A Monkey of a Year

While January 1st marks the first day of the year for the U.S., China's New Year falls on the day of the first new moon, occuring between January 21st and February 20th. The Chinese New Year for 2016 begins today, February 8th, and lasts until January 27, 2017.

Among the traditions tied to China's turn of the year is their zodiac, which rotates annually among 12 animals. Legend has it that each of these animals answered the Buddha's invitation to meet for a race. The order assigned to a cycle of twelve years coincides with the order in which each animal finished in this mythical contest.

Based on the Chinese zodiac, 2016 marks the Year of the Monkey, the ninth in this succession of 12 creatures. Characterized by playfulness, creativity, and a bit of mischief, monkey years portend especially good fortune for entrepreneurs, and in general bring with them change and the unexpected.

Change has indeed graced the SandStorming shop in the form of a new line of austere, Scandinavian style prints.

Augmenting these minimalist items is a Year of the Monkey poster, the first of several monkey-themed products. SandStorming monkey year creations all revisit the retro appeal of sock monkey toys, which originated in Rockford Illinois, USA, from a pattern designed for use with Rockford Red Heel socks.

As the year progresses, keep an eye out for this and other Year of the (Sock) Monkey designs and, in the spirit of the Chinese New Year, happy monkey business!

Getting a Foothold in Design

Pursuing the world of design inspires me to:

Contemplate.

Innovate.

Laugh.

Yes; laugh. And when a design leads me to laughter, I know I've stumbled upon the gold standard in creative discovery.

I'm no stranger to re-defining and re-re-defining -- and then laughing! -- at the struggle to get it right: the right color, the right approach, the right feel. It all seems so personal and yet, countless other designers and innovators, creatives, all, persevere to get it right, too.

I came across an article yesterday about one such bold designer from Japan, and felt inspired to share that piece, here.

Why?

Perhaps the article itself best explains its ability to beg an audience with these tantalizing words linking feet and food, "Design inspired by nature (or cheese, in this case) is intriguing..."

If duly intrigued, follow the photo link to read on:

And if that tidbit leaves you hungry for more, here's another brief but useful feet-ure article on the same topic:

For further intrigue, take a moment to stop by the shop and see what's afoot among SandStorming's artistic concepts for 2016:

Storms Made of Sand

There's a story about sand here, and I partly have my high school freshman year English teacher to thank for that. 

This inspiring instructor provided the impetus for what became my long ago established pen name, Sand Storm, the origin for the name of my Etsy shop and this blog.

These days, no one uses pen names. The prevalence of social media renders the practice obsolete, since it obscures rather than assigns credit to its author, and social media thrives more on revelation than obfuscation.

What does SandStorming, and its root, Sand Storm mean? When I first coined the name, I referred to it as a metaphor, one that involved grains of sand (words and pictures) swirling about my mental landscape, creating the thoughts that culminated in a poem, artwork, or a song. The fact that it contained a form of my name iced the cake.

Destination Inspiration

As I entered the world of social media with the masses, I noticed that mine was not, er, the only storm churning up sand. My solution? One that would possibly have made my former English teacher proud: I created a gerund from the word and from there, forged ahead. Gerund, you say? Yes; the "Storm" half of the term with "-ing" tacked to the end of it, smooshed together with "Sand" in front, "smooshed " being the less technical but appropriately virtual-space sort of term. It seemed to make sense, in a logical progression sort of way. 

Since my high school days, the military has coined SandStorming for its desert-worthy implications. My sand is more the beach variety, or maybe an Arizona landscape on a quiet moonlit evening. Such is the variety of sands swirling in my own mental space and arriving often thereafter on paper.

Walking Crow Logo Tee from the SandStorming Shop

What has felt most remarkable to me is that, after many years of desert, these sands seem drenched in sea again--ebb and flow and mist and mystery--the kind of mystery that accompanies the creative process. 

Sometimes the sense of innocence and impression leads me to joke that, when I'm drawing, I'm transported back to my childhood once again. But really, I'm only half joking. And what about that shop mascot, the crow? How does he link to sands and storms and pen names? 

That is a story for another time. 

Of Art and Music

A friend made this comparison, recently: For the most part, we make music to play it for or even with others. When we create art, it is typically a solitary experience.

But are these two creative avenues so different, or are they more alike than this observation suggests?

When I'm drawing, I sometimes notice several things happening internally. For one, I notice my thoughts regarding the particular image at hand (pardon the pun). A drawing may evoke a memory or an interest, such as the desire to visit a place I've not yet seen. Or a random song might come to mind and, often, I find myself humming or softly singing as I draw.

Rocky Mountain Rails at Sunset

Often, I experience an inward turning, toward a calm space, a place of contentment and balance. Access to that space does not seem limited to the creation of the visual arts, however; rather, it is shared across each art form, no matter how it is finally expressed. 

Granted, performing a song in public appears in opposition to creating a piece of visual art. Yet I notice that the creativity in the performance itself feels much the same as when I am drawing. Further, songs can induce a picture in my mind, which can later become a drawing on a page. Thus, for me, songs as art, whether I am writing or performing them, begin in the same solitary secret place, even when they culminate in collaboration. In that respect, a song can be an invitation to share that space for a time, to complete the creative process.  

What remains the same for both is that each can be shared again and again. A song can be played and replayed, and a work of visual art can be revisited, too. And, given each is seen with fresh ears/eyes, the joy they evoke can be renewed beyond their creation. 

Returning

Sometimes it helps to go away from a place for a while to really appreciate it. 

In a perfect world, such going away would not be necessary. We'd see things afresh without having to take a vacation from this too-embedded knowledge of them. But the human condition tends to blind us sometimes, dulling our senses, pulling a misty veil across our eyes, so that things we see daily are seen only through a glass, darkly. We lose the ability to notice nuance, to perceive change, to discover that which remains alive and turning before our jaded eyes. 

Such is the feeling I get when returning home, to Maryland, or what is called "the DC metro area." It's a bustling place, frantic with traffic and high energy, or perhaps its just nail-biting nervousness that makes the place seem so electric. There is a sense of duplicity that accompanies a town rife with political deceit that often overshadows its foundation of democracy. Yet, even though the former often stifles the latter, whenever I return to my roots, I can still hear the steady heartbeat of the just and true, however faint. 

In the same way that this returning can open one's eyes, a fresh look at almost anything -- one's occupation, one's surroundings, one's life -- can create an awareness of what is worthwhile, and what is not; what enriches the soul as opposed to that which drains it. If that fresh look is not forthcoming in the moment, then taking a break from the day-to-day, such as a visit to the beach, can offer this same clarifying space from the frenzy that tends to dominate my life. 

Sand and See

I'd like to think that I can clear such a space internally, but more often than not, the external world dictates that sense of peace so that, usually, it takes removing myself from the noise to get down to serious introspection. If I carry that noise with me to the drawing table, I find the same effect: that is, I may need to walk away several times from a drawing before completing it. Not always -- but sometimes. 

I've come to appreciate both sides of this same coin. The important part is listening: What direction is this piece taking? Has it collided with a wall at the moment? Is it time to step away, clear my head, and look at it another day with fresh eyes? It's not how it happens so much, but rather the integrity of its coming about: I can see it through best by listening to the ebb and flow of this art; and so, too, of this life. 

Something Serendipitous

More often than not, for me, something artful comes from a completely unexpected place. 

Much as I'd like to think that I can plan each piece, barely any work of art that suits me on completion comes out part and parcel from any sort of immediately distinct vision. It's true that, generally, I have an idea at the outset--either a complete scene, or most of it--but where it goes from there is anyone's guess as much as it is my own. 

Floating Blossoms

For instance, I'll start by creating some sort of color wash, but then, something else often takes shape that I couldn't predict. Perhaps a tiny sail boat appears on a still ocean-view, or a house crops up among daisies. 

One of my more recent works started out as a blue wash which could have morphed into anything from a watery scene to a landscape. It sat for at least a week while I tended to the daily grind. At best, I'd give it a quick glance, but for more than a few days I'd had no time to sit quietly before it to see what belonged in that space. At last, though, up cropped a layer of cherry blossom petals atop a very still pond. 

Today's creation started as a colorful pastel that I decided to turn monochromatic once I'd scanned it. I'd started with an image set in the daytime; but when I looked at it onscreen, the sturdy lighthouse at the center seemed to tell me that this was really an evening study, and that it needed some light piercing the darkness. 

So I returned the piece literally to the drawing board, and swept a swath of light from the lighthouse peak out across the early morning sky. I re-scanned and swapped the image to monochrome once again, adjusted the photo curves to darken specific areas of the scene and, at last, the resulting image felt right to me. 

My favorite artistic surprise happened a few months ago, starting with a piece of sandpaper. Not just any sandpaper, but the kind made for drawing with pastels. Yes; they actually make sandpaper on which you draw--in different weights no less. I'd not had any experience with this sort of paper though and, silly me, instead of using it to see how it went, I decided to use it to rough up some too-smooth art stock so I could use that with pastels. It seemed like a practical idea at the time, anyway. 

With purpose, I took the cream colored sandpaper and rubbed it on the too-slick black drawing paper and voila! I mean, OOPS! The black paper was not sanded enough, and now the sandpaper had gray blotches on it. 

Reach

When I looked at the sandpaper more closely, however, I began to see a man's arm reaching in from the left side of the paper. Maybe there's a picture here, already, I thought. I noticed a larger blotch going nearly top to bottom on the right side, but I couldn't make out anything, so I put the paper on a music stand (i.e., creative props are interchangeable), and decided I'd have a look every once in a while to see what I might eventually see. 

After several weeks, the last few of which I'd not looked at the sandpaper for about a week or so, I finally saw the entire drawing. It simply needed me to put in some outlines to finish it, adding a bit more blotching to finish the man's coat and add that last far-left fold of the woman's dress. Then I had to add the man's hand, which for some unforeseen reason seemed to take me nearly as long as it might to begin the whole thing from scratch, and that made me laugh. I could not figure out how that should look, other than subtle, just as the woman's hand is subtle. 

In all, much of what appears as shading was already there from the sanding event; I just had to see it and outline it, adding a few strokes and a bit more rendering to complete the scene. I am especially fond of its mystery: The woman's right arm looks as if it's extended upward, for example. 

These sorts of serendipity pieces are my favorites. It seems there is a sheer wisdom in the flow of not knowing in art as well as in life--of seeing what at first seems obscured, but suddenly, at just the right moment, is absolutely unmistakable to the creative eye. 

Losing It and Finding It, or Thoughts on The Muse

Some folks who don't choose to dabble in the arts imagine that a painting or a song happens at will. Truthfully, it sort of does and it sort of doesn't. In fact, the arts imitate life: there's an initial intention, and then whatever comes after is potluck. 

I've grown to love this come-what-may fact of creativity. Having had a long business career that's often about executing as close to plan as possible, the joy of discovery that comes free of expectations eclipses the staleness of repetitive process.

Last night, for example, I started with a conceptual piece--the third in a series--with the intent of rendering a vision of sea meeting sky. What I expected to take shape from each stroke and smudge of pastel, however, did not. Five seconds from making a paper basketball and scoring a free throw in lieu of a masterpiece, I stopped short. 

Deep as the Ocean

As I looked once more at the darkly smudged page highlighted from one angle with streams of light, I realized something different emerging: not a different image altogether, but rather a backdrop for something even more visually dramatic.

I propped the piece against the curve of the task lamp, doused the light, and went upstairs. I knew I needed to break away from it and see it in new light, with fresh eyes.

The next afternoon I returned to look at the pastel rendering and sure enough, I could see precisely what to do. Just a bit of color here, and some there, and suddenly this directionless drawing evoked a sense of both mystery and whimsy, completely unforeseen the day before. 

The understanding it took to complete the effort came only through the space given for something to flourish. And flourish it did. The original image set the stage one day for the bright yet spare elements I added the next. 

With a little patience on my part, a drawing that seemed lifeless at first gained its own voice, that je ne sais quoi of artistic expression. 

I couldn't have planned it better.