfect paint shade, 3 Colorsis a blessing. You can input the colors you have (using names. It’s a toss up which will work. “Olive” is fine but “forest” is not.) and it will mix them for you and show you the result. I’ll note that it works with additive color mixing, which I think is more light-based. So I scroll down to the bottom of the results and find the “color blending” result. That’s the one you’re going to get if you mix paints. And then if you want complements or to tweak the shade or something, you can pop that RGB result into one of the other widgets.

And the last color widget I’ve got for you is Crayola Color Blending! Yep, pull out your crayon box. You can predict what color you’ll make by layering two fun Crayola colors. This one’s more fun than useful for your art. But hey! Maybe you do work in crayon sometimes. I don’t know.

28 MarPretty Palette: Curious Goose

Curious Goose by Sylwia Urbaniak. Photograph.

This curious goose caught my attention for its expression, of course – but also for the beautiful colors in the image. I always find it exciting when brighter colors make an appearance in nature. In this photograph, the oranges and reds in the goose’s beak are what make the color palette extra special for me.

02 MarClosing Doors, Opening Doors

Door by Eunjung June Kim. Digital Illustration.

We are all creatures of change by nature of the world in which we reside.

The change often comes, however, with a good amount of resistance. We don’t appreciate having to leave the comfort we’ve created for ourselves, even if we know we’ll like the new better than the old.

That’s why we often can’t see a new door has appeared until we close off the weird glow coming from the old door. In fact, sometimes those new doors aren’t new doors at all, but wide, open, expanding space for possibility.

I can rest properly telling you this because I know you’ve got astounding things ahead. You wouldn’t be reading this if you didn’t.

Check in with yourself. What door must you close so that you can reach the stunning places you’ve yet to go?