March 9, 2025
Good morning everyone! This weekend got a bit busy, so I am a little late with these Studio Notes. But I’ve got some good stuff to talk about with you today!!
As I’ve been back in my studio for a few sessions now, I am slowly getting used to it again. While it hasn’t been as smooth a transition as I’d been hoping for, it feels so good to have this space for painting once more.
In these Studio Notes, I talk about balancing studio and desk work once more, and what I’ve found works for me in this time of my life. I then talk about sunlight, how I’ve been seeing its effects as winter loosens its hold on the land and spring is starting to show. And finally, I talk about inspiration from a recent book and how it’s affecting my work.
Also, a quick note in case you missed my last email, my shop is now open! Lots of new prints, poetry postcard prints, and more. It is all up on my website, so take a look if you’re interested!
Other than that, settle in and keep on reading!
I am so happy to finally have the privilege of finding the balance between studio work and desk work. I started this week expecting to be able to spend a whole day down in the studio. I was so excited.
Unfortunately, that did not quite turn out the way I was hoping. I think it was a bit like trying to go for a long run to jump back in, when you haven’t gone for a run in months. It didn’t work out so well. While I still had fun, I just had a hard time knowing where to start.
So, for now, I’ve decided to take it easy starting studio work once more. I’m going back to my tried-and-true routine. I get up early to drink coffee and read as the sun rises. Then I head to my desk and get those admin tasks done right away. I find it harder to focus on these tasks, and my focus is best in the morning, so it’s most efficient to do these right away.
However, I think I’m learning that although my focus is best in the morning, that doesn’t necessarily mean my creativity goes along with that. I actually find it very easy to paint in the afternoon, when I don’t need as much discipline or focus. My studio (as I talk about below) is a lot harder to get distracted in than on my desk at my computer. Also, in the afternoon the sun streams into my studio, and it’s a lot warmer, so it is a lot more comfortable to open my studio door.
As always, I will continue to experiment with my schedule to find the one that flows the best and has the least amount of friction. I am so happy to have this studio space and time to paint once more!
(Here’s a sneak peak at the beginning layers of a new painting I started last week!)
I’ve never realized before just how much sunlight affects me and the world that surrounds me. As the days are growing longer once more, and the constant cloud cover is breaking up more and more, I find within me a renewed energy. It comes out in my journals, in the free-flowing of ideas, and in my canvases. More light, more energy, and more movement, coming alive with the green shoots in the field.
I’ve always tended to lean more towards playing with light in my paintings, and now as I reflect on this energy and lightness, I realize that I’ve always been this way. I tried to convince myself out of it in the past, arguing that winter was my favorite season: I love snow, I love being cold, I love the dark cozy nights curled up under a blanket with a good book. But, as I experience the changing of the seasons with more intentional mindfulness, I realize that, like everything in this world, there is a balance, a cyclical nature to it all. These trees and plants need winter to survive, but they also need spring. They need the sun. Just like me, and everyone else.
I want to explore this more moving forward. My studio has a garage door that opens up into a beautiful view of the field, and it faces south, towards the sun. Which might not be best in terms of consistent light (you always hear you need north-facing light for professional painting studios), but it is best in terms of letting in that energy, that lightness, that movement into my studio and letting it dance with me and upon the canvas.
I also moved my desk to face the bigger windows in my house, and that simple change has drastically increased my productivity and ease of working on my tasks at my desk.
I want to carry intention with noticing the light and how it makes me feel, and see it in my paintings, and dare to explore it further. This is the season we are in, right now, and I realize I owe it to the authenticity of my work that explores the natural world, to heed the seasons outside and inside.
Through rereading The Creative Act, one of the areas of thought this week we covered was Inspiration. Now, inspiration is not the end-all-be-all of a creative practice. In fact, only relying on inspiration is a sure way to have creative block, de-motivation, and more. However, when inspiration does strike, it is telling you something, and you’d better be ready to heed its call.
Now, I have a little story to tell about inspiration this week, how I heeded its call. And this all started with (surprise, surprise, I know) a book.
Wild Dark Shore is my favorite author, Charlotte McConaghy’s, newest release. It came out on March 4, and I don’t know for sure, but there is a good chance this book changed the course of my life.
Charlotte McConaghy weaves through her novels strands of human connection, character growth, and raw emotion against the backdrop of a changing, dying planet, tied together with themes of grief and trauma. And yet, despite the darkness, hope and light shines through in the beauty of the natural world and the wildlife within it.
When I say I want to be a novelist, I mean I want to write novels like Charlotte McConaghy. She has three published, and each one has a hold of my heart and speaks to my soul. And through reading her latest, I felt a fire of inspiration.
It struck me, and I had to get it out of me. And now it looks like this:
A solid plan to self-publish my own chapbook, within the next few months.
A rediscovered want to take apart and put back together a rough first draft of my novel, To Swallow the Sea.
The need to explore these themes and emotions on the canvas, in my paintings.
So thank you, Charlotte McConaghy, at reminding me my passion for words in accordance with our natural world. I cannot wait to see where this takes me, but I am certain, somehow, someway, I am meant to be both a writer and an artist.
That’s about it for this week! The next couple weeks I will not be able to spend much time in my studio. I’ll be camping (hopefully with lots of plein air painting!) and then traveling the week after. But I will still have lots to talk about in my next Studio Notes, so stay tuned!
As always, thank you so much for reading, and I hope you have a wonderful rest of your week!
Also, one last reminder that my shop is open! Click the link below if you want to check out the new prints, poetry postcard prints, and more!
~Anna
