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Process vs Product: the Art of Play

Updated: Apr 21, 2020

Not every piece of art you make needs to be finished. It can have coffee rings, splatters and drips of your paintbrush (or in my case it can have paw prints made by your cat who doesn't seem to understand personal space.) The fact that you sat down and gave yourself time to create should be awarded. We live in a busy time and if art isn't your full time job, it can be hard to put that time aside to be creative. So if you sat down with your tablet, your colouring pencils, your watercolours or paints, I applaud you. Now, the next step is just to let go of any pre conceived ideas you have in your head and just play. Create for the sake of creating and not for the intend of creating something 'finished'. And yes, I'm also trying to convince myself.

My time is precious; when I finally sit down with my watercolours, I automatically feel like I need to have a plan. I think: I carved this time out for myself to create and now that I'm here, I owe it to myself to produce. Maybe, not everyone feels that way. It could be the older-sibling-type-A personality to me, but I feel that pressure every time and I'm trying to change that. I'm trying to let go of the finished piece I see in my head and just allow myself to explore, play and experiment. This is how I'm trying to do this:

First, have a really good playlist on (or podcast or audio-book if that's your thing). You want something that makes you feels relaxed and maybe a bit inspired. Trust me, painting to your favourite tune is so much better. My thought to this is, if you're loving the music and vibe it's creating, you might not feel so uptight about putting down that first brushstroke. Loosen up, rock out and create.

Secondly, now that you have some sweet tunes on- put the phone away! Leave your emails for another time. Quit looking at pinterest for inspiration. Get off instagram. This is YOUR time to make art and it's going to be influenced by what you like and whatever your intuition tells you put down on paper or canvas. If you need a reference photo, sketch it out.. . or print it off and pin it to the old fashion vision board. Does anyone even own a printer anymore?

Thirdly, give yourself time to 'warm up'. Think of it as stretching before you do that work out; your body will love you so much more for those extra calf stretches you did before running 10km. Your creative mind is the same way. Grab some scraps of paper and decorate it with lines, doodles, or colours. Test out those cool markers your aunt gave you for Christmas. Go crazy.

Lastly, have as much medium around you. Have pastels, paint chips, markers, glitter, watercolours, pencil crayons...anything- you name it (if you have it)! Reach for them sometimes. Layer, layer layer. Cut and paste. Explore how one medium might compliment the other. Experiment with different patterns. Combine colours you think are tacky or plain. The act of creating and getting into 'flow' is much more therapeutic and rewarding than any pretty finished picture with 1000 likes on instagram, I promise you.



So channel your inner kid, tune out the outside world and play.






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