Experiments in Illustration

My goal is to write a blog post once a week, so I thought I would start by sharing my process with the book I am writing about my daughter, River. One day several months ago I sat down at my computer and started writing from the perspective of my two year old, chuckling at myself as I put my experience of her as a parent into words. The book starts like this.

“I am River. These are the faces I like to make: (picture here of faces). In the summer, I walk around the yard and pick up apples that have fallen from the trees. I take one bite - crunch! and put it in my pocket.”

The book goes on like this, describing River’s difficulty talking (although she finds other creative ways to express herself), and her special hobbies and interests (beetles, throwing oracle cards behind the bed, etc.).

This was the first illustration I made for the book:

I had the idea in my head that I would try watercolor illustrations, so that’s what I did here. Since I’ve never attempted to illustrate a book before, I figured that I would just use this project as a way to practice and experiment with what my style is, while also creating something special for my kid. Last semester in school (I’m getting my PhD in East-West Psychology at California Institute of Integral Studies), I got to do a mentorship with a published author and illustrator, Ajuan Mance. The mentorship was one of my favorite things that I’ve done in my program so far. I showed Ajuan this illustration as well as another one in colored pencil that I did for a class. She thought the watercolor was a little busy (so did I), and liked the composition of the colored pencil better.

This was the first colored pencil drawing I did for the book.

I had really only done the second illustration in colored pencil because I was on a time crunch for the assignment for my class, and I thought colored pencil would be faster than watercolor. I was surprised that I was actually pretty happy with how it turned out, especially because I’ve never thought that I could really draw. Ajuan was extremely supportive with changing that myth in my mind and encouraged me to keep exploring styles and see what worked best for me.

Because I enjoyed the colored pencil drawing so much, I made a few more like that, adding some mixed media collage elements into the pieces. (You can see all of the drawings for this book in my Illustration gallery on the Work page of my website). I really wanted to figure out a way to make my mixed media style work as illustration, and that’s something I’m still working on. For this book I have landed on colored pencil with some few collage elements thrown in, and I’ll keep exploring other styles with different projects. One thing that I never thought about before with my mixed media collage work was copyright issues with using other peoples photos and artwork within my art. I started researching that when I became interested in illustration, so for the second version of the apple drawing the collage elements I used were all public domain images. I found several resources online where you can access tons of public domain images, such as rawpixel and Old Book Illustrations.

Here is the second version of the apple drawing and the one that I will actually use for the book, since it matches the style of the rest of the art. I also changed the composition to make River a little more of the focus, since I thought she got a bit lost in the first version. I love the vibrancy of the watercolor and I think it really accurately represents our actual backyard, but for overall style I think the second one works better for the book.

I plan on continuing to work on this book throughout the summer and submit it to some agents/publishers kind of just for fun (if you consider that fun). If I don’t get any bites, I will probably do a kickstarter campaign and self-publish it. I had originally only intended to make a few copies for River and family, but Ajuan really encouraged me to do more with it. It’s amazing what a difference it can make in your creative endeavors to have another professional give you guidance and support, and I’m so grateful for that.

Next week I think I’ll share more about some of the writing projects that I’ve currently got cooking.

Until then, keep creating!

On Imagination

On Sunday I attended a painting workshop with Shiloh Sophia, who I didn’t know anything about, but who led us through her intuitive painting process. I don’t usually do abstract painting, because anytime that I’ve tried, I’ve just gotten frustrated and felt like a failure. I need some kind of structure or image to work off of, especially since I always tell a story through my art. The process that Shiloh led us through yesterday was quite abstract, and I found myself facing the familiar inner critics voice criticizing my piece. I felt SO relieved when she invited us to add an object or figure to the painting and I could go back to familiar territory. But what I also learned through the process was to let go a little, and just play with the paint. Shiloh invited us to think about our “codes,” the part of us that we are born with, that are just inherently our own gifts that we have to offer to the world, and what I came to as I dreamed and painted was Imagination.

I’m pretty sure that one of the gifts I have to offer the world is finding ways to access imagination, because it’s something that I’ve always been able to do, although there have been times in my life as a teen and an adult where I’ve lost touch with that part of myself. Over the past year in my work in my PhD program as well as in my personal therapy, I’ve come back to that child-like part of myself that loves magic and stories. As an art therapist, I’ve seen that some of my most resilient clients have gotten through terrible things because of their access to their imaginations.

I’ve really struggled this year with my career choices, becoming an art therapist instead of pursuing art or writing more professionally. My intention with creating this website is to give the artist and writer part of myself permission to take charge. I’ve identified as a therapist first for the last seven years, and now I want to be a writer and artist first, therapist second. I’m pondering whether therapist still fits into the equation at all a lot lately, but maybe there’s a way it can all work for the time being if I can find ways to guide people back to their imagination, their inherent creativity, through writing, art, and therapy.

My goal with this blog is to share bits of my journey in exploring writing and illustration professionally. I’ll share short pieces of my writing, write process blogs about my illustrations and how I create them, and share information that I’m learning about self-publishing versus traditional publishing and all the ins and outs of the publishing world. I’ll consider making a newsletter, so if you would like these posts to get sent directly to your inbox, sign up with your email below and I’ll see what I can do.

There are parts of me trying to tell me that this is already a wasted dream, I shouldn’t be spending money on this website, etc. etc. In fact, I nearly gave up before I completed the website because computer stuff just doesn’t come that easily to me and I was sick of looking at templates I didn’t like. But I’m choosing to invest in my creativity, in my imagination, because I know what reading and art can do for a soul. And it doesn’t hurt that this website is the color of the yellow house I’ve always dreamed of having.