a beginning

Sue B here...

I thought I'd give you a glimpse into how I approach creating a  piece of work once I've got a theme to work with.  Actually, this process is pretty much how I approach any new piece of work that I create and it all begins on the pages of my sketchbook...

Whenever I have a new theme or idea to work with the first thing I do is to make a list of words that relate to the theme.  For  "empty spaces" theme that we're working with my list ran the gamut from literal and abstract interpretations to techniques and materials.



As you can see from this shot of my sketchbook pages I am not worried about neatness and I definitely don't censor myself at this stage of the process.  By that, I mean I write down any idea that comes to mind whether or not I think it's a good or bad idea or even if I think I have the skill set to bring it to fruition. I'll keep coming back to these pages to review them and add to them over the course of days or even weeks until I find the ideas that I am the most excited about and that I think I want to carry off the pages and start developing.



For the "empty spaces" theme I find that I have the problem of too many ideas.  I know what you're thinking - how can too many ideas be a problem?  Well for me, too many ideas is overwhelming.  I need to narrow down the list so I know what to focus on.  Once I've got some focus I can start the actual art making process.  For this theme I have several ideas that I'm considering: the empty space in a vessel, lace work and the space between two objects.  Which one I will end up using will depend on the results of some sampling that I will be doing over the next few weeks which I've already begun by starting to paint a new piece of textured silk...

hand painted silk in progress

I'll be back with another look at my progress with this theme in a week or two so stay tuned!