London Calling - Filling the Well at their Wedding

In the month of May, we've had so many public holidays here in London that the whole month seemed to run into one. For me it they were like a Godsend because the well of my creativity had grown desperately dry. I really welcomed the chance to see our great city full of visitors.

When visitors come here on holiday they bring mess, noise and inconvenience but they also bring fresh perspectives, laughter, excitement and weird questions like 'Can you tell me where Sherlock Holmes lived,' even though Sherlock Holmes was a fictional character invented by Arthur Conan Doyle.

The wedding of Prince William to Katherine Middleton was a thrilling occasion - but for me, the important thing was that I got out there. If I had stood in the pouring rain to watch the bride go by in her gold and glass coach, it would have been just as good for my writing as if the weather were glorious.

I love the way that creativity has a voice in good times and in bad, whether we are busy empathising with other poor souls, perhaps homeless after a cyclone or a flood, or whether today, our own worries and troubles threaten to overwhelm us. It makes no odds - craft a word, redraft a line, snip a sentence here and there. Suddenly nothing else matters.

Jennifer Pittam is a winner of Coast to Coast writing competition and is working on her second novel.

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Sculpting
a Life:
Susan Gallacher-Turner’s turn
in the Pacific Northwest.






Can you live a creative life and make a living? Yes. You can.

“Developing your lifestyle as an art form puts an element of fun and style into living your life,” says Dave. “For us the internal goals of being happy and healthy and having good family life have been our primary drivers.”

Dave and Janice Weitzer have made a living and lived a creative life for over 40 years. They’ve raised 3 children and run several successful businesses: a bamboo farm, a massage therapy practice, yoga school and a custom woodworking shop.

“If you love something, keep studying it, there’s always more to learn. It keeps you inspired and happy,” says Dave. “So, don’t wait, start some small cottage business, something you like doing, you work when you want to. When you’re your own boss, you can’t get fired.”

As an artist, writer and teacher, I’ve been working at making a living for over a decade, now. But during this difficult economic time, Dave and Janice have been an inspiration for me. They showed me that it’s possible to do what you love, what makes you happy and be successful. As I began to see my life in a new light, with new possibilities, I wanted to share this idea with as many people as possible.

Now you can hear interviews with artists and entrepreneurs like the Weitzers on ‘Voices of Living Creatively’ on the new website at http://voicesoflivingcreatively.web.officelive.com
And it's available on iTunes as well at http://ax.itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/browserRedirect?url=itms%253A%252F%252Fax.itunes.apple.com%252FWebObjects%252FMZStore.woa%252Fwa%252FviewPodcast%253Fid%253D319569665


If you’d like more information about me and my sculptural artwork, visit my website at http://www.susangt.com/ or read my other blog, Susan’s Art & Words at http://sculpturepdx.blogspot.com/ Read more!

Mixing It Up Down Under: Creativity Unblocked

I've always been interested in the subject of creativity and read a lot about it. I don't write much about it at all. Why is that I wonder? I think it is because I leave it up to the experts.

I am reading this post over at Pikaland about creativity blocks. Amy has put together advice from 40 artists on how they deal with the problem. In reading through I realised (again! why do I keep forgetting!?) that we are all experts on ourselves! I am an expert on me! (Actually, I'm glad it's me. I'd hate it if someone else had got the job of being an expert on me.)

I haven't got through the 40 pieces of advice yet, and I don't know if I'm just going to repeat something that is already there, but I thought I'd write about my technique I have to break through creative blocks.


When I can't begin or when I can't progress it is usually my inner perfectionist raising her ugly-but-well-maintained head. I have become too precious about the project, sometimes it is just an idea but already I see it as sooooo wonderful that I could not possibly do it justice. I become blocked. I can't do a thing. My inner procrastinator (actually, it is rarely 'inner' - it is usually my outer coating!) is remarkably skilled at getting me to the computer to spend hours looking at the work others are NOT blocked doing. Or to the bookshop where I'm sure there MUST be a book that tells me exactly what to do. (There never is.) I waste so much time that I have had to come up with a technique to un-precious-ise my idea.


My solution is volume. Instead of beginning the one perfect work, I begin 7. Or 52. Or 3 if I'm being a bit lazy. How can you be precious about 7 paintings!? Well, you can, but to a much lesser extent. I can even convince myself sometimes that it is OK to have, say 2 of those as just pure experimentation. As I progress on my array of works, some naturally slip into the 'later' basket and others I become obsessed with, working at them until they are done. Ahh. Now that is what I was after all along - a little obsession to drag me to the canvas again and again.


If this technique doesn't work I know why. Again it has to do with volume. I NEED a quantity of art materials waiting in my studio. If I'm using up my last canvases, or the 2nd last sheet of my favourite paper, I can't work. I need an abundance waiting on my shelves. This too is a preciousness. If it is the last squeeze of paint from the tube, then I must do it justice, I can't waste it by making a mistake. I find that with a draw of paint tubes I can 'waste' any quantity of paint. And of course it has not been 'wasted' but has gone into something I loved making.


So I go shopping. When I prioritise I often have trouble putting studio time up high on my list of things to do, but I don't allow myself the sabotage of stopping myself from spending money on my supplies. I know from grim experience that there will be no point in putting studio time anywhere on my list if I'm not well supplied.

Now, one of the reasons I'm mentioning this here is purely selfish. I wanted to remind myself of this. How is it I keep forgetting?

This post also appears on my personal blog.

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A Creative Blog for Photographers

By Andrea Avari Stevens

Fractal by Wynne Stevens

 

There is a creative call out to photographers from a blog at www.poeticlicensephoto.blogspot.com. Tina Harris, from central Oregon is the host of this blog. Every two weeks Tina chooses a random word and asks photographers to send in their photo interpretation of that word. The blog is fairly new, beginning last July.

The word for this two-week span is 'fear'. Each photo that is submitted has a short writing attached to it explaining the picture. The deadline for this offering ends March 15th. A new word will be chosen at that point. I spent several hours walking today....and although I forgot my camera....I had great fun looking for creative interpretations of the word 'fear'. Check out Tina's blog and new word next week and see if the concept sparks your creativity in new ways.

Andrea's website is www.andreaavari.com

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The Wholeness of Light and Dark

By Andrea Avari Stevens, Ph.D.

After reading an inspiring article about Peter Kater in Science of Mind magazine by Claudia Abbott, I wanted to share some of his thoughts on creativity. Peter has been nominated for 5 Grammy Awards, written musical scores for a number of documentaries, and his Healing Series of music is used in the healing and therapeutic arts.

No stranger to life’s ups and downs, Peter Kater was raised by a single mother who died when he was just eighteen creating an early life of poverty and hunger. Being aware of the interplay of the light and dark in our creative lives, Kater states “….so often we are light chasers, so concerned with creating our lives and moving into light, that we often overlook the importance of the dark.  

What we don’t know and cannot see becomes disturbing. But it is so obvious to biologists and physicists that the darkness is essential. Light and dark can’t exist without each other. We have to have both to create. We have to learn how to integrate darkness and be curious about what is hidden inside. When we imagine a world that works for everyone, we need to explore the pain and integrate it. You cannot sustain a light, bright experience 24/7. Darkness becomes dysfunctional only when it is denied. Looking at our pain, understanding the shadow, integrates the darkness into wholeness. We have to see the value of all life’s experiences. We have emotions for a reason.”

When I was teaching creative thinking at an art college, a few students would be concerned that if their depressive perspective on life were taken away, they would be unable to create. These students were very protective of their anxiety and depression as an integral part of their art. For some, the more positive aspects of life did not generate the depth of emotion that they wanted to touch in their process. Remembering the wholeness of the experiences of our lives means we appreciate both the light and the dark. I think Kater’s words might help bring a balance to the fear of those students who so embraced the dark.

Andrea Avari Stevens is a spiritual coach focusing on the process of awakening.  She will be offering Mindfulness Teleclasses through her website at andreaavari.com.   Andrea is the author of A Hit of Heaven:  a soul's journey through illusion.

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The Art of Creating Divine Compost in Our Lives

Andrea Avari Stevens, Ph.D.

In the wake of welcoming ourselves into the New Year of 2009 we cannot help but notice that a decaying process is taking place. Under normal circumstances this process would seem in ecological balance to the rest of our lives. Death and rebirth are but sides of the same coin. Each is contained within the other. But to those of us willing to pay attention to both our inner process and the outer reflected world, the energy seems to be flowing towards the disintegration of those patterns and structures in a way that challenges us not to grip our minds and hearts in fear.

Normally we try to keep the compost pile out of sight over in a corner. A beautiful process that is sometimes stinky and not pretty in its slimy disintegration is not something we place at center stage. We appreciate the good work of the bacteria and fungi in breaking down the organic materials we supply to our pile, but we give them wide stance to do their important work.

And now the decay is in our faces. If we turn one way, there it is. Twisting our head another way, there it is in another form. Some days it seems as though it is coming from every direction. We can feel overwhelmed by the rate and depth of decay. Or we can embrace it. Just as a compost pile needs to be turned over for aeration in order to encourage the process, so we need to aerate our compost pile of fear with love and gratitude.

Perhaps we have lost money in the stock market, our home mortgage and/or our job is at risk, or we lost money moving into other currencies. Financial institutions are failing and we don’t know where to put our money. Ways of managing money in the past no longer make sense now. Then we turn on the news and see and hear about people from all corners of the world suffering in some way. A subtle kind of anxiety begins to surround us as we realize that the labor pains of this decay are deepening in preparation for rebirth.

What can we do? Remember who we really are. Know that we are Source. It is not that we deserve abundance and creativity; we are that. In our compost pile is the key to a new way of Being for us. If we calm down and appreciate that what is not needed anymore is falling away from us, our strengths for new ways of creating become obvious. When you hold the flower you also hold the compost or there would be no flower.

Be gentle with yourself and others. We are all the same energy of love at the core. Have gratitude. Give what it is that you want to get. Move your energy by giving whether it be a smile or a dollar. Recycle your own energy rather than constrict around the decay. Be that which you would want to see evolve from the decay. Be it now….Do not wait for other signs of love and peace to begin….this moment is waiting for you to choose. Check in with yourself often. Release any self-judgment by drawing it into your heart.

Move your energy by breathing your composted energy in for transformation and exhale compassion and rebirth for yourself and all beings. Step inward in meditation and extend your light of love to yourself and all others. Step out physically and connect with others of like mind for support. Love your compost. Your unique flower is seeded within.


Copyright 2009. Andrea Avari Stevens is the author of “A Hit of Heaven: a soul’s journey through illusion.” She is currently finishing her new book entitled “A Lunatic in Love: creating soulful relationships.” Andrea will be offering Coaching for the Awakening Spirit using the practice of mindfulness awareness through teleclasses on her almost newly designed website (due in February). She can be reached at www.andreaavari.com.

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Southwest Ramblings: Thoughts on Making and Living Art

Lessons in Strange Places

A good many of us are self-taught artists, whether we be in fiber, in painting, in words - whatever. We become immersed in our learning and experimenting, and when we are done we pack up and go back to the rest of our lives.

What about looking into our "regular lives" for the inspiration to learn to increase our artistic abilities? I'm not sure I can really explain what I mean, but I'm going to give it a shot.

Those of you who are regular readers of my blog know that I am in the midst of studying for a major math test to "prove" (according to the Bush administration) that I really can teach algebra. Now some of you might be thinking, math, art, learning how to do math from art? This seems to be a stretch.

But it isn't. I sat for three hours in a internet cafe with a friend doing math problems and understanding some new things about trig, and functions, and matrices, and inverses....all the time thinking "Oh my, I really can do this and understand it!" Years ago I would have laughed if you had told me I could do upper levels of math.

Now to get to this point - being self-taught in pre-calculus and calculus, I told myself I could do it, and I WOULD do it. On the way home from our session (people around us no doubt thought we were nuts, as we were laughing about forgetting to rationalize a denominator), I realized that the strategies I had been using were much like my self-teaching with my fiber and marbling. Dean and I worked to learn how to marble, trying, making mistakes, and learning from them. We weren't afraid to try.

I started doing weavings with my fabric, trial and error, some successful, some not. I kept trying, and I wouldn't let myself be negative about what I was doing. My "regular life" as a teacher constantly trying to improve what happened in the classroom served me well as I tried to take those lessons into my new world of art. Since I learned I could work successfully with marbled fabric, I told myself I could learn math. It was only today that the epiphany of taking from one to learn the other struck me.

Usually we think about learning our art, based on our real life. I discovered I could learn about math through my experiences in art.

Linda Moran is a high school teacher and fiber artist who lives in Tucson, AZ. She is really interested in comments and thoughts on this particular post. You can read her blog Marbled Musings and visit her website, The Art of Fabric. Read more!

Monday Morning Motivators to Slay Your Creative Dragons

By CJ Lyons and Margie Lawson

SWITCHING GEARS: from CJ


Ever feel like your brain is just plain tuckered out? The writing goes stale, nothing you read is pulling you in….heck, even your fav authors aren’t engaging you, much less inspiring you to get back to work.

What to do?

Try taking a break from processing words and switch gears to more visual pursuits.

Grab some paints or crayons and create some art (no one has to see it except you). Or re-cycle those old magazines by cutting out photos and creating a collage. For those more computer savvy, make a video.

Think of your story as you work, use it as your inspiration. Relax. Have fun. After all, it’s not writing, it’s playtime.

You might be surprised by your results! I know I was.

Using a free, fun-filled site called Animoto, designed for cyber-klutzes like me, I created this video Took me maybe ten minutes--and I could "re-mix" it as often as I wanted.

I think it nicely captures the romance, suspense, medical elements and that these books focus on the women characters. But mainly it was fun! If I ever try again, I can do something different to fit my mood or put the emphasis on a different element--I might even try to do one as a brainstorming exercise!

Obviously, it's not professional quality--it's just me, having fun. But it did inspired me to hire Circle of Seven to make a real video in time for WARNING SIGNS' release on January 27th—and now I can't wait to see how the professional version turns out!

Bottom line: Switch gears and return to your writing rejuvenated and refreshed!


As a pediatric ER doctor, CJ Lyons has lived the life she writes about in her cutting edge suspense novels. Her debut, LIFELINES (Berkley, March 2008), became a national bestseller and Publishers Weekly proclaimed it a "breathtakingly fast-paced medical thriller." The second in the series, WARNING SIGNS, is due out January, 2009. Contact her at http://www.cjlyons.net

Margie Lawson -- presenter, psychotherapist, writer -- lives at the top of a Colorado mountain west of Denver. Margie merged her two worlds, psychology and writing, to develop psychologically anchored editing systems and techniques that teach writers how to write page turners. A former college professor, Margie works as a psychotherapist, writes fiction and nonfiction, and presents full day master classes for writers internationally. Go to http://www.margielawson.com for more information.


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Iowa Writing Coach: Got 15 Minutes? Make Something.

I took an online course from Eric Maisel last year. The focus of the course was coaching other writers, but I was so in need of a motivational kick in the pants as a writer/artist that I elected to coach myself while I took the course. For me, the most useful exercise during the twelve-week course was developing the practice of devoting fifteen minutes to a creative project, several times a day -- in and around the other responsibilities I had at the time.

What I learned during this exercise is that even when you're half-mad at your partner because his job means a move you don't want to make, and even when you have work to do to pay the bills that isn't all that engaging at the time, it turns out that if you can devote at least two or three fifteen-minute sessions a day to your own creative projects, you will find the energy you need to move forward.

During this time of relative chaos I was able to make amazing progress on a book proposal about the freelancing life (okay, it got shelved but I plan to reignite the project this winter) and I was able to sketch the sweet view out of our upstairs bathroom window in Ames, Iowa -- a view that I had savored for the five years we lived there. I was so pleased to be able to capture the essence of that view that I forgot to be sad about moving that day.

Fifteen minutes can do wonders. Try it: make something.

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Iowa Writing Coach: Has Mother Nature Caused the Crash?

Could it be that Mother Earth has somehow willed the economic crash? Maybe this ground zero financial disaster is nature’s offering – a golden, just-before-the-tipping-point opportunity for us to align our consumption toward preserving nature more and despoiling her less. We all know that Nature needs fewer plasma screens and more vegetables grown without chemicals, but now maybe we’re going to have to really listen. Maybe she’s asking us to simplify a la the Voluntary Simplicity movement even if it’s not quite voluntary, and embrace the Slow Movement even though we love the Fast Track.

Maybe Creation wants us to reconnect with our creative selves (write a song, draw a picture, dust off the guitar) more often and rely on adrenaline rushes and shiny new toys less often for that sense of being alive.

Okay, maybe it’s naïve to suggest that the earth is metaphysically causing us to base our existence on creativity over material consumption. Still, trusting in the earth’s wisdom to right itself shines a little hope on the situation.

I heard Sandra Steingraber speak last week at the University of Iowa. Steingraber holds a Ph.D. in biology and a master’s in English and is the author of a book of poetry (Post-Diagnosis) and two acclaimed books on the environment (Living Downstream: An Ecologist Looks at Cancer and Having Faith: An Ecologist’s Journey to Motherhood). She told the audience that when she was a graduate student at the University of Michigan in the 1980s, she made a bet with a graduate student in economics on which system would crash first – the economic system or the environment. Each chose his/her own area of study, the economist because of the deregulation going on, and Steingraber because of the lack of teeth in environmental regulations.

They were both wrong, she told us: it turns out the systems are crashing at the same time.

Steingraber went on to explore some of the elements common to both systems. Both are large and complex, with far-reaching causes and effects. (An example in the ecosystem is the proliferation of large plasma TVs that require as much electricity as an average fridge. More electricity means more coal being burned, which causes more ocean acidification, which causes the collapse of coral systems.) Another element common to both systems is that with less diversity comes more danger. (Mergers in financing mean more catastrophic losses; agricultural monocultures mean potentially larger outbreaks of pests.) Both systems have an underlying addiction to oil. Both tend to be dominated by positive feedback loops. (Economic panic and fear create more panic and fear. Melting permafrost releases methane, which causes more melting permafrost.) Finally, in both systems, regulatory apparatuses have been dismantled – or never existed in the first place.

One difference between the two crashes, Steingraber asserted, was that business writers have “made the economy visible” in a way that environmental writers still have not made as environmental issues visible. “We don’t have a steady stream of data like the Wall Street ticker,” she lamented. She wondered who would become the ecological equivalents of Paulson and Bernanke. Who will rally the world into an integrated set of policies that will help decrease pollution and the use of fossil fuels that are clearly warming the planet? (She was too humble to name herself but did mention Bill McKibben and Paul Ehrlich – names familiar to environmentalists but still unknown in many households.)

I don’t have the credentials to rally the world about the environment, but I do hope that the silver lining in the economic uncertainty is that as a society we’ll shift away from currency to creativity as our raison d’etre.

And in the spirit of making the environment visible on this day in Eastern Iowa, I offer these observations of Mother Nature: Okra plants are still blooming even though the leaves are beginning to yellow. There may be a few more of these lovely little vegetables to pick and eat. Purple ashes are not native to Iowa but they’re everywhere in the towns and cities and they’re at their peak in the southern tier of Iowa, all luminescent yellow, peach, orange, and plum. Some of the early-turning maples are beginning to fire yellow, orange, and red. Geese can be seen flying overhead and on the ground, combing harvested soybean fields that look like tightly woven, grey and brown sweaters.

And big blue stem grasses are waving purple arms in prairie patches across the state, unbothered by the Dow Industrial Average.

As a writing coach, writer, editor, and visual artist from Eastern Iowa, Suzanne Kelsey tries to inspire people to live their passions and to find miracles even in the mundane. She blogs about the freelancing life, Midwest Bohemia, nature, creativity, visual journaling, and living large in a small town. Visit her web site at www.suzannekelsey.com. Email her at suzannekelsey@msn.com.

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The Power of Silence: Beckett and No Country For Old Men

Pauline Kiernan's notes on Creativity, Writing
and Thinking.

One of the writers I'm mentoring at the moment is asking how to de-clutter her writing. She says she wants to discover how to stop over-writing. It got me thinking about all the artists and writers who seem to pare down what they create as they move on. Samuel Beckett took this to an extreme with a 35 second play called Breath. It consists of light and breath and silence with no actors.

Maybe it's partly because artists and writers get more confident the more they create - they've discovered how to trust their unique voice to 'stand alone', and don't feel the need to try to fill up the space of what they're expressing in case it's not enough.

A lot of movies get stuffed with overcompensating matter. My personal bugbear is music that tries to punch the emotion and tell the audience what to feel, which has the opposite of the effect intended - it just detaches us from the characters. A movie that I can't seem to stop thinking and talking about, No Country For Old Men, is a magnificent exception to this rule. Film composer Carter Burwell's score is only 16 minutes long, and the majority of it is heard during the end credits.

Director/screenwriters Joel and Ethan Coen are still quite young, but they seem to have reached the stage where they trust their superb cinematic story-telling instincts. And, perhaps, more importantly, they trust in the intelligence of their audiences. The power of silence and stillness in this movie demonstrates something I think all creative people can get inspiration from.

I've been writing about this film a lot lately, and I've been covering the often misunderstood element of screenwriting - subtext - and how it's much much more than simply a question of dialogue, of the difference between what someone says and what they mean. It's what you leave out. The unspoken, the stasis, the deeper meaning that is what lies beneath.

I'm not sure I could want to go as far as Beckett in stripping away words and actions to a raw core of meaning, but I think he helps me to understand that what a writer leaves out can be more important than what you put in.
www.unique-screenwriting.com







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Southwest Ramblings: Thoughts on Making and Living Art

Creative Ceilings
Linda Moran
Ever count all the little holes in a ceiling tile? And that's the most exciting thing you can do?

On Monday I had that opportunity, as I was strapped to a backboard for two hours, and in a neck brace for another 6 hours. All I could do was look up, and since I have virtually no vision in my left eye, that one ceiling tile was my world. You can only count holes for so long.....

So my mind wandered to what else could go up there? Posters? That would get old. I discovered, as I stared at the light fixture, that there were some incredible patterns to the texture of the light cover. And - they would change, depending on how long I looked at the light.

Why not a digital screen in the ceiling tiles, centered so that it wouldn't really matter where the stretcher was placed, with interesting patterns that would change on a regular basis? Since we seem to spend more and more time waiting in ERs for assistance - even if you came in by ambulance - this might cut down on the number of angry patients who are tired of waiting - especially those whose field of vision is so restricted.

Just a thought...someone want to patent the idea? Remember, you read it here first.

Linda Moran is a fiber artist working with hand-created marbled fabrics. This centuries-old art form originally limited to paper takes on new life when used on fabric. Join her for musings on the fiber field, art in the Southwest, and the challenges of creating fiber art. See her work and contact her at The Art of Fabric, or reading her musings on her blog. Read more!

Southwest Ramblings - Thoughts on Making and Living Art

Creativity in Rocks
Linda Moran

Who knew? I sure didn't. You study rocks in school, and they're - well, they're rocks....How can you get excited about a dark rough rock? I didn't understand the appeal....until.....

The first time I went to the Tucson gem show, I was expecting plain, ordinary rock, like I saw in elementary school. I was - in a word - stunned. I had no idea there was that much color out of the earth. There sure is color on the surface of the planet, but I wasn't prepared for what was down below.

Now the gem show is a regular stop for me each February - dealers from around the world - oh my, two years ago it was an incredible jade boat, last year crackelated quartz, and just this past weekend, some amazing jasper. The original question about why go to the gem show to see rock now has an answer - for my fiber art.

The Tucson Gem and Mineral Show is spread out around Tucson, with one weekend at the Convention Center (depending on road construction...), but the fun is going from site to site, motel room to motel room, to see the vendors. There's beads, sculptures, raw rock, tapestries, feng shui aids, jewelry findings, diamonds, HUGE geodes, and semi-precious stones.

Be prepared for your senses to be assaulted - the colors are kaleidoscopic, and there is SO MUCH! If you check this list of dealers, you can get an idea of just what is available. After the first jaunt, when I had NO disposable income, I survived on getting a set of a dozen hand-painted jade eggs - for $10.00. I was hooked.

As I have gone back each year, I've narrowed my focus to what I need for embellishing my fiber. Two years ago it was tree agate, for some of the environmental pieces. Last year I was looking for stones that would work with my water pieces - some great aquamarine and glass fish. This year I'm looking for "fire" for a couple of "volcano" pieces.

I've started going with my friend Alison, who does jewelry with semi-precious stones. I've gotten VERY good at finding unusual pieces for her - which she ends up buying, and then I usually end up with earrings as a result...great deal. Alison has learned a great deal about stone - what's manufactured, what's dyed, what's "reconstituted" (like coral, so it isn't hurting the reefs). We both like agate and jasper and the stones that have "interesting veining and occlusions - the more detail, the more interesting. We paw through piles, sort through individual strands, and decide just how much we can buy. I go with specifics in mind - otherwise, there's just too much to see!

And bottom line - some of the stones you just want to have - 'cause they're gorgeous, plain and simple. In fact, this past weekend was the "preliminary" show, with some of the dealers who would be here in February. Guess who found some of the most interesting stones? Hubby has a great eye for what works with our marbled fabrics.

Linda Moran is a fiber artist working with hand-created marbled fabrics. This centuries-old art form originally limited to paper takes on new life when used on fabric. Join her for musings on the fiber field, art in the Southwest, and the challenges of creating fiber art. See her work and contact her at The Art of Fabric, or reading her musings on her blog. Read more!

The Mystery of Creativity: Wil Kerner’s Art

Andrea Lee Avari

I love this young’s man art. It makes me smile. With amazement I watched a video that showed how a pair of scissors gripped in 12 year old Wil’s hand transformed solid colored pieces of construction paper into emotionally expressive geometric forms. His perspective on the characters he creates may come from the TV and videos that he watches. No one is exactly certain.
If art is about communication, then Wil is letting us peek into his world of autism by creating collages of animals and people in a manner reminiscent of Picasso. In varying degrees, autistic children have been observed to have a lower toleration for eye contact and social interaction with others. Awareness of others’ emotions is generally not demonstrated in ways that are readily discernable. And yet, here is Wil immediately connecting us with the emotion of his artwork.
Wil spends his days being home-schooled by his grandmother, Susan Mooring. In occupational therapy, Wil was taught how to use scissors to cut in order to increase his fine motor skills. He grips them instead making short fast cuts on sheets of colored paper. One day his grandmother noticed the symbolism in the round heads, one or two eyes, and the expression of emotion created from the juxtaposition of the forms. Because Wil moves quickly from one collage to another, Mooring had to also move quickly to recreate his work, taking digital photos of his assemblages to keep the artwork in its original form.
Wil and his grandmother have set up booths at art shows to sell his work. Some collages have sold for as much as $1000 to benefit a charity for autism. Wil’s story and a gallery of his artwork may be seen at www.wilspapercutouts.com.


Andrea Avari is the author of "A Hit of Heaven: a soul's journey through illusion." She is currently at work on a new book about creating relationships with soul. Her website is andreaavari.com. Her blog is natteringnabobofposititivty.blogspot.com.
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