When I talk to people about art one thing I emphasize is that understanding art is largely a matter of looking, looking often, and looking lots.
You look and your eye becomes trained. Look and think and you begin to understand. Two things brought this to mind recently. I was talking to a friend’s husband on Monday night having just found out her husband spent three years as a teen living among the Inuit in northern Canada. He’s an artist and a writer and I had always wondered why his art looked the way it did and was oddly familiar.
When I learned that, I knew. Although he probably doesn’t think it or even remember how, those years and that place taught his eye something and it influences his art, decades later.
The other thing happened last week when I was asked what research I had done for something about Japanese art. I hadn’t. I’ve just looked.
So I find lots of inspiration all around me for my needlepoint. And I cut out much of it. This creates a storage and organization problem. These pieces of paper are not the same size and don’t have any single reason for being there. I might like the colors, the pattern or even the whole picture. They might become the basis for a needlepoint (like my turquoise cross, based on a piece of jewelry), or someone else might find them and turn them into a canvas (like this animal parade/a>, also pictured here, that sat in my notebook for YEARS until earlier this year my daughter found the source and Art Needlepoint has turned it into a canvas.
But I have to put them someplace, so I keep big notebooks (I’m on my fourth) and paste the stuff into them. They are not organized and if I use something as a source, I note that in the margin. I paste them in with double-sided tape.
I tried to keep it organized at one point, but gave that up. Stuff I like bumps up against other stuff in happy, inspirational anarchy. I like it that way because that gives me ideas. When I’m too tired to stitch, I like to go through and flag with post-it NOtes the things I like best.
This method of organizing does have it’s drawbacks, I can’t store two-side things this way. I’m getting a notebook for them and using page protectors to put them into place.
I just have to get around to it.
About Janet M Perry
Janet Perry is the Internet's leading authority on needlepoint. She designs, teaches and writes, getting raves from her fans for her innovative techniques, extensive knowledge and generous teaching style. A leading writer of stitch guides, she blogs here and lives on an island in the northeast corner of the SF Bay with her family
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