How to Be Creatively Productive.

dannygregory5 Comments

Here’s a piece I just wrote for Thought Catalog,

Inspiration Monday: All aboard!

dannygregory9 Comments

I’m just back from a trip to Grand Central Station with two artists I really love: France Belleville van Stone and  (former President of Urban Sketchers) Jason Das. The weather outside was frightful but the airy spaces and poetic architecture were a delight. We began with a visit to the Apple Store on the mezzanine to check out the new iPad pros which are zippy and powerful and a pleasure to draw on with the new Apple Pencil.

Then France gave Jason a lesson in how to use Paper, the drawing app for the iPad, and the two of them settled in to draw the information booth and the massive chandelier beyond. It was great to hear how they tackle the space, what they feel about drawing digitally, how to contend with spectators and finally, to see the beautiful art they made.

If you are as entranced as I am by these artists, join them and four other great teachers) in Stretching in the new term at Sketchbook Skool. Find out more here.

Inspiration Saturday: a tiny adventure

dannygregory27 Comments

This week I finished my homework early, in part because it was a short, sweet assignment. Our teacher was the legendary Michael Nobbs, my old pal and a calm and lovely spirit.  Speaking of, this week I met an ent.

This is the last week of “Expressing” and I have enjoyed sharing my homework projects with you. I do hope you’ll join me in one of the klasses beginning next Friday at Sketchbook Skool. You can sign up today to make sure you have a spot.

Inspiration Monday: Printing with Penelope

dannygregory21 Comments

After crawling from my sickbed, I finally finished my homework for Penelope Dullaghan’s klass in Expressing at Sketchbook Skool.

It was a bit messy and I managed to completely screw it up at one point, but her assignment got me to thinking a lot about one of my other favorite artists, Andy Warhol. In this rather adenoidal video, I explain what I was thinking, and then make three different pieces that I like quite a bit.

Unwell

dannygregory41 Comments

sick-2I started to feel a little chesty on Saturday night and ignored things as they got worse and worse. On Wednesday morning, I went to do a shoot and when it was over, so was I.

A couple of days in bed have helped and I am feeling vaguely human again but I am still weak as a kitten and my lungs feel like old paper bags filled with broken lightbulbs. I am utterly sick of Mucinex and tea with lemon and can’t wait to get back on my feet.

Field trip: Twingley & Picasso at MOMA

dannygregory6 Comments

One of the many recent cultural highlights has been the Picasso sculpture retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art. Another was undoubtedly Jonathan Twingley‘s klass, Stretching at Sketchbook Skool.

If you missed either or both, I’m sure you are quite bereft.

Last Friday, Mr. Twingley and I braved the snow to see the Picasso show one last time. I brought along my camera and Jonathan brought his sketchbook — he has visited the show a dozen times and drawn virtually every sculpture in the show.

Unfortunately, the MOMA show ended a few days later. Fortunately, however, and by popular demand, Stretching is set to return for an encore performance at SBS in just a couple of weeks. I hope I’ll see you there. Enroll now before it too is but a memory.

 

Inspiration Monday: watercolor lunch

dannygregory13 Comments

This week, what I learned from Felix Scheinberger‘s klass on watercolor techniques. Actually, this is just the tip of the iceberg. I keep studying Felix’s work and learn more and more each time. As he says, watercolors are the fastest medium to paint with, but the longest one to learn.

 

PS I inadvertently posted this article twice. I have been sick for the past few days and am not my usual fastidious self. 

Inspiration Monday: watercolors

dannygregory7 Comments

I was enormously happy to convince Felix Scheinberger to join the fakulty of Sketchbook Skool. Felix is an amazing watercolorist and a great teacher and his book Urban Watercolor Sketching is one of my favorites. Felix’s lessons started this week in Expressing and I really enjoyed tackling his assignment: to paint my lunch.

The numbers game.

dannygregory16 Comments

Increasingly, life throws digits at us to evaluate our worth. Your watch can tell you how many steps you took today. Facebook tells you how many friends you have. Your ATM tells you how much money you have. What’s your credit score?

And social media has put us all on some endless celebrity list with Kim Kardashian and Justin Bieber at the top and each of us somewhere far, far below. How many likes did your Instagram get? How many comments did your post get? How many views did you get on YouTube? How many followers do you have on Twitter?

It’s as if we are all on the ballot, stalked by monkey pollsters projecting our fates, tabulating our votes, handing out our final grades.

Because we are all online, we are all in a line.

This is what technology and the media have wrought. Because things can be quantified, they can be ranked. Because we are all online, we are all in a line. And those digits seem to indicate our place, our worth.

And of course, it’s all bullshit. Just because the world holds up so many measuring sticks, doesn’t mean we have to step up to them. We still have the power to decide what matters. People are not numbers. Art is not worth what Sotheby’s or Google or Billboard deems its rank.

What matters when you make something, even when you share it, is what it means to you. How deeply does it touch you? Does it feel authentic? Does it speak to you? Did you work hard enough on it to make it clear and resonant? If you must have  a numerical scale, count how it makes your pulse accelerate, how broad your smile is, how many tears rise to your eyes. Those are the only digits that count.