Where do you get encouragement as an artist?

[Eric Nykamp]

Ok, so maybe this is just totally selfish, but I am going through a dry time, creatively speaking. What scripture passages do you go to for encouragement, or what do you do to keep on keeping on?

[Kathy Mays]

I've just come out of a dry time ( one of many in my life) and some things that I find that have helped me are these: I don't have any real passages of scripture but I do go to the creator and look at his creations. I either get outside and look at nature( We happen to be in a beautiful part of the world) or look at his creatures and marvel at how they are made or look at peoples faces. I usually come away with the thought--how can any artist top what god has done? ( not so encouraging it seems) but it helps to know he made me to be creative and to look at the master creator is inspiring. The second thing I've done is take myself out and look at art that is really different than mine that I am drawn to. And I usually get inspired to try something different- for me it was to do a whole series of abstracts. My first ones were tragic but I loosened up and had fun with it. Afterwards I had some new ideas for my more realistic style that I usually fall back on and it felt alot fresher. I also started to do some creative things that weren't visual arts related. I started learning to play the congas online and I practiced for about a half hour a day to some really good music- a little jazz , a little African and some good old David crowder band stuff. It just helped me be a little more creative without having to judge myself harshly about not "coming out of my slump". I think anything to keep any type of creativity going while you aren't particularly productive with your work helps get it back.

[Kathy Mays]

Here is an example of what happened when I looked at some abstracts, tried some and went back to a changed realistic approach.

[Betty Bartlett]

Kathy, these just reek of the essence of God! Particularly the First Position and Cat Whiskers! I guess you found out what works for YOU!'

Betty Bartlett

[Virginia Wieringa]

I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me! There was a song of this in VBS when I was a kid and yes, it's true. Day by day, hour by hour, I am held in his power...or something like that! EVEN in the dry times. Maybe ESPECIALLY in the dry times.

You have to go through dry times before you hit the wellspring! Go to your studio and smear some paint. As the guys wrote in ART AND FEAR, you have to paint the crappy paintings before you can get to the good ones. Some canvases have to have really crappy paintings on them before a good layer can go on there.

The piece I posted here is called Bloodlines I wrote about it:
BLOOD LINES is built over layers of former paintings on a canvas I’ve owned for twenty years. Some areas are textured and impastoed with a variety of materials. It’s collaged with fabric, tissue, and photos of ancestors layered over a grid of horizontals and verticals with bits and pieces of debris from my studio life. The varied shapes and lines create a kind of map of territory that evolved over time. It is a continuum of history arranged in an intuitive composition.

It just won a people's choice award in Layers of Life in Lowell.

[Julie Quinn]

I often turn to the Psalms when I'm feeling depleted...Psalm 63 is my very favorite...especially verse 1....this seems to describe the place I'm at much of the time lately. Also Psalm 37: 4,5,7...trust, delight, be still....I think the Lord has a special place in His heart for artists, and there's a lot of truth for us creatively here...leave the stress, expectations, worries outside of the studio....just trust Him, the Lord of all creation for inspiration, delight in the incredible invitation He gives to partner with Him in this gift of creating, and be still before Him before you do anything....wait for His spirit and love and grace to fall upon you as you submit and trust that His gifts are true and perfect and meant just for you....

[C. Robin Janning]

I read, I meditate, and sometimes I clean house. I try to notice the small things, and then I realize there are no small things. I work with both Lectio Divina and Visio Divina. Right now, these couple of verses from John O'Donohue's "To Bless the Space Between Us (A Book of Blessings) are keeping me company:

"...May your imagination know
The grace of perfect danger,

To reach beyond imitation
And the wheel of repetition

Deep into the call of all
The unfinished and the unsolved

Until the veil of the unknown yields
And something original begins
To stir toward your senses
And grow stronger in your heart..."

[Eric Nykamp]

Tell me about Visio Divina. I have never heard of that, though I regularly use Lectio in my own devotional life. I also like to do "Visual Lectio Divina" (I made up that term ... don't know what anyone thinks about this) and respond to scripture with pictures.