illustrated poetry

Books, games, art supplies and more dogs

A Creative Life, art exhibit, art gallery, art prints, artist book, artistic inspirations, books, creative thinking, dog portrait, fine art, games in art, gift books, Gifts, Patchwork Poems, pet portraits, Sustainable creativity

I’m borrowing a concept: I create an original one-of-a-kind artist book and then make limited edition reproductions of that book. Just like a fine art painter might make art prints from a painting. Only my art reproductions are books! Anyway my artist books, both the original handmade books and the limited edition reproductions of the originals are currently at the Aurora Gallery  www.auroragalleryonline.com

Patchwork Poems is also available by mail via this link https://www.blurb.com/b/11318282-patchwork-poems

Here below is a video look… https://youtube.com/shorts/-7MjaMkkj5A?feature=share

The Aurora Gallery has Patchwork Poems and 14 of my other artist books on a shelf!

Below is a fun video by Caplan Art Designs about my 3d sculpture “Dogs On The Block”!! On Dec 1 from 6 to 8 there was a reception at the Caplan Art Designs Portland gallery – and my work found a new home! The Gallery specializes in shipping and delivery of artwork and will handle delivery of my sculpture to it’s new place! www.caplanartdesigns.com

Below are some recent books that have come via mail! I’ve had time to peek at them but not to do any serious reading. It’s a fun to tease myself with them. Thanks again to Liz Gauffreau who suggested “Rescuing Socrates”!

Games have come via mail too! Our cat loves the practice golf balls more than any other toy. We joke that he must have been a golf pro in a former life. So we got him a new package of balls. Which meant that, to be fair, we needed to get the dog a new toy too. Of course then we decided that the humans needed some new toys too…

Rusty loves his new toy! First he checked to make sure it didn’t have much stuffing. Here’s my wife demonstrating that the new toy is flat and floppy as per his preference. Once that prerequisite was shown Rusty loved it!

On my email newsletter I shared my sources for sketchbooks, pens and other art supplies in case another creative person like me is looking for a gift for themselves. BTW: My paid subscribers will get an 84 page ebook from me this week!! (Hee hee hee 😁 and yes, let Jolabokaflod begin!!!)

Just in case another creative person wants a source of inspiration for creative thinking I also shared one of my favorite books that stimulates my own creativity. “How to be an explorer of the world” by Keri Smith

How to be an explorer of the world – by Keri Smith

As you know many of my art projects this time of year are someone’s holiday gift so I can’t talk about them online. But recently I was asked to do two different pet portraits for two different people who were getting art prints of the portrait as a gift for themselves so they generously allowed me to share…

Here was one of the photos of the dog for the portrait to be. Trusty lived to be quite an elder dog and he’s passed now so for the portrait painting I compiled the various photos his human sent of Trusty throughout the years. This photo below is of him as a younger fellow. Trusty was a mutt with Terrier in the mix. His hair had to be groomed and he greyed over the years. So creating this portrait was a challenge. This photo below showed the nose and eyes best though this hair style wasn’t quite the normal. Like I say… a challenge

Here’s what I came up with. The human, thankfully, was pleased!

And here’s the other portrait… it was of a West Highland Terrier. The photos I was sent were taken of the dog that very day and more photos were possible.

I created the original artwork using watercolor pencils and brush and sumi ink.

Then I made an art print of the original artwork. This human too was very pleased!

I’m primarily doing my portraits through the galleries I work with yet I’ve found that some people prefer art prints as they can fit a budget better. There are several size options and frame style choices for all of the prints I create. Here’s a link so you can see what I mean. https://society6.com/product/jozy_framed-print

Am I tired from all of the commissions and recent art exhibits? Yes. But I suspect all of Santa’s helpers are tired this time of year. So I’m content to restore myself each evening with time to read or play a game with my spouse.

Since I can’t show or talk about the main pet portrait work I’m doing I’m especially grateful that a dear friend gave both of us an advent calendar of Arteza art supplies !! I’m posting pictures on my Instagram and Facebook of each days unboxing and showing what was inside. We will also share whatever we make with the supplies too.

I hope your week contains many moments of restorative fun! See you next Monday.

Patchwork Poems and a something

A Creative Life, Art Word Combinations, artist book, author illustrator, children's book, handmade books, illustrated poem, illustration, Patchwork Poems, poetry, printed books, Storyberries, whimsical art, words and pictures, writing and illustrating

It’s been a tough week. One friend died. Another is on hospice. I’ve also completed two commissions for holiday gifts and delivered them. So my bandwidth for writing this blog barely registers on the scales. Please forgive me. I’m still playing in my sketchbooks I just find it is easier (and soothing) to actually *be* creative than it is to talk *about* being creative.

The main thing I want to share here with you is that my book Patchwork Poems is now available on Storyberries as an ebook, an animated book and an audiobook – and it’s available as a printed book too! Links are below…

https://www.storyberries.com/bedtime-stories-clancys-patchwork-poems-seasonal-autumn-childrens-poems/

Somehow Storyberries was able to make my book pages be side by side as they are in my original artwork!!

Here’s a look at the videos related to Patchwork Poems which show my original artwork:

On YouTube  https://youtu.be/_hsI__5cJPA

The Instagram Reel https://www.instagram.com/reel/CkzcVR3JTrD/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

A very happy highlight this week was when I was asked to sign books for two twin 4yr old fans of my work!

They had come over to my studio to see this book several times while I was making it! (Their grandparents live nextdoor) The kids are both quite helpful editors! The first time they saw my original artwork in progress I had done perhaps half of the book. I read some of the poems out loud to them. They seemed pleased! However there were blank pages. They pointed at the blank spots. “You’ll do a something here right? And here, and here, and here? A something?” I said that I would. They came back over the very next day. “Did you finish our book yet?”. I explained that these things take time to do, sometimes months, but that I was working as fast as I could. A month or so later they came over for a visit. “Did you finish our book yet?” This time I said that I almost had and would they like to see it? They looked at it with me and took turns very gently holding my original book (it’s the size of a credit card) and opening it carefully. The covers were still blank at that time. “You’ll do a something here right?” I said yes, and that it would become an ebook and a printed book too so even after I finished the original book covers there was still work to do before it was ready. “But there will be a something everywhere right?” They asked. I said yes.

Here below is a look at the printed book Patchwork Poems. It’s much larger, 8 x 11 inches, than my original artist book which is 2 x 3 inches. As per both of my 4yr old editor’s suggestion I made absolutely sure there is “a something” on every page! The magazine style format lets me do that so that’s one of the reasons this book is so much bigger than the original artwork.

Here’s a link for the printed book: https://www.blurb.com/b/11318282-patchwork-poems

Thank you in advance for sharing any of the above Patchwork Poems related links. Thank you most of all for staying as healthy and as happy as possible. I’m glad and grateful to you for reading my work and for your comments!

See you next Monday – with a something…

A hearing book and the cookbook is out!

A Creative Life, art gallery, art techniques, artist book, artistic inspirations, author illustrator, book design and layout, books, collage, creative thinking, drawing as thinking, handmade books, illustrated poem, illustrated recipe, illustrated shorts, illustration, Kim Cooks Sue Draws, mental health, poetry, publications - publishing, recipe illustration, sketchbook, visual thinking, words and pictures, writing and illustrating

Recently a friend asked if I had made a book about my hearing experiences. Yes! In 2003 I made a one-of-a-kind book titled “Book Of Days And Ears”. It measures 3 inches tall 6 inches wide and is one inch thick. When fully opened it is a smidge more than 12 inches wide. The leather covers and the pages are hand sewn together with a Coptic stitch. This book binding style allows for page expansion, letting me sew additional elements into the binding and do thick collage applications on the pages themselves while still enabling the book to close.

Book of Days and Ears begins July 31 2003 and ends Oct 10 2003. It is a diary or journal style book with the date stamped on each entry. The entire book took place when we lived in Oklahoma and the main content, the overall “plot”, of the book is dealing with my hearing aid issues over the span of 3 months, trying to contact the hearing aid company and fussing with the mean dragon lady who worked there. The other staff were nice (nicer than others I’d encountered in Oklahoma) but during visits I had to get past dragon lady first. Here are just some of those pages.

Part of how I dealt with the hearing issue saga was through various art projects which I recorded in my book: paper marbleling sessions of which I sewed samples into the binding, letterpress and block printing project samples were glued onto the pages, art exhibits were documented by collaging parts of the event announcement on a page or actually sewing the event flyer into the binding. Here are a few of the art project related pages.

Of course in and amongst the pages shared above there are visits with friends, the death of a mentor/friend (the book artist and author Shereen LaPlantz), visits to bookstores and restaurants. And board games like backgammon which are ways to interconnect with people that don’t rely solely on the spoken/heard word. Here are a very few examples of this kind of page entry.

Here’s a video flip through of Book of Days and Ears https://youtu.be/2It3Vjl_Eao and me talking about it. You can see some book pages not pictured above. Did I mention that I talk about the book in the video? No, I couldn’t hear myself talking. I showed the video to my wife for sound checking prior to putting it on YouTube. Brave and cheeky of me eh? 😆😁

Fast forward away from 2003 Oklahoma to present day 2022 in Washington state and as I wrote last post… my current hearing aids stopped working and I visited a local hearing aid center, Vancouver Hearing Aid Center. Things are vastly better now: there is a button and a window in the hearing testing area, there are zero dragon ladies to deal with (Wow! An absence of mean dragons!!!), my supportive spouse is allowed to be with me and clear time tables, contact information etc details are given in written form! It’s almost as if they recognize that their clients might not hear well! Imagine that?! Anyway, I am still profoundly deaf just as I was in 2003 and as I was at age 8 see the hearing test chart below.

Very loud drum roll please!! The cookbook I’ve been illustrating is now available! It is titled Kim Cooks Sue Draws and can be gotten in person at Chef Kim Mahan’s culinary Class Cooking which is part of the winery Burnt Bridge Cellars. It is also available for shipping or as a downloadable pdf file from this link https://www.blurb.com/b/11301105-kim-cooks-sue-draws

Progress has happened on my upcoming illustrated poetry book for Storyberries! Here are a few of those original pages.

I have finished the 3D block now and titled it “Dogs On The Block”. More photos will be taken, it will be varnished and delivery to the Caplan Art Designs gallery arranged. So more still to do.

This current hearing aid repair season (Ha!) we’re playing dominoes as well as reading books each evening. So I’ll leave you with the action packed photos below and see you next Monday!

Perceptions, a poem, art projects and hearing

A Creative Life, art exhibit, art gallery, artist book, artistic inspirations, author illustrator, books, children's book, dog portrait, fine art, gift books, illustrated poem, illustrated recipe, Kim Cooks Sue Draws, kitchen art, mental health, Odditerrarium, poetry, reading, sketchbook, words and pictures, writing and illustrating

My Gallery owner Amy at Caplan Art Designs had the idea to pair photos of the pets that inspired my Odditerrarium series portraits alongside my paintings! I swear I am so grateful to have her expertise! Two heads really are better than one sometimes.

The gallery has started doing posts like this. Isn’t this nice?!

I quickly followed her lead adding additional information such as how, like in this cat portrait, I refer to previous portraits I’ve done of this cat as well as alluding to other things relevant to the life of this cat and human. For all of my portraits I like to include something from the lives of pet and person. In this way my paintings can become a visual story.

As I wrote in my last post my hearing aid in my “good” ear had a problem. We went to the hearing aid repair place in hopes they could repair it while we waited. No luck. They asked me to leave it for a few days to see if another tech wizard could work a miracle. No luck again. So, long story short, when you’re reading this blog on Monday I’ll be at the audiologist getting a new hearing test, an evaluation and recommendations re hearing aids. Please wish me luck in the comments below!

Consequently this week has literally been quiet. I sketched a lot, much of it about perceptions, in my sketchbook as a self comfort. I shared the sketchbook pages in my email newsletter.

I read a lot, mostly Donna Leon mystery novels as I love those! Hearing is no issue when reading a book! Reading books was how I dealt with being a deaf child too! Here’s a picture of hearing-aid-less me in front of my books to cheer up by shelves (details here)

Luckily since I’m self employed hearing isn’t much of an issue really. My spouse and I now have either have a conversation or we do things, like cooking, we can’t do both at the same time as we did before. But that’s given both of us more attention to the conversations themselves and that’s been enjoyable!

I’ve also focused on my work and in the quiet I’ve made major progress on the cookbook I’m illustrating for Chef Kim Mahan of Class Cooking! I’m planning/hoping that will be available in early November in time to be a gift book for the holidays.

Here’s one part of the illustrated poetry book for children that I’ve been working on for Storyberries. Progress here!

Progress has been happening on my 3d box project too. As I worked on this side of the box cube I remembered to take photos of my stages of work! Aren’t you proud I remembered?! This box is being painted in acrylic so it will be durable enough to be in a kids room, handled, sat on etc.

One of my friends, Becky Ross Michael who writes a wonderful blog Platform No. 4, asked me last week if I had ever done an artist book about my hearing experiences. I have!! I will rummage around for it and take photos or do a video of it for sharing here next week.

See you next Monday!

Odditerrarium opens this week and other projects

A Creative Life, art exhibit, art gallery, artist book, author illustrator, books, fine art, handmade books, illustrated poem, illustrated recipe, Kim Cooks Sue Draws, Odditerrarium, pet portraits, poetry, printed books, sketchbook, whimsical art, words and pictures

My Odditerrarium fine art exhibit opens this Thursday Oct 6 from 6 to 8 pm at Caplan Art Designs! It’s been fun to think so much about what dogs and cats might think about! I hope others are amused too.

I’ve enjoyed titling paintings in ways that refer to aspects of mental life. Sometimes, like this painting below, I’ve been rather straightforward. This painting is titled “Intellect”.

Here’s a look at the exhibit in the process of going up on the wall at Caplan Art Designs. The gallery kindly sent me these photos. You can see more about my entire series here on my portfolio and I’m still very proud of the nonsense poem book related to my exhibit! Yes, copies of my book will be available at the Gallery and also available online here – with a full preview of the entire book too.

On another gallery wall there are 3 of my other paintings from other series.

Here’s a kid looking at one of my paintings before it got moved to a different place in the Gallery.

On my email newsletter recently I shared a few of the sketchbook pages where I’d thought, with a pen in hand, about thinking.

Over on NIL-TECH they wrote a really nice thing about my currently in progress drawing marathon…please click here to see it for yourself. It’s so nice! <blushing>

https://shop.nil-tech.com/blogs/news/drawing-marathon-with-sue-clancy

Progress has also been happening steadily on my 3d 8 inch cube that I mentioned in my last post.

Progress too this week on the illustrations I’m doing for a cookbook by Chef Kim Mahan. I propped a spoon on a small bowl so I could draw it properly.

For my fans at Storyberries.com this week I filmed a peek at my illustrated poetry book in progress – just in case any kids wonder how a book like this gets made. Here’s a link…https://www.instagram.com/reel/CjDxgGoJ6jN/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

If you saw the above Reel then you’ll recognize the progress I’ve made in the photos below.

If you’re wondering how I’m managing so many projects at one time: I have 3 work stations in my studio. Each project has it’s own area with an art supply taboret between them with my color palettes and brushes sorted for each project. This way the projects and the supplies I’m using for each one are always ready. I’ll take turns working in short bursts almost daily on each project until they’re finished.

My sketchbooks and the art supplies I use for them are much more portable and roam with me from the coffee pot to the breakfast table or outside to our patio.

And here’s hoping the rest of this week goes smoothly for us all. See you next Monday.

This Rabbit some lunch and books

A Creative Life, animals in art, art techniques, Art Word Combinations, artist book, artistic inspirations, author illustrator, books, Books In Art, fine art, graphic design, home hare care, illustrated recipe, mental health, poetry, printed books, publications - publishing, published art, rabbits in art, reading in art, recipe illustration, visual story, visual thinking, whimsical art, words and pictures, writing, writing and illustrating

This week was filled with photographing my illustrations for a new children’s book tentatively titled “This Rabbit” (as I wrote last week). Then I uploaded the photos checking the digital images against the original artwork for accuracy of color. Sometimes I had to retake a photo.

Once all of the illustrations were digitally correct, more or less, I uploaded them into the software I use to make the printed books. My art studio supervisor cat, as you can see, helped with the process.

What I’m aiming for as I process the photos: I want to make an album of my fine artwork that just happens to be for kids. Kids need fine art too, in my opinion. So I’m striving for digitally capturing as much of the range of color and detail in the original artwork as possible. No camera or screen matches the capability of the human eye but I do the best with what I’ve got. I’m also trying to keep the soft feel of the original artwork on the off-white handmade papers.

My root idea with this new book “This Rabbit” is cultivating the skill of enjoying the many things there are to like and do. So that is always in the back of my mind as I work.

Here are the two poem lines I wrote to go with the two illustrations below:

This rabbit likes pretty pearls

This rabbit likes doing curls

This rabbit likes pretty pearls
This rabbit likes doing curls

After the photos of all 32 illustrations were digitized to suit me, it takes me a lot of time to do the digitizing to suit because I am the original Ms. Picky, but when I had the images as I wanted them then I worked on the books graphic layout and design. As I proceed with the layout/design part of this project I may need to take new photos of some of the artwork depending on how they look as I place them side by side in the book design … we will see how things go.

This new book is part of a series of children’s books I’m creating. So it will have a have similar cover design (and other format elements) to fit with the book series. However, for “This Rabbit” I decided to make the illustration images on each page larger, filling two thirds of the page or perhaps a bit more, filling almost to the three edges of each page.

I chose this layout because I’ve included small details within many of the artworks that might be missed if the images were smaller. My poem text is one single line within a small white space on the bottom of each page.

I will serialize some of “This Rabbit” on my Instagram page and give you more details of my working process (and my creative life) here on this blog each week.

Anyway, now you know what a busy week I’ve had. Needless to say lunches were quick-fix affairs. Like this broccoli pasta dish.

Here’s the recipe – a loose guide or philosophy really rather than a recipe. When I made the dish this week I used short pasta and added spinach. But the rest of the recipe was followed. It’s a recipe from my Favorites So Far kitchen sketchbook.

Copies of Favorites So Far are available here:
https://www.blurb.com/b/9759759-favorites-so-far

Despite being busy I still carved out time to read most evenings. In my last post I was still reading “The Mexican Tree Duck” by James Crumley. I finished that book and loved it! I’ll miss the main character Sughrue. Sughrue was a decent guy, a good friend to other characters in the story, someone who cared. I liked that! Crumley’s character and his writing style will be a hard act to follow.

As I cast about for which book to read next I realize that I want another protagonist with a strong decency streak. Not moralistic, self righteous, preachy or anything like that. I want a character who is just plain caring and kind. Even if they have flaws, faults and difficulties I want there to be a core of goodness, a sense of concern for their community, at the heart of the main character.

I’m ready for the good people to win a few … damnit!

So from my book shelves I pulled this book selection for consideration: The Nine Tailors by Dorothy Sayers, Rumpole A La Carte by John Mortimer and Death of A Bore by M. C. Beaton.

A few more cups of coffee and I’ll decide which book to read more of later after my working day is done.

See you next Monday with more of my progress on “This Rabbit”? (And yes…so far my working title has stuck.)

Patch La Belle part 5

A Creative Life, Art Word Combinations, artist book, artistic inspirations, author illustrator, Authors, books, ebook, illustrated poem, Patch La Belle, poetry, visual story, visual thinking, words and pictures

My book Patch La Belle has been officially released on Storyberries! You can see it for free here: https://www.storyberries.com/poems-for-kids-patch-la-belle-childrens-poetry/

The printed book version is slightly different (more on that in a sec) and it’s available here: https://www.blurb.com/b/10351859-patch-la-belle

Here’s a look at the digital files for the front and back covers:

Front cover of Patch La Belle by Clancy
Back cover of Patch La Belle by Clancy

Photography of the pages was a challenge because I wanted to keep the warm creamy tones of the paper on which I wrote and illustrated the poems. I wanted this book to have a nostalgic handmade feel. By and large I’m pleased with how it turned out.

For the ebook version of Patch La Belle on Storyberries.com I was able to have each page of the ebook be 100 percent my hand made pages. Because it’s not a printed book blank pages aren’t needed.

In the printed books I had to have blank pages in strategic places in order for the covers to attach properly. So I used the blank pages as a chance to visually foreshadow what was to come in the book. For example the little illustration on the blank page attached to the cover visually relates to the dedication page:

And the candy on the book info page (above left) visually relates to the page just before the about-the-author info.

There’s also a visual relationship between the characters on the cover of Patch La Belle and two of the poems inside the book. The paintings of books on the list of “other books by Clancy” also echoes one of the poems.

Yes, I tried to rhyme in my artwork as well as in the words of the poems!

I strongly believe that children (all people really) need exposure to all kinds of images including complex images just as they need exposure to all kinds of food including complex foods.

Homemade cookies are often more robust and complex in flavor, more, more full of love, than a box of store-bought cookies.

I like to think of my artwork, my books, as the visual equivalent of a sheet pan full of homemade cookies.

Thanks for following my progress on this project!

If you’re just joining this party – welcome! – there are details about Patch La Belle and links to past posts about Patch located here.

I’ll see you again next Monday. Till then…

Patch La Belle part 4

A Creative Life, Art Word Combinations, artist book, artistic inspirations, author illustrator, illustrated poem, illustrated shorts, illustration, Patch La Belle, poetry, visual story, visual thinking, words and pictures, writing, writing and illustrating

(There’s a surprise inside this blog suitable for all ages) This week has been a flurry of finishing pages, and the cover art for Patch La Belle. I’ve also been doing the graphic design hocus pocus for both the printed books version and an ebook version for Storyberries.com

As per my last post I’m still thinking about the topics of enjoying and trying things:

There’s the trying that is an effort to make something – like a cake or a book.

Then there’s the trying things so as to learn what you prefer – like a type of food or a hat.

Trying things also gives us abstract information about how much food is too much and what time bedtime is.

It’s an important lifelong skill to cultivate the willingness to try things.

Here’s the finished pages (my last several blog posts tell more of my working process)

And here’s a photo of me working on the cover art and finishing a few pages.

Sue Clancy with original pages for her book Patch La Belle

I slipped all the artwork into archival sleeves so the pages could be sorted without risk of damages. Prior to being sprayed with a fixative and varnish the gouache colors could be easily smeared.

I asked my first editor, my wife Judy, what page order she thought was best – and I sticky-note flagged her page order and it was such a good order that I followed it! And if you’re looking at the picture above thinking “that looks like a lot more pages than have been shown on this blog” – you’re correct, I’ve impishly saved some for when the book is formally released.

My desire to hand make all of the words and images for this book has also resulted in a relaxed way of working – everything exists in the real world and can be laid out on a table.

In the past when I’ve done a hybrid of computer typewritten words and hand made illustrations the page sorting and design was more abstracted. But this time everything was made by hand. The “graphic design hocus pocus” that I refer to above is simply the photography of the finished art and laying out the photos in a software package for uploading to Blurb.com the place that will print and ship the books on demand. A different software package is used to make the digital file for the ebook on Storyberries.com [Btw: the art page photos above are just quick pics for sharing here on social media. I have another camera for photos of art to be reproduced]

Here’s the cover artwork as photographed for reproduction. I think I managed to keep the warm tone of the off-white paper I used to make the original artwork. (Yippee!)

Anyway, showing Patch La Belle to the folks at Storyberries.com generated some excitement there! They said “it’s going to be really engaging and the families will spend a long time reading it and looking over the pictures… it’s so beautiful!”

And just the thought of that feels so good!

Surprise! Dear loyal reader of my social media posts here is an early access link to the printed book Patch La Belle https://www.blurb.com/b/10351859-patch-la-belle

The “official” release of this book will be next week with the books release on Storyberries.com – more details here next Monday!

Patch La Belle part 3

A Creative Life, Art Word Combinations, artist book, artistic inspirations, author illustrator, books, drawing as thinking, handmade books, illustrated poem, Patch La Belle, poetry, Sustainable creativity, visual story, visual thinking, words and pictures

As I worked this week on a new children’s book (see my last post) titled Patch La Belle I’ve thought more about the importance of enjoying and trying things regularly.

Too often we expect our enjoyments to be big life changing experiences when in reality a good life is a cumulative of many small pleasant moments. To have a good life one has to be able recognize a pleasant moment when it happens (even in the midst of a pandemic). This ability to recognize something enjoyable, while also absorbing it, is a skill to be learned and practiced all of one’s life.

Anyway, I spent time this week rereading my poetry sketchbooks, thinking, writing notes and sticky-flagging pages. Here’s a picture of two of my poetry sketchbooks. They’re small books, about 5 x 3.5 inches and I wrote in them with a fountain pen

As a way of working creatively I find it helpful to collect a bunch of thoughts into sketchbooks for sorting into something, a published book or an art exhibit, later. (I do a version of this sketchbook method with my fine art exhibits too.)

When I work in a sketchbook it feels random, the thought I’m recording feels unconnected to any future book or exhibit notion. The book or art exhibit ideas come later from rereading the sketchbooks and refining elements from my sketchbook. Essentially every sketchbook is a series of very rough drafts along with notes on what inspired me.

Here’s a page from my poetry sketchbook. Please note the margin notes, my thoughts in connection with my poem effort.

That poem with its marginalia sat for a long time. Months later I tried this effort, pictured below, to shape it a bit… still without a firm plan for what published book or exhibit it might become.

That finished art sat in my files for a while, gathering dust, unconnected to any project.

Then more recently when I was talking with the folks at Storyberries – www.storyberries.com – about formats for doing my words and picture combinations for them I remembered my illustrated giraffe poem and shared it with Storyberries. The above format of my poem it turned out wouldn’t work for my future Storyberries projects. So I shoved it back in my files.

Later on when rereading my poetry sketchbooks for the umpteenth time I came across the original poem yet again. As I reread my sketchbook I’m noting themes; multiple thoughts on a topic. The raw poem and my thoughts that inspired the giraffe poem fit with my reoccurring theme of trying things. Seeing this theme and thinking more on the topic is helping me to organize my current project Patch La Belle. So this week I reworked both the text and illustration for this particular poem.

That format fits much better with Storyberries guidelines and with my desire [more on that here] to do an entirely handwritten book. Now the poem has a place, it has become – at least for now – part of my newest children’s book effort. It will stay there till all of my pages for this project are finished and I reread them and decide what ultimately fits together best.

This project still feels “in flux” and uncertain but I just keep working, trusting that as I bring my vague notions into the real world as touchable objects I can see better what to do with them. My project idea firms up as I work. The trick is to roll with the feelings of uncertainty until that point.

And here are some more new Patch La Belle pages that have been done and redone in similar fashion to what I’ve just described. To save time I’m skipping ahead, omitting the sketchbook draft pages, and showing the finished work here.

I’m sure you’re seeing my working method now. My way of getting a thought outside of my head into a sketchbook, however messily, however vaguely, and then working with it multiple times in multiple ways just to see what it can become.

It’s my way of trying out ideas, of practicing enjoying something, of taking a notion and playfully exploring it. It’s also a way to have a small pleasant moment of fun regularly.

Thanks for reading. See you here next Monday?

P.S. if you’re just joining this party – welcome! – and you can see my other children’s book projects on my portfolio page here.

Patch La Belle part 2

A Creative Life, art techniques, artist book, artistic inspirations, author illustrator, books, creative thinking, ebook, fine art, illustrated poem, illustrated shorts, illustration, Patch La Belle, poetry, printed books, product design, publications - publishing, reading in art, story, Sustainable creativity, visual story, visual thinking, words and pictures

This week I thought about the importance of trying things. So I’ve reread my poetry sketchbook for poems on that topic.

As I mentioned in my last post I’m working on a new children’s book for Storyberries.com titled Patch La Belle. As I work on this book I’m trying several new things but chiefly I’m trying to group many poems and illustrations together with a few themes as organizing factors. This is different from what I’ve done in the past where I did one poem with multiple illustrations as an entire book – as you can see on my portfolio page.

Anyway, here’s the pages I selected from my poetry sketchbook this week:

And below are the finished pages that I hand wrote and illustrated using ink and gouache. I use waterproof ink pens from jetpens.com on smooth hot press watercolor paper. I like the Holbein brand of gouache colors because they’re smooth and have strong pigments.

The watercolor paper I’m using is off-white and I hope that won’t be a problem when it comes to reproducing these pages. But I like the tender nostalgic feel of this paper and will endeavor to keep this soft tone in the final book. We’ll see how it goes. This is part of the risk of trying new things…

Part of Sue Clancy’s collection of poetry books

If I’ve posted the above video correctly you’ll be able to see part of my poetry book collection; books written by many other people, some famous, many not so familiar. My collection is in my dining room where I have breakfast and sketch. I find it soothing to read a short poem or story to start my day. I also have a collection of books containing short stories in the same room but this post is about poetry…so…

When it comes to writing my own poems I like to consult “The Book Of Forms” by Lewis Turco – pick a short poetry format, like limericks or couplets then think of a topic like “trying things” and play with related words and images. Some poems turn out okay, others don’t…the key thing, I think, is the willingness to write badly and trust that I’ll survive. So far that’s been true. And now after several years of regularly writing poems in my poetry sketchbook I’m able to reread it and find a few poems that are fun to illustrate and potential material for a new artist book.

Here’s a mantra I have thumbtacked to my art studio wall

Thumbtacked to Clancy’s studio wall

So I plan to keep working on Patch La Belle this week too. Will I see you here next Monday? Hope so. And I hope you enjoy whatever creative projects you’re working on this week too.