I Now Have a Studio

Well, there's something to be said for using what you have.  And I now have an art studio.

And guess what?  I love it.

It's my dining room.  I have been enjoying working in mixed media more and more - and getting better at it, with each project.  So, on a whim, I emptied one of my china cabinets of all its china, and filled it with (some of) my art supplies.

(Click on any picture to see a larger view of it...)

 This is what it looks like when things are all in their place, and the door shut...

 ...a little bit of a clearer view...

 ...top shelf...with its brushes, watercolor pencils, micron ink pens, and General's Sketch and Wash pencils.  Were you to peek in that oak antique drawer, you'd find an unbelievable amount of watercolor cards, even snippets of fabric and antique papers, gesso's, matte medium, washi tapes, various glues...

 ...top and middle shelves.  That middle shelf has my small canvases, my handmade watercolor paper journal, a stack of large stamps, my acrylics, and a small chest of glitters, beads, and antique buttons, all in glass jars, inside the trunk.

...the bottom shelf has a few of my art books, and miscellaneous stuff.

I haven't even taken any pictures of the drawers I emptied of their cloth napkins.  They are now full of gauche paints, watercolor tube paints, acrylic tube paints, and inks in various colors.  I also keep my heat gun, protractors, rulers, and some of my decorative papers in those drawers.

The plan is, once we graduate our youngest from our home school, I will get two whole shelves in our dining room closet back!  Those I will stockpile with the rest of my stuff...the stuff that still waits for a home.

Until I have a whole room I can dedicate to my writing/photography/blogging/Photoshop/painting/sewing/and all my books, I am happy with my dining room table, which is religiously protected with waxed paper every time I sit down to paint.  I also have a plastic tablecloth I am going to begin to use, in order that the entire table is protected...since it is oak.  Ahem.

And people...my friends...creativity is a messy state of being.  My penchant for mis-en-place and my drive to create can seem to be at odds, but I know me.  Until I have an art studio in a separate room, my mis-en-place will win out every time.

If for no other reason than I love how all those art supplies look when they are nicely put away...

 Yes...please do take note of the adorable baby to the right...sigh...I adore that child (my grandson).

 

Messy, messy.  And this is after I cleaned up half of the mess.  I cleaned up half of it before I thought to snap a picture of the chaos.  I almost put the mess all back out, just to get a true picture of it...but...yeah...mis-en-place.  It is ingrained in me, and it wins almost every battle.  Unless I'm very, very ill or my back is out.  Then I (nicely) ask everyone else to mis-en-place for me.

   I almost mixed up my coffee cup with my paint-water...twice.  Twice, I nearly drunk paint water.  Thankfully those brushes sticking up were a huge deterrent.  My hand would sort of go, "Oops..." and move to the coffee cup.

 This is a little mixed-media tag book I've been working on.  The tiny sketch is by my son-in-law, Jonathan Howe, who sells thousand-dollar pieces of art.  But I am not ashamed of my little mixed media labors of love...

 ...Jonathan sketched some mercury glass balls I have hanging from my dining room chandelier, and Hannah did the hand-coloring...

...and I put it all together, to make a tag-sized page in a book I've made for a friend.

There's a peek into my "art studio".  I've learned something else in my old age (I am a grandmother, remember!  I'm so stinking proud of that fact...) and it is this:  when a woman tries to be "prophetic", she messes up every time.  Trying to be a prophetic person will make you strange.  God has gifted me with a prophetic inclination...I simply live my life...and it turns out to be prophetic, many times.

Right now, God has me cultivating an arts skill set.

So I chase down joy, I follow the delights of my heart, and there ends up being something of destiny in it, even if that destiny is simply to inspire others to do what I do and then they do it much better.

I love it when that happens.  In fact, I'm all about that.

So go make something.