Day 23: Spiral and Target

Full disclosure:  I did this last night, but got too sleepy to post it on the blog.  So, this is yesterday's drawing.
I don't love this one, but as I tell my patients, "Not everything we make HAS to be a masterpiece."

I will say, that this drawing has a lot of energy, but the energy seems to be self contained and not really going anywhere.  It needs to break free of its limitations (metaphor for my life OR I am tired of working on the small iPad screen).

Day 54: Wisteria

After I removed all the wrapper from this crayon, I placed it on its side and started swinging it around to make the circular shapes.  It takes quite a bit of muscle to press the crayon length-wise to make it dark enough.

Once I completed the drawing, I realized that a "wisteria" IS a flower.  I had looked at the name, but I was not consciously thinking that I should draw a flower (like on "Granny Smith Apple" day, where I specifically wanted to draw an apple).

I do an Art Therapy technique titled the "The Rosebush", where I direct my clients to visualize a rosebush.  I ask, Where does it lives? Who takes care of it? Does it have thorns? ... and many other questions.  This becomes a metaphor for the self - as all art ultimately is.  So, what does this rose drawing say about me?

It does have thorns.  I can be a little prickly at times, but most people do not know that about me unless they get close enough to see those thorns.  The rose is strongly rooted into the ground.  I feel that I am pretty stable and rooted.  We only see half the flower, though.  Am I trying to hide something?  I don't really think so.  What else could it be?  There is a lot more to my life that I have yet to see - the whole picture had yet to be revealed.  I guess we never get to see the whole picture until the very end.  And we may or may not be totally cognizant at that age/time to understand.

Day 9: Red

I really like that this one is not as busy as some of the others.  I purposely stopped myself before I thought I was done and I walked away for a little while.  When I came back and viewed it with a fresh eye, I decided that it was done. Sometimes less IS more.  That is outside of my comfort zone, but it does seem consistent with trying to do less, better (monotasking).

I mentioned in another blog post that I like stairs and ladders, while here is that symbol again - without intentionally putting it in.  I think I may spend some time looking up metaphors, meanings and mentions of ladders and stairs.  That is what I tell my clients to do when images and symbols begin to reoccur in their artwork.

I am ascending something - moving towards the future.  The "Bliss" (free floating images) are still in the background as the circles, but now there is a path. A direction.

The red is very dynamic, energetic and powerful.  I have had some emotional challenges in the past few days, and I believe that I am calling on my inner strength for power, direction and stability.  I have to accept my limitations, and understand, and maybe alter, my own response to frustration. I may have to change my role in the family dynamics.

There is a lot of texture that is created from removing the wrapper* and spinning the crayon on it's side. That is how I made those circles in the background.  I purposely broke the crayon into several different sizes so I could get different circle radii.

*When I was a child, it was very easy to remove the Crayola wrapper. All I had to do was open it at the seam and it lifted right off.  Sometimes it even slipped off by accident (maybe that is why they changed it).  But it seems that the wrapper is now glued to the crayon, and in order to remove it I have to scrape off small parts at a time and often my fingernail digs into the side of the crayon - leaving unwanted grooves and gouges.