1% Inspiration
There’s been a “meme” floating around lately in which a friend gives you some words as topics to write on (usually a paragraph or so each). One of the words I’ve seen floating around is inspiration.
That word’s come to mind over and over this weekend as my partner and I were wandering art galleries (and drinking mojitos). We’ve seen all sorts of things – from kitsch to paintings to photography to sculpture to comics.
Today, it occurred to me that possibly the most inspirational thing for me – as in, the thing that inspires me to get off my butt and create – is the art other people create. I can’t help looking at it and thinking “you know, I could do that …”. Sometimes the rest of the sentence is “… right now” and sometimes it’s “… if I spent years practicing and had a lot more equipment” and often it’s somewhere in the middle.
99% Perspiration
At the same time, I’ve been slowly working on my latest vectorization. It’s been slow going, even though I am improving with my tools (Illustrator, if you’re wondering). Longer, even, than the drawing goes. It’s not quite like I draw a line in Illustrator and it’s done and unmoveable, like a pen line is – I get to tweak and fix the lines (well, fuss with). Here’s a snippet of what I’ve got so far, probably 5 hours in:
It’s kind of a labor of love (and practice). Someday, maybe it’ll be art.