Art Is Not Escape

Let the countdown begin!

Only three weeks until spring break…And about two months from there left to the school year!

Yes, I am starting my count down right now.

Honestly, I love my students-even the ones that make the job more challenging…But, I really look forward to my breaks. While I’m always looking for opportunities to be creative, my breaks are when I get to be my most creative.

Disappointment set in this past week since I haven’t been getting as much practice with my pointed pen as I have wanted. Below is my practice from a couple nights ago where you can see I’m attempting longer phrases, etc.

I posted a question to one of my FB groups yesterday and I saw that there are other women creatives who feel the same disappointment when they are challenged in making progress with their artistic practice.

Enter spring break. Or summer break. Or weekend break for that matter…

Breaks slow down the blur long enough to experience life at a pace I can handle.

A new IG friend told me that taking breaks is just part of maintaining good, mental health…and it made me think of a conversation I had a couple weeks ago with the head of our school (a former art teacher herself). During our talk, she shared a quote by Robert Hayden, the first black poet laureate of the United States.

Art is not escape, but a way of finding order in chaos, a way of confronting life.

~Robert Hayden

When we gravitate toward drawing during a pandemic, or times of trouble-or even just trying to slow down the frantic pace of life at the end of a lonnnnng day, we’re not trying to find a way to escape at all…We are trying to find a way to face the things we have to deal with with a mind that is still intact.

In an effort to heal my art-deprived, little heart the past week or so, I have been treating myself to some engraving.

I topped it all off with a little sketching in my sketchbook today. 🥰

Spring break, here I come! ♥️