Studio Diaries 004

When I started my website I had a goal to write down a blog every week, documenting what I did with my art, resources I found or things I tried out. As with a lot of things I want to do, this small goal turned into a big mountain of stress in my head. Then, I end up not doing anything at all and beating myself up over it. So maybe the goal should not be to blog, but to stop stressing over the smallest of things and be a little nicer to myself. When I do that, I usually start blogging again haha.

This week was a bit ‘in between’. I have those weeks often after I finish a painting or a series. I don’t really know what to do with myself and need time to recharge I suppose. I’m trying really hard to come to terms with these cycles. Rationally I know it’s logical to function like this – you can’t always work at peak performance. But there is always a part that keeps tugging, saying I need to get something done at least. It’s still a work in progress. 🙂

I finished this series of (self)portraits in acrylic on paper.

The days before I started the acrylics series I worked and experimented a lot with charcoal on different surfaces. I made some interesting art papers by glueing torn pieces of kraft paper onto a sheet. I covered some with a bit of gesso and work with charcoal on them. I also did the same on watercolor paper. Charcoal interacts very nicely with gesso, it creates very smooth grays.