Making Art Every day in 2018

Are you thinking about doing a year-long project? Well, today, January first or any other day is the day! You just have to simply start and it's a big deal! I want to be completely honest with you about the journey. It's hard, it's not hard every day but there are periods of time that you will not want to make art or be creative at all. Like when you're sick or when your kid keeps you up all night and wants you to sleep in their teeny tiny toddler bed. (I am totally talking about Everett) What I have learned along the way is that in these moments I don't necessarily want make the best art, but I use that time to think about my process, what I want to be creating, practice some new skills or maybe try a new idea.

The best piece of advice when you are feeling uncreative or uninspired is to acknowledge it and realize there are other ways in finding your creativity. It doesn't have to be hard or perfect or ugly or beautiful. This year long journey is about showing up every day and seeing what happens, even if it's a stick person or a smiley face. Give yourself permission to create whatever you want and just show up.

January 1st is officially my fourth year at creating an original piece of art every day. What I plan on doing for the month of January is to give you a peek behind the curtain and share even more inspiration and exactly how I come up with and create something new right here on this blog. What I am going to show you is how I get unstuck and how the smallest crumb of an idea turns into something larger.

I have not planned this month ahead because I am making the actual art that day. Growing is important and sometimes I think in order to make the best work, you have to push and grow outside yourself.

Here are the original list of rules for this project.

1. Make art every day, no matter how big or small. Any medium counts. Even if I draw a stick person or just snap a blurry photo, the point is just to make art.
2.  I am not allowed to give up. This is very important.
3.  I am not allowed to throw away any artwork or rip out any pages in my sketch book. I am allowed to start over. I am not allowed to start painting over canvases or ripping out pages in my sketchbook.

Cheers to 2018! and good luck and good fortune for the year