Posts in Category: Dear Creative Heart
The Battle of Creative Courage
Dear Creative Heart,
This is the time of year that I am spending hours in the studio fighting the battle of creative courage. It is the time of year when all the time spent dreaming and reflecting about what I will be creating in 2017 starts to unfold.
When the sun is shining and light is pouring through the windows of my upstairs sunroom studio, it helps me to find the inspiration to put the brush to canvas.
You can also find me this time of the year in my basement studio. This is a much bigger space so I have room for canvases in various stages from beginning to end. Some are drying from a layer of gesso which is the very first layer I apply to canvas. Some canvases have just had the clear line work laid down, and some have reached the finishing stages-ready for the sides to be painted and the multiple protective layers of isolation coat and varnish to be applied.
So many pieces are in progress right now…but still I work from this place of not knowing. It is in this place of not knowing where the battle of creative courage intensifies on an hourly and daily basis.
This is the place where I have to remind myself time and again that listening to what is in my heart is the way to taking the next step.
This is the place where I am deeply grateful that I have to opportunity to wrestle with translating thought, feeling and experience to the canvas in vibrant color.
Keep creating friends.
Keep ushering art into your life in all its various forms.
Look for the light, it is waiting to be found.
With Passion,
Melynda
New Year and New Art “Unraveled”
“Unraveled”
Detail of first painting of 2017
48 x 36
Acrylic on Canvas
Melynda Van Zee © 2017
Dear Creative Heart,
This new year has brought the first large painting of the year “Unraveled”, the beginning of a new body of work, local art exhibits and an “art show application season” in full swing. It is hard to believe we are already a month and a half into the new year.
“Unraveled”
Detail of first painting of 2017
48 x 36
Acrylic on Canvas
Melynda Van Zee © 2017
Hard at work in my Downstairs Studio
Winter days in the studio are finding me adding a layer of gesso (white undercoat layer) to canvases, designing and laying down the line work for new pieces and applying to 2017 art shows.
As you can see…canvases are spread out everywhere this time of year…
Melynda Van Zee Art exhibit at Edgewater Retirement Community in West Des Moines, IA.
I’ve also been enjoying sharing my work in some local art exhibits over the winter months. I’ve shared my artwork in a retirement community, an art center members show and a coffee shop. It is one of the best joys of being an artist to share work in places where people congregate as a community for fellowship, healing, growth and conversation.
“My Everything” by Melynda Van Zee Ankeny Art Center Ankeny, IA
There are many different responses we can choose when facing the multitude of changes, transitions, fears, and unrest that we have been dealt as a nation. One of the things I have decided to do is to choose creating and sharing art- focusing anew on creating beauty, joy, vibrant color, hope, and community.
“Emerging Through” by Melynda Van Zee
Ankeny Art Center Ankeny, IA
I’ve decided…
- to commit to picking up my brush again
- to commit to expressing my own creativity
- to commit to growth that comes from reflecting deep within
- to commit again to inspiring those around me to express the fullness their artistic creativity
With Passion,
Melynda
“Spheres of Completion” by Melynda Van Zee Ankeny Art Center Ankeny, IA
Collaboration
Collaborative Painting for Paintpushers “Collision” Show
36 x 36
Acrylic on Canvas
Artists Chris Vance & Melynda Van Zee © 2016
Dear Creative Heart,
Over the past few months I’ve been working on a collaborative painting for our yearly Paint pushers show. I attend a monthly critique group with artists from the central Iowa area and once a year we create an art show together. The goal for the show this year was to pair two artists together to collaborate together to create a 36 x 36 piece of art. Each individual artist was also to paint 3 10 x 10 pieces of work to hang alongside of the collaborative piece so that viewers could see the individual styles. We could also create individual smaller works to be hung on walls with the work of all contributing artists blended together.
First layers on collaborative painting
At our monthly meeting in April we drew names out of a hat to decide which artists would be paired together for a collaborative work. I drew the name of artist Chris Vance and we began the collaborative process this fall. Chris typically paints on wood panels so he provided me with the 36 x 36 wood panel and I began the piece by laying down line work with polymer medium. I added a thin glaze of fluid acrylics in turquoise and golden yellow colors and then made myself stop and turn the painting back over to him.
In the middle of the collaborative painting process…
After he finished his first layers, we traded the piece again and I set to work adding multiple layers of translucent fluid acrylics. When finished with my layers, I gave the piece back to Chris to add the final details.
Collaborative painting by Chris Vance and Melynda Van Zee
10 x 10 paintings on the left by Chris Vance
10 x 10 paintings on the right by Melynda Van Zee
Friends- Collaboration can be a very useful tool for your work. To let someone else interact with your work while it is being created…to give up control…to release a specific outcome…to not know the final direction…to interact with changes as you go…to wrestle with variety of techniques or art supplies…to face the challenge of colors or vision for a piece…to work with someone else who is not you with different viewpoints, skills, technique, ideas…this is the world we live in. Working together makes us stronger, brings new energy, stretches our flexibility muscles, teaches us new skills, and helps us to see our work in new ways. Collaboration may not be without anxiety or frustration. It will probably push us out of comfort zone. But, I encourage you to look for opportunities to collaborate in your world. If we as creative individuals are going to face the challenges put before us in this generation, we are going to need the skills to collaborate with a wide variety of individuals across our cultural landscape.
With Passion,
Melynda
“Collision”, a Paintpushers collaborative showcase, hangs from now through Jan. 2 at the Des Moines Social Club with purchases made possible through the Viaduct Gallery.
Do you have any paintings in neutral colors?
Horn’s Ferry Bridge #1
24 x 30
Acrylic on Canvas
Melynda Van Zee © 2016
My dearest creative hearts,
I’m sitting at my computer desk gazing out of my window on a gorgeous fall afternoon- it is an unbelievable 72 degrees on Nov. 4. (I am born and raised in Iowa and we are long trained to start most any conversation with a comment on the weather!) And, now that the gorgeous weather conversation has got us going…what’s really on my heart and mind is a recent artistic challenge I’ve been wrestling with.
One question I have been frequently asked is “Do you have any paintings in neutral colors?” Now to be honest- I’ve met these requests to paint with more neutrals with a variety of responses…down right ignoring them, laughing them off, feigning interest while internally shouting “But I DON’T paint neutrals, they are boring”, followed by a crossing my arms pose while internally staking my claim “I paint COLOR!” Occasionally I would let myself wonder, maybe I could try it, but then a whole other host of excuses and fears would rise up. I would worry that in light of my earlier work with bright colors, I “shouldn’t paint neutrals” because it might dilute the signature colors I usually put on my palette. Artists are trained by professionals and gallery owners to do consistent work in a recognizable palette and style so that people can easily recognize the work-deviating from the known can create marketing challenges. But, underneath all the mental gymnastics, what I think was really going on was fear- fears I wouldn’t figure out the technical difficulties of switching to a new color palette, fears the paintings wouldn’t be beautiful (what if people don’t like them?), fears that maybe people would think maybe I was “going through a hard time” if I starting painting gray paintings. Oh- the power of fear to block our creative experiments!
Horn’s Ferry Bridge #3
12 x 36
Acrylic on Canvas
Melynda Van Zee © 2016
I wish I could tell you that I was so self aware that right away I just started painting neutral paintings. But the reality is that I had to personally do the steps to the creative process that I have taught in my classes so many times throughout the years. One benefit of having painted for many years is that I am becoming more knowledgable about my own resistance patterns to creativity. Sometimes I can’t or don’t take the time to step back and figure out what is going on internally, to really digest what truly is getting in the way.
Horn’s Ferry Bridge
Marion County, IA
Completed in 1881
What finally helped to break my creative roadblock was taking a walk to one of my favorite places-Lake Red Rock. I explored again old territory by doing a slow walk across the remaining section of Horn’s Ferry Bridge that still rises above the Des Moines River.
I allowed myself to go and hang out at a place I have been hundreds of times before, but this time I saw it with fresh eyes. I walked the planks searching for inspiration and sure enough I found it-under my feet.
The weathered boards…
the knots…
the lines…
the gaps…
Horn’s Ferry Bridge #2
16 x 40
Acrylic on Canvas
Melynda Van Zee © 2016
The creative cycle going full circle- a problem to solve, making something new from something old, letting the past speak into my future, letting my specific place in this world inform my art and inspire new creative leaps. A settling of my spirit in knowing that this series of work is authentic to me and my story and my places. And, that the seemingly simple requests for more paintings in a neutral color palette took me on a creative ride back to pieces of my own story.
With Passion,
Melynda
You have the opportunity to purchase one of the new “Horns Ferry Bridge” series at any one of these three upcoming shows in central Iowa or by contacting me directly at the studio- just send me an email ([email protected]) if you are interested.
2016 Art Show Schedule
- Santa’s North Pole Show, Booth #413, Parkview Middle School, 105 NW Pleasant St, Ankeny, IA (November 5 9am – 4pm)
- Art on the Prairie, Hotel Pattee, Perry, IA (November 12 & 13)
- Iowa Arts & Craft Show, Varied Industries Bldg, Iowa State Fairgrounds, Des Moines, IA (November 18, 19 & 20)
I’m also working on a collaborative painting with artist Chris Vance for the upcoming Paintpushers show “Collision”. Painting in progress now- make plans to see the collaborative piece and meet all the Paintpusher artists at the opening reception on Dec. 2 at the Des Moines Social Club!
2016 Art Exhibits
- Collision, Paintpushers Collaborative Showcase, Des Moines Social Club,
Des Moines, IA, December 1-31, 2016
Meet the Artists Opening Reception Friday Dec. 2, 2016 5-9 pm