Lisa Call

Structures #18    ©2003    8" x 9"

 
More thoughts on the design principles from my kids’ Expeditionary Learning school and how they relate to being an artist.

Design Principle #2: The Having of Wonderful Ideas

Teach so as to build on children’s curiosity about the world by creating learning situations that provide matter to think about, time to experiment, and time to make sense of what is observed. Foster a community where students’ and adults’ ideas are respected.

Who doesn’t want to have wonderful ideas? And even better having those ideas respected. Did I mention I love my kids’ school? The kids are treated with respect and the teachers listen to their ideas. What an excellent way to build self-esteem.

Wonderful Ideas and Art

That design principle touches on a lot of points that I think are vital to making art.

1. Matter to Think About: ie Ideas. Art is all about ideas. Without an idea I don’t think an artist can start making a piece of art. Artists need a stockpile of ideas to inspire their work. They need to constantly feed their imagination and keep inspired. I find that the more I create the more ideas I generate.
2. Time to Experiment: Not every idea is fully developed and ready to turn into a masterpiece. I find that I need some time playing around and trying out different variations to flesh out some of my ideas. Playing around with materials with no set purpose in mind is another way to generate great ideas.
3. Time to Make Sense of what is Observed: After creating artwork I spend a fairly good chunk of time sitting back and looking at it. Thinking about what works, what doesn’t, where I want to go next, what I can improve upon, what I can do more of, what I can do less of, etc. I take notes in my sketchbook to keep track of these ideas.
4. A Community where Ideas are Respected: Putting ones artwork out into the world can be a scary thing. It’s hard not to take it personally when our art, which is a reflection of our ideas, is not accepted. Having a safe community that an artist can share their work is powerful. I’ve been a member of artist communities, both in real life and online, for dozens of years. The support and friendship are invaluable to building ones confidence in ones art (and ideas).

Design Principle #3: The Responsibility for Learning

Learning is both a personal, individually specific process of discovery and a social activity. Each of us learns within and for ourselves and as a part of a group. Every aspect of a school must encourage children, young people, and adults to become increasingly responsible for directing their own personal and collective learning.

As artists there are many things we need to learn. From mastering our craft to marketing our art. There are uncountable sources for learning anything we want to learn. Taking responsibility for that learning is instrumental to our success. If I want to sell my art I have to learn to market my art. No one owes it to me to teach me these things or do these things for me. I need to go out there and learn how to do it. I spent years perfecting my craftsmanship and my art is impeccably made and I’m proud of it. It’s now time to take responsibility for my art business education also.

Structures #18 - Moving Sale

Structures #18 is one of the first pieces in the Structures series with thin lines. It’s also available as part of my moving sale. Originally priced at $150, it is $90 until June 15.

If you are interested in purchasing Structures #18, or any of my available artwork please email me.

Detail of Structures #18:

Structures #25    ©2003    8" x 8"

Expeditionary Learning

I’ve mentioned before that my kids attend an Expeditionary Learning school. From their website:

Our approach combines rigorous academic content and real world projects — learning expeditions — with active teaching and community service. The ELS design focuses on teaching in an engaging way.

The schools have a set of 10 design principles that

express the philosophy of education and core values of Expeditionary Learning. Drawn from the work of Outward Bound’s founder Kurt Hahn, and other educational leaders, they shape school culture and provide a foundation for the moral purpose of schools.

I’ve been looking at these design principles the last few days as my daughter finishes up her portfolio for the year. Instead of grades the kids have to create a portfolio of their best work from the year and present it to a panel, which will determine if they are ready to pass onto the next grade.

The principles are not just a great way to teach kids, they are excellent guiding principles for anyone.

If the principles fail to become a way of life, then we have negated all that we have put into Expeditionary Learning.

Over the next few posts I’m going to share these design principles and some thoughts about how I think they relate to my being an artist.

Design Principle #1: The Primacy of Self-Discovery

Learning happens best with emotion, challenge and the requisite support. People discover their abilities, values, "grand passions," and responsibilities in situations that offer adventure and the unexpected. They must have tasks that require perseverance, fitness, craftsmanship, imagination, self-discipline and significant achievement. A primary job of the educator is to help students overcome their fear and discover they have more in them than they think.

Self-Discovery as a Artist

I’ve spent the last 2 days thinking about what to say about this in relationship to making art because for me this principle basically captures so perfectly what being an artist is all about. There isn’t much more to say. Discovering who I am and pushing myself into the unknown - yes. Much of it is about acknowledging the fear of creating and then just going on and doing it anyway.

I think having friends, mentors and a community is tremendously valuable for exactly what is written above - "discover they have more in them than they think". Yet I also think it is my responsibility to learn to overcome the fear on my own also. To push myself into something new and unexpected. Relying on others to always do the pushing doesn’t work for me. I think taking that responsibility for myself is extremely enriching and it’s where my best art comes from.

Moving Update

I have new carpet! I’m more than half done moving my furniture back in place and getting things ready for the house to go on the market on Tuesday, June 3rd. Lots of cleaning, minor repairs, last minute touchups, the last of the yard work: it’ll be a busy weekend and I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. I’m so excited!

The house looks fabulous. The yard looks awesome. My kids say our house is starting to look like a model home so we are headed in the right direction. And best of all I have 2 potential buyers chomping at the bit to see the house.

By sunday evening I hope to be back in my studio making art. Keeping the house clean for showings seems like a piece of cake compared to what it took to get this place in shape.

Structures #25 - Moving Sale

Structures #25 is one of the first smaller pieces I made in the Structures series. When I looked up the date to put in this post I realized I made it 5 years ago. Somehow it doesn’t feel that long. This piece is one I still love. It doesn’t have as much of the cringe factor (I love that phrase Stacey) as some of my older work. It’s originally priced at $175. With my moving sale it is $105 (until June 15).

If you are interested in purchasing Structures #25, or any of my available artwork please email me.

Detail of Structures #25:

Today I cleaned out my studio in preparation for new carpet on Wednesday. Moving all of my fabric and tables and supplies out of this room took quite a while.

Then came the fun. I ripped out the carpet myself, with help from my son and cats. Six years ago when I got my kids their first cats my daughter picked out a declawed cat from the animal shelter. I never declaw my cats so this was a new thing for me. Unfortunately, Dorothy had very bad litter box manners. As in, she preferred my studio floor to the litter box.

I read later this is a very common behavior for declawed cats and it’s not surprising her previous owners gave her away. Sadly, this cat disappeared one night after about 7 months at my house. My daughter was crushed. I can’t say I was quite as sad. My daughters current cat has claws and doesn’t have this feature - yay.

I am sealing the cement floor so the odor will finally go away. This little issue in my studio hasn’t been much fun the last 6 years. I dumped huge amounts of Natures Miracle on the carpet and it wasn’t noticeable most of the time, just the hot humid days, which we don’t have very often in Colorado. Now it’s time to seal the cement so the problem is gone for good.

 
With no studio to work in for the next few days I will be completely focused on house stuff. The painting is done. This week is carpet and final landscaping and home repair details. One more week and the house will be on the market.

Markings #12    ©2007    44"x 32"

Giving

One of the things we talked about in Christine Kane’s E-seminar in January was what she termed expansive giving. Sharing our resources because we are inspired to do so. It goes beyond donating money to charity and for some it’s related to tithing. Many that believe in the Law of Attraction have a bunch of rules about what constitutes this type of giving back to the universe.

I’ve always donated some portion of my income to charity each year but it’s never been a huge amount. When I made the decision to rearrange my life to make a living from my art I decided to build in the giving up front so it’s a part of my business.

At the end of each month I work through my art business finances and give 10% of my gross income to others. I’ve decided I don’t have any rules about what this might mean. Some months I’ve given the money to charities that support causes I believe in. Some months I’ve given the money to people that have helped me or inspired me. Some months I imagine I might buy something to support an artist or small business owner and then give the item to someone else. I can imagine all sorts of ways of giving back to my community and the universe without feeling trapped by someone else’s rules.

It’s been very fun the last few months to sit and think about where I want to give my money. And I’m thrilled to say that every month I’ve had at least of bit of income so I can give.

This month I sent a check to FINCA, an organization that provides financial services to the world’s lowest-income entrepreneurs so they can create jobs, build assets and improve their standard of living.

Courage

In many ways the point of expansive giving is about opening up and trusting that the universe always provides. That there will always be enough. It takes courage to not hold on to it all too tightly.

I know when I first make the big leap and quit my job I’ll be living a different standard of living. From software engineer to artist just starting down the road to being self-supporting. When I first thought about it I was pretty scared. Then Christine introduced the idea of giving away 10% of our income I thought "no way, I’ll barely have enough to live on". Those thoughts are about fear.

So I made the decision in January to commit a full 10% of my gross income to giving, sharing and donating. I don’t want to live my life being afraid. Courage is my word of the year and this is part of that. Trust and love are a lot more fulfilling than fear.

Moving Progress

I’ve had painters at my house all week painting inside and out. Everything inside has been draped in plastic for a few days as they were spraying the walls (I have an 18 foot high ceiling). So just like last week not much art is going on at my house. I’m out of the house all day and just home at night to sleep in beds in the middle of the room. My son thinks it feels like a haunted house in here with all the plastic.

This long weekend, it’s memorial day weekend here in the US, the unofficial start of summer. It isn’t going to be much of a holiday for my family. I’ll be working on small house and landscaping projects all weekend with the help of my kids.

We’re in the home stretch. I’ve now got a real estate sign in my yard that says "Coming Soon" with the goal of having that switch to "For Sale" the first week in June.

Markings #12 - Moving Sale

As I mentioned in my post yesterday, all of my artwork is for sale. The above piece is one of those pieces. It’s full retail price is $2500 and through June 15th it’s available for $1500.

For those curious about my pricing, it’s roughly $230-$260 per square foot based on the year it was made. I round up or down to reach an even number. If you are interested in purchasing Markings #12, or any of my available work please email me.

Structures #90, Structures #86, Structures #85
Structures #87, Structures #88, Structures #81
Structures #89, Structures #91, Structures #82

The Convergence of Two Events

One: To protect my artwork during painting and other remodeling activities I have all of it laid on a couple of tables in my basement covered in blankets. No dust or paint will get on it.

When the home repair work is done I’ll select a couple of pieces and hang them on the wall during the time the house is on the market. The rest of the artwork will be rolled up and stored until I move.

Two: One of the first major projects I plan to tackle, after I move and get settled, will be to finish the small book I started with images of my first solo show 2 years ago. I’m going to expand the book to cover the early pieces in my Structures series and add some of my writing.

To publish this book (self published) is going to require a pretty big chunk of start up money.

The Result

Thinking about all the art that needs to be moved and thinking about all of the money I will need to publish my book the obvious solution to ease both problems is to have a moving sale.

Between now and June 15th all of my work is 40% off. If there is a piece you have been wanting now might be the perfect time to buy it.

For example the work above is originally priced at $250 each. With this sale they are $150 a piece. [note: Structures #85 and #88 shown above are not currently available].

If you are interested in purchasing any of my available work please email me for availability and prices.

Nature Abhors a Vacuum

Recently someone mentioned that they had a theory that when you clean stuff out of your life it creates a vacuum which will then suck stuff back in to fill the empty space.

I think it’s an interesting question as to what happens in our lives when we make some space. Be it time or physical stuff or even emotional crap. Do we just junk up the new space with the same old crap?

It’s certainly our nature to keep doing the same thing we’ve always done. I think if we live unconsciously within a short matter of time we just go back to old patterns and fill up our lives and homes and space with the same stuff.

Changing Habits

In the past 9 months I’ve gotten rid of close to 1/2 of my possessions and I’ve said no to a huge number of things - including some relationships that were not positive for me. I can see the tendency to just do the same thing as before - it’s easy - it’s well known - these are my habits.

I’ve been putting a lot of intention into not doing that. It’s uncomfortable at first - to have all that space - shelves and rooms that aren’t cluttered - spending only quality time with friends that support me - slowing down - cherishing the space.

It’s a big question - what do we do when we decide not to do the habitual thing?

There’s a lot of things that can rattle around in all that space. I’ve found that by just sitting with it and letting it be that I learn to grow comfortable with it. It was a challenge at first and I’m getting better at it each day.

I love my open uncluttered house, life and all the extra time I have. So I’m doing everything I can to stay aware of how wonderful it is so I don’t clutter it up again.

Home Repair Report

My hardwood floors are done. Now I’m having my house painted, inside and out. Moving things off the hardwood floor was a lot of work. Moving everything away from every wall so it can be painted. That’s really big work.

The result is there will unlikely be pictures on my blog over the next few weeks as I’m in the home stretch for getting the house on the market. My goal - June 3rd.

The Studio

My hardwood floors are done and after 8 hours of wiping up dust off of everything I’m ready to head back to my studio. At least until I can get the inside painting started.

I’ve been working on adding the surface stitching to Structures #72, which is bunched up under the back sewing machine.

In January I added a second large work table to my studio. My sewing machine, a pfaff 1475, nestles down into the these tables and gives me a large 4 foot by 8 foot surface to work on. It’s a wonderful setup that helps facilitate creating my textile paintings with ease.

I wanted a second table so I could use 1 table for surface stitching and the other table for constructing the compositions. These two activities require different creative thinking on my part and different sewing machine set up. Having 2 machines and 2 tables would allow me to switch between activities quicker and with less interuption.

Open Space

As soon as I got the new table set up my productivity in the studio crashed. I kept trying to tell myself I loved having the 2 tables but it wasn’t working. My studio felt cramped and crowded. I’m used to having lots of open space. It’s interesting how much the energy shifted by adding more furniture.

I’ve used the second table only for a few hours, always going back to my original table to do sewing. A few months after completing the new table, I decided to move into a smaller house, where there will be no way the second table will fit.

My original thought was to store the new table until I can move into my dream studio (slated for 6 years from now when my kids have all left home and I will move again). I still think having 2 tables is an excellent idea. I just need more space to do it.

For Sale

Then I got real and recognized I won’t have room to store the table top and all the bookshelves in my new smaller home. So the second table is for sale. I obviously can’t ship it but if you live in the denver area and are interested let me know. I’m asking $200 for the table (I paid $180 for the bookshelves and table top and $175 for the labor to build the shelf that holds the sewing machine).

It is custom fit for a pfaff1475 but can be modified to fit many other machines. Recognizing that I probably don’t need all 3 of my pfaff1475s for the next few year, I will sell one of my pfaffs for $700 to the purchaser of the table if desired. I’m selling the one I bought last year for $740 then paid $100+ to have it serviced. I’ve used it very little since purchasing it so it’s in excellent shape.

If you are interested please send me an email or leave a comment below. The table top is not fastened to the bookshelves so it is (relatively) easy to move. It’s definitely heavy.

I’m going to list it on craigslist in a few days if none of my readers are interested.

This is my kitchen as of 9am this morning. The stove is in the living room. In it’s place is a whole bunch of sawdust. Refinishing hardwood floors is quite the process.

This is the stairway down to my studio. Although you can’t really tell, that is plastic at the bottom of the stairs. Huge hopes that no dust gets into the studio during the 3 day refinishing process.

As a result there is no art making going on at my house. There isn’t much of anything going on at my house as the polyurethane doesn’t smell so good. So I’m headed to a hotel for the next day or 2. Thanks to priceline and their name-your-own-price feature I’m staying at a super nice hotel for a super low rate - yay!

The answer this week to the question: when do you have time for fun and relaxation? Right Now.

Looking forward to having absolutely nothing I feel I must do the next few nights. Great time to recharge my batteries. The next few weeks, finishing up my house so I can get on the market, are going to be busy.

Shaded Walk    ©2007 Stephen Carl
Reprinted with permission from the artist

Artist Breakthrough Program

The last 4 weeks I’ve been participating in the Alyson Stanfield’s online Artist Breakthrough Program.

Today is the last day, the last phone call. Time to evaluate how things went.

So to start here are the goals I stated for the month:

1. I work 5 or more hours a week in my studio making art.
2. I complete the rewrite of my website and blog and go live with them by May 12, 2008.
3. I update my resume to include jurors for all juried shows.
4. I create a complete resume for my personal use with every show in my career listed. This list also includes a list of which pieces were included in each of these shows.
5. I design a portfolio package to send to galleries (the package does not have to be complete but I identify all the parts and the format of the package)
6. I start a list of potential galleries to contact for representation. The list has 30 or more galleries listed.

In addition to the above, I was also working on getting my house ready to put on the market. Cleaning, packing, hiring contractors, yard work, etc.

How Did I do?

1. I worked in my studio 19 hours over the 4 weeks - very close to the my original goal.
2. Nope - the website is coming along nicely but it needs more work.
3. Didn’t even start
4. Didn’t even start
5. Didn’t even start
6. I have between 15-20 galleries on my list with contact info.

In addition I got a lot done on prepping my house. This weekend I completed the last of the decluttering, and have done a bunch of packing, cleaning and yardwork. I’m almost done getting contractors lined up to do the big stuff (paint, carpet, refinish hardwood, etc). This was a larger job than anticipated, getting estimates, rescheduling, etc, etc. I’m certainly learning a lot about how to deal with these guys (number one tip - don’t have expectations about getting anything done soon).

How Do I Feel About It?

I’m super happy with how things went. I probably stayed focused about 70-80% of the time I had available to "do stuff", which is a lot more than normal. Although I didn’t complete everything on my original list I didn’t really think I’d get it all done so that’s fine (more on this later).

I knew I’d be super busy, not just because of all I had going but also because my kids were with me almost the entire month since I didn’t get to see while they were in Europe for 3 months. Not every weekend was as crazy as the one I outlined in this post, but we were still busy. Staying this focused for a sustained period of time, with my kids at home, was probably a first so I’m very happy about that.

I got some really great ideas from other participants in the program for my website so I have more work to do than originally planned. I’m writing a custom plugin for wordpress to display my artwork images, as I couldn’t find anything out there that did what I wanted. I haven’t written code in a while so I’m excited.

What Did I Learn?

I set my goals higher than was realistic. I did this to keep myself motivated. But what I found as the weeks went on is that I wasn’t taking the goals quite seriously enough. I’d list 6 or 7 things to do in a day and only have time for 4 or maybe 5. So I set myself up from the start to not finish everything.

I think this is how I normally operate. It’s safe - because I know I never get everything done I fall back on that as the excuse every time to not do stuff. Eventually I start to think I don’t really need to finish things.

This month has shown me this is maybe not the most optimal way of doing stuff. I love my Getting Things Done project and tasks lists (from David Allen’s Book) as they are great at capturing the big picture. Yet this month I’ve found I need to get more specific, and more realistic, about what I am doing TODAY.

So in addition to my big lists, each morning I started to pick at most 3 things todo. The super most important things that absolutely have to get done. And I put my focus on getting those things done. At the end of the day it’s awesome to say I’ve completed them all.

Learning this new way of approaching my work was the best thing I got out of this class. Taking the time to think about how I get things done and to try some different approaches.

Where Does Blogging Fit In?

Obviously I stopped blogging about 1/2 way through the program. I’d find myself with an hour of time to work on my website or to write a blog post and more often than not I’d blog. So I decided to drop the goal to write and spent my free computer time on my website.

I don’t intend on making this a habit. Living my life at a pace where I don’t have time to blog is not okay with me. I love writing and I find it a great way to process information about my art and myself. So something else is going to have to give because I’m going to continue to blog 2 or 3 times a week throughout the process of selling my house.

One fun thing about this class was watching other artists work on their goals. Steve Carl (photographer - the above image is his work) had a goal of starting a blog and it’s been fun watching him and remembering back to when I started mine 3 years ago. I think he’s off to a great start. You can check it out here: Works by Steve Carl

What’s Next?

The other important thing I feel I learned is that trying to do 3 things at once (make art, build a website and get a house ready to put on the market) is too much. I think if I would have focused on just 1 thing at a time in the end I would have gotten more done.

Time to focus on the house and get it on the market. I’ll have a few moments here and there to do some art/art business work but at least 2 of the 3 must do items on my list each day are going to be house related. While I’m not excited about losing momentum on the website I think in the end this is the best choice. I’ve been feeling a bit too scattered the last few days not really making huge headway on any one thing.