The Creative Identity

Two Artists

When I used to put together The Creative Times, I enjoyed looking for news and talent enormously. Now that I do not any longer, at least for the foreseable future, I have realised that I have missed the opportunity to tell you about two of my favourite creative girls. Memi The Rainbow, also known as an Italian in Paris, is the blog of an extraordinarily creative girl who is extremely handy with stamps and inkpads. Do you, like me perhaps, have a collection of stamps which you can never quite tell what to do with? Well, Memi is better than that; not only does she always know where to use her stamps to wonderful effect, be this on paper, objects or fabric, but she actually devises her own. Her blog is all about the creation of rubber stamps, which she designs and then hand-carves, and she also provides truly interesting snippets of information on Paris. She has an Etsy shop and is extraordinarily prolific. Over the years she has produced wonderful seasonal collections and has modified her output according to some brilliant life events, notably having acquired Fifi, an adorable little dog, and having become the mum of Gemma only a handful of months back. You can read an interview with her on Etsy too. I've been following her work for many years and I am always surprised and delighted by her creations. She is a wonderful artist. By contrast, someone I've only recently started to follow is a wonderful... Read more →

Liberate Your Art – Part II

This update on the Liberate Your Art postcard swap is tragically long over-due. I was supposed to link back at the end of August but those of you who remember that my birthday falls soon after will most likely understand that sitting down to do any work whatsoever at that time of the year is about as probable as finding a reliable plumber. Days are presently ticking away very fast and all I am working on are my notes for the next issue of The Creative Times. Meanwhile, somewhere in the world, someone is shading the logo I've chosen to go on the next set of anthologies (email me G!). These are the beautiful postcards I received: Top left: by Joelle (I hope that I can make the writing out correctly!) in the USA Top right: by KC O'Donnell Bottom right: 'Stitch Microscope' by Fiona at Naperie Bottom left: 'Clam Beautiful' by BleuOiseau Gourd Art by Tracy Kat's own postcard, a thank you gift to all participants I loved receiving these, especially now that I've gone paperless with all my bills. I just don't get anything (apart from Vogue) through the letterbox and, quite frankly, some post that was addressed to me as a person and not as a taxpayer or individual-to-spam-at-all-costs was immensely uplifting. Kat will run this swap again next year, hence I urge you to sign up too if you'd love to receive some Real Post. The cards are all sitting on my desk in my blue... Read more →

Liberate Your Art

I haven’t just been reading over the past couple of weeks or so, oh no. I’m tying up lots of proverbial loose ends insofar as a couple of projects are concerned, I am getting started on another two or three and I am also finally focusing on gaining a little more visibility in my visual arts-related endeavours. In a sense, all of this overwhelms me slightly. I am not a person who thrives on burning out and, stupid as this sounds, there are people who do just that. Give them more to do and they’ll be ever more fired up, more focused, more switched on, more able. Cast me in the multi-tasking arena and I’ll fight it all the way, cursing myself to boot. Hence this Bank Holiday weekend saw me focused on one thing only, the Liberate Your Art Postcard Swap organised by Kat of Kat Eye Studio. It did help that the weather was propely Mancunian (which, for the non-Mancunian among yourselves, means proverbially shit, cold and wet) and that all I really wanted to do was cracking open my new set of Staedtler Triplus Fineliners while watching DVDs. During the week I am constantly torn between the writing/editing I need to do and the writing/drawing I want to do, and I must confess that reaching a time compromise for the latter is not coming easily. So weeks ago I signed up for this fabulous new project because there is nothing like a nice fat deadline to get... Read more →

Fashion Designers' Sketchbooks

A couple of weeks ago I settled down with British Vogue fresh off the letterbox. I really do think that British Vogue is the best English-speaking Vogue there is by many miles, but I cannot say to be that enthralled by Cheryl Cole and Victoria Beckham occasionally gracing its covers. I think they are two chavs who epitomise all that is crass with society but, of course, I do read every single line of Vogue, hence I also came across Posh Spice's interview. In it she proclaims, 'Look, I don't draw, but nor do lots of designers.' Gosh, don't they really? Or was she referring to the 'designers' who rapidly copy what's marching down the catwalk so that cheapish versions appear on the high street a mere six weeks later, in Zara and Marks and Spencer? I thought that Posh epitomised the transliteration of the adage a little knowledge is a dangerous thing when she spewed that she doesn't read books, only magazines. I guess the crux is there and then dear reader: if you only read magazines how would you possibly know that designers are very often illustrators (Lagerfeld, for example) and very accomplished artists whose drawings are legendary (McQueen, Manolo, Dior)? It so just happens that yesterday I was dragging my heels in my local library and spotted one of those stellar books one could use as voyeuristic entertainment and/or immense inspiration. Fashion Designers' Sketchbooks, compiled by Hywel Davies, is a fabulous book if you're interested in illustration,... Read more →

How To Draw

Of course both you and I know that no book about drawing will ever replace Danny's book in my heart, for the multitude of reasons I talked about in the past. This doesn't mean, however, that I do not cherish other books about drawing, especially the ones that are not airy-fairy about it. As you must have realised by now, I dislike airy-fairy, for it is a philosophy that discounts the sweat-aspect related to drawing (and writing if we're talking about writing). More and more people (self-fashioned 'experts', usually) proclaim that there are no rules and that the only rule worth following is that no rule should be followed. But this is likely to build false expectations. Imagine that! Someone tells you that YES of course YOU CAN and that YES of course YOU WILL because YES I did it just by sitting at the kitchen table, two evenings a week and LOOK AT ME NOW I got the publishing deal/the exhibit in the gallery/the sales through Etsy and so on and so forth. But what happens when you try the same and it doesn't work for you? Hurts, doesn't it? That's because these 'experts' I am telling you about never ever talk about the Hard Work involved in hitting one's goals. They paint everything with this rainbow brush that gives you a picture filled with unicorns and fairies that never ever tells you a thing about the fear, the problems, the worries, the difficulties, the re-writes, the corrections and... Read more →