Anyway, I realise that I have to try to get back to normal eventually so I went to the studio for a few hours. Needless to say, when I got there I found it difficult to find any sort of meaningful inspiration. I carried out my rituals and creative exercises but nothing was coming to me. I pottered back to the apartment for some lunch and reluctantly dragged my heels back to the studio again afterwards. And then I decided to just "go for it" so to speak and try out one of my time-limit exercises to try to put some bit of a spark under my bum. I tore up a few random sheets of paper, whatever I found lying around the studio and endeavoured to sketch out 4 faces in 10 minutes, adding as much detail as I could but still working quickly to get as much of the overall basic shapes down.
I sketched the faces using simple compressed charcoal - nothing too fancy. When the 10 minutes were up, this is what I had achieved.
Four completely unique faces with four completely unique expressions. I had surprised myself so then I thought "What can I do with another 10 minutes?"
I set out a limited palette of paint and set the timer for another 10 minutes.
Again, I was surprised at what I could achieve in just 10 minutes. So I decided to set the timer for a final 10 minutes to finish the faces off.
I'm really happy with them! And they were all created in just 30 minutes. It always interests me what and how much you can create when you put a time limit or some other kind of restriction on yourself.
I had so much fun with these faces that I went ahead and created another set.
It is exciting to think that I have a new technique to try out for creating faces and it all came out of struggling to find inspiration. I love happy accidents don't you? Why don't you give it ago? See what you can do when you set a time limit on yourself!
Happy Wednesday
Ci x
