P.S. This topic will become this week’s YT video so I’d love it if you subscribe to get notified when it comes out! The script is different as writing and verbal delivery are obviously not the same.
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'I don’t think I've picked up a paintbrush since uni - that was maybe 15 years ago!'
This is a comment I heard over lunch last week. Whilst it was an offhand remark, something casual and meant more as a bittersweet joke. However, it’s a line that has lodged itself in my brain, namely because it reminds me of the vow I made to myself as a child.
Growing up, as an artsy child I’d have multiple people (mostly women) enter my bedroom and admire my artwork. They’d smile and their eyes would light up for a second, a fleeting look of some vague regret passing across their face. This is when I knew what was coming.
The inevitable comment would come out. ‘I remember when I was younger, I used to *insert creative pursuit here*’. This was given up after marriage, kids, or work (or all of the above) making it difficult for them to continue. The life of a ‘responsible adult’ meant retiring their creativity at the doorstep of their youth.
And yet, despite my childish insistence that I wouldn’t let this happen, I can feel the fog of this ‘creative retirement’ latching onto me (or perhaps I’m already in the middle of it). This fog addles my brain and makes me believe I have no time, or that there’s no point. It’s what Socrates describes as ‘the barrenness of a busy life.’
But I believe, even despite being in the fog, I can still see. With the small amount of light available, I see hope. And it's this hope that I cling to that fuels my sporadic blog posts or the vague ideas for artworks or YouTube videos that linger in my brain.
I can’t pinpoint exactly the reason why I continue to make art. But when I think about the people who left their creativity out in the rain, I shudder at the thought of lost potential, of a life uncreatively fulfilled. I know that I will live a life of regret, if I don’t at least try to keep going down the path of personal creativity. It's for no other purpose than self-expression on my own terms (no money, no clients, no external expectations to dictate them).
It’s why I continue to hold onto my sketchbook practice, despite its sporadic nature. It’s taking me over 6 months to finish a tiny A6 Sketchbook, but I feel that it’s important to hold onto the vestiges.
In holding onto the threads of my creativity, I’ve been noticing progress (if slow - it’s still something!). It’s been exciting to see how my creative practice is evolving. My second A6 sketchbook looks very different from my first A6 Sketchbook which I talk about in this video.
Firstly, there are a variety of things stuck in, including post-it notes and different types of paper. I use different mediums, like sketch pens, ballpoint pens, and children’s markers.
I don’t worry about what I’m sketching or if the drawings look cohesive to the others - rather, I just choose to sketch something that’s relevant to that day. And in that, there’s a lot of beauty as I look back at the small snippets that I’ve visually captured of my life over the last few months. As I mentioned in a previous blog post, I think the fact that I am the author of these sketches is enough to tie them all together into the desirable ‘aesthetic’ that an artist ‘should’ be known for.
This sketchbook also includes visual ideas, usually on post-it notes that I stick into the back pages. This is huge for me as visual ideation is something I’ve (ironically) always struggled with (I’m a designer by trade - this should come easy to me!). It’s been exciting to see the small wins when I draw in my journal or I sketch a visual for a blog post.
In fact, I’ve always struggled with my creativity being siloed (i.e. my writing is usually separate from my drawing or painting), but I’m starting to see things overlapping now and that shows me that I’m progressing in my creative journey.
This phenomenon, of overlapping creative pursuits, is known as combinatorial creativity. It’s something that Einstein used to do when he attributed some of his greatest physics breakthroughs to his violin breaks. And it’s something I hope will naturally start occurring in my life, as ideas and my personal creative ways of working overlap and align.
It’s taking me a loooong time to finish this current sketchbook (I started it in Oct 2022 and it’s not exactly a lot of pages) but I’m trying to embrace that (at least I’m still going with it!). I’ve also got an exciting trip planned where I plan to fill a (different) A6 sketchbook and document the process through YT so I’m looking forward to that (and I hope you will too!).
Until then, I’m going to keep fighting tooth and nail to stay creative, despite the odds stacked against me - time, work, family life, and my general lack of focus. And I hope against hope that you will join me on the journey to fight the fog too!