In terms of being able to draw and the time it takes I struck gold by being two days holiday from work quite unexpectedly. This prompted me begin to plan my free time the night before and decided it would be a good idea to review the ideas dragnet that is a multitude of sketchbooks and loose sheets with drawings and records of undeveloped and unrealised ideas on them. Through circumstance and lack of space I was forced for several years to work specifically from sketchbooks – the ultimate in a portable studio. The downside to this was although I was always recording a large volume of ideas almost none of them cam to any fruition. It also made me lazy in a way as I knew I was limited and in the mindset that my work should be operating on a larger level. This of course is ridiculous as any resourceful artist would of just made do and used the resources available to its further point. I however did not.
This has almost become a blessing in disguise of sorts as I now have a relatively large bank of work that is yet to be explored, picked from, developed and integrated into more meaningful pieces that I am now in a position to make. The issue of scale has also influenced my drawings also because I like to work to a small scale now (although larger pieces are in the pipeline), I find it helps to keep me fresh and interested in everything I do. Leaving aside my lifelong passion for the visual arts it is still important for anyone practicing their craft to remain engaged and willing to go through the rigour of producing work at the avant grade of their respective practice – if you understand what I mean?
Anyway, the reviewing of older work and ideas can definitely be fruitful and would advise anyone to do it from time to time. This allows parts of the portfolio to remain firmly in the past – whilst learning from those parts and other parts to be pulled into the present to be used to developed.
This will almost sound pretentious beyond measure but how exciting is it to be able to explore any idea that enters ones mind, it is akin in my books to the dreamlike power of flight – creative flying if you will.
