Month: March 2015

Time travel coffee.

dannygregory38 Comments

What if you could go back in time — and talk to an earlier version of yourself?

Let’s say that after years (decades?) of struggle and self-denial, you have finally allowed yourself to be creative. After all that self-flagellation, you have started drawing, painting, writing, singing, tap dancing … just as you have always dreamt of doing for years.

Think back on the person you were when all this self-defeating behavior began.  How you felt about yourself and the world.

Think back on all those things that prevented you from getting to where you are now. All the ways you sabotaged yourself.  All the classes you signed up for but never attended. All the money you wasted on art supplies you never used. All the sneers, the indifference, the judgement. All the vile things your monkey muttered in your ear to prevent you from starting a creative habit.

Next, think about the things that made a difference in your turnaround.  What lit the fuse? What helped you blast through all those obstacles you’d arrayed in your path?

And finally, how do you feel today, now that you have finally given yourself permission to be the artist you truly are, that you were all along, but couldn’t see?

Next, create a time machine and travel back in it.  Go to that person you were and take him or her out for a cup of coffee.

What will you say?

(P.S. And, if you don’t yet feel you have made it to full-fledged, liberated-artist mode, tell us what you’d say anyway.  You know what you need to hear.)

Please share your conversations in the comments area below.

How I make art before I make coffee.

dannygregory95 Comments

Recently I was invited to participate in a lovely series called “The Original” Documented Life Project™”. Guest artists are asked to document their process in making a piece. I was emailed the following assignment:

“The theme for this month is ‘MAKING YOUR MARK (DOODLES & MARK MAKING). The art challenge for this week is ‘AS A FOCAL POINT’, and the prompt is ‘COMING INTO FOCUS”

I’m not always awfully good at following assignments so I just sort of did what I do. I hope they like it.

 

1dog-focus
The theme is “Coming into Focus.” It’s 7:17 a,.m. and I am decidedly not in focus yet. I need coffee and ink.
2-coffee
Purists may cringe, but I will be enjoying Trader Joe’s Half Caff® this morning.  In my advancing years, I find that if I drink a small amount of full-bore caffeinated coffee, I will snap peevishly at people all morning, be wrung out all afternoon, and wake up at 3 am, thinking about my tax return.
3-bread
This is pretzel bread.  It’s sort of a baguette but crustier and slightly salted.  Most importantly it makes nice crumb, pits, and crevices — ideal for close-up drawing.
4-eggs
Drawing, like all grueling physical activities, requires protein. Like Kevin Bacon*, I take mine in ovoid form. These are large brown eggs, free-range, organic, anti-biotic, hormone and steroid free. Despite all that palaver,  they still taste great with some Tabasco.
5-breakfast
This looks like a balanced breakfast — compositionally, if not nutritionally. But, before I can eat it, I must make Art Before Breakfast (yes, that’s the name of my new book, available wherever life-changing books are sold).
6-supplies
My trusty art cart. Ready to roll at any hour.
First I do a contour drawing with a brush pen, drawing the outlines of the major shapes.
First I do a contour drawing with a brush pen, drawing the outlines of the major shapes. Honestly, before I’ve had my coffee, this is about all the detail I can handle.
8-contour-details
Next, I draw some of the inside shapes. I define the contents of the plate, which keep jeering, “Eat me!”
9-shadows-lines
The shadows are super-long so I add their outlines next.
10-watercolors
I open my watercolor palette (various brands all squeezed into a metal box) and a big, fat, soft brush.
I mix up some diluted Payne's grey and add the shadows.
I mix up some diluted Payne’s grey and add the shadows.
The shadows need a second coat so I add more Payne's grey so you can see its cool blue nature. It's the Miles Davis of colors and my favorite. I eat it by the tube.
The shadows need a second coat so I add more Payne’s grey so you can see its cool blue nature. It’s the Miles Davis of colors and my favorite. I eat it by the tube.
13-toast-details
As the shadows dry, I scrutinize the crusty surface of the bread slices, pretending I am an astronaut mapping Planet Crumb. I use a Tombow Fudenosuke brush pen (WS-BS 150, for you pen nerds).
14-toastB-details
Next I visit and chart the sister planet, Crusto Maximus.
15-coffee-details
There’s a lot of stuff going on inside my french press and now that I am pretty much awake, I can draw all the grounds and bits.
16-doc-martins
Good morning, sunshine! I pick out a couple of lovely yellows from my Doc Martin’s collections ( I have a bottle of every color they make and love to guzzle it).
17-yolks
I hit the juice and the yolks with a blend of two tones and various degrees of diluted Doc M. Pop!
I like my coffee with three or four browns and a purple.
I like my coffee with three or four browns and a purple.
I try to approximate the various light values as the sunshine passes through the deep lagoon of java.
I try to approximate the various light values as the sunshine passes through the deep lagoon of java.
Time to toast the bread with the same palette of browns and purple.
Time to toast the bread with the same palette of browns and purple.
While the paint is still wet, I sprinkle in some salt to suck up moisture and make an interesting texture. Plus, it tastes better.
While the paint is still wet, I sprinkle in some salt to suck up moisture and make an interesting texture. Plus, it tastes better.
Okay, I'm starving and the eggs are getting cold. So I pause to digest my subject.
Okay, I’m starving and the eggs are getting cold. So I pause to digest my subject.
As I eat, I think about the day ahead. I drew some hasty sketches to make up my to-do list.
As I eat, I think about the day ahead. Then, burp, I drew some hasty sketches to make up my to-do list. I use a dip pen and India ink. Which reminds me, I think I’ll have Indian for lunch.
Full tummy? Time for a little white pencil to add highlights and reflections to the glass 'n' crockery. Burp.
Time for a little white pencil to add highlights and reflections to the glass ‘n’ crockery.
I give my page a headline.
I give my page a headline.
I do a little journaling, commemorating the day, counting my blessings, splattering some ink.
I do a little journaling, commemorating the day, counting my blessings, splattering some ink.
The sketches look a little sketchy so I hit 'em with a fresh coat of sepia Doc's. Martins.
The sketches look a little sketchy so I hit ’em with a fresh coat of sepia Doc’s. Martins.
Okay, time to do the dishes and get on with my day.
Okay, time to do the dishes and get on with my day.
What th'? I left out a couple of letters. Squeeze em in, man!
What th’? I left out a couple of letters. Squeeze em in, man!

* I love Kevin’s latest.

 

Living on purpose.

dannygregory27 Comments

What if success meant living a life of purpose?

What if your high school and college educations were designed to help you do one thing: to discover what you are truly good at and what you love to do? That instead of emphasizing test scores and grades and cutthroat placements in prestigious universities and high starting salaries, the system acknowledged that we are all born with different skills and abilities, needs and wants. And that we all need a mission to guide us.

What if we said you don’t have to be good at math or science if you have no natural aptitude, that you might be better at building something with your hands than constructing a paragraph? That we will help you discover if you are more visually oriented, or more intuitive about people, or better at concrete thinking or abstractions or that you were born to be a great chef or a gardener or a cab driver or a banker. What if that was the whole purpose of your education — to help you lead a life that perfectly fits who you are?

What would a planet full of people working with passion and conviction look like?

What if it was the norm to pause every decade or so and assess whether that purpose still fits you, whether you need some variation or specialization, new skills or new experiences? What if was expected that every major decision you made was measured against the yard stick of your purpose and your mission, not your salary or your retirement package? That each person was expected to be true to their nature and their passion. That each of us did what we did to genuinely be of service to the greater good. Not because it was tax-deductible but because it felt right and part of who we are.

Would things unravel? Would certain jobs never be filled? Or might we discover that some people were genuinely born to enthusiastically empty septic tanks or write parking tickets or run hedge funds, to do things that now people seem to do only for money? Would we still dread Mondays? Or would we work with passion and conviction, doing more and better things than we could conceive of today.

What if everyone in our society did what they did because they loved it, were born to it, were passionate about it would do it just as a hobby? What if we all lived authentically according to our talents and drives? What would a planet full of people working with passion and conviction look like?

What would it take for that to happen? An act of Congress? An act of God? Or a commitment made by each of us as we lay in bed and pondered the road ahead. A commitment to who you truly are.

Could you make one?

The worst of times, the best of times.

dannygregory23 Comments

What if:

You could know,
with absolute certainty,
that the worst day of your life was behind you.
And the second worst too.
Would that knowledge change how you lived,
what risks you took,
what dreams you had?

And what if you could know that
the best day of your life
was yet to come.
How would that change your life?

And, even if you couldn’t really know for sure,
what would happen if you lived
as if you did?

Spring in my step.

dannygregory11 Comments

I just wanted to tell you that, though I have not been very active here of late, it’s mainly because Koosje and Morgan and I have been beavering away on several important projects we will soon reveal. I think they will please you. I sure hope so.

I also want to thank you so much for supporting the release of Art Before Breakfast. You have managed to thrill my publisher into wanting me to immediately do other exciting new things — which I will tell you more about as they gel.

Meanwhile, we are waiting for our container ship-full of freshly printed copies to be unloaded onto the Los Angeles docks (which just concluded a long and bad-for-books-and-other-goods strike) and soon the shortage of Arts B4 Breakfast will end (I myself have but a single dog-eared copy)

Also, you (but not my monkey) will be heartened to know that my manuscript for “Shut Your Monkey: How to control your inner critic and get more done” is in my (other) publisher’s hands and will be hitting the shelves this autumn. Thanks you everyone who sent me their monkey tales. They added delicious fodder to my book.

In sum, Spring is finally springing here in New York and many lovely new things are blooming. Details to follow.