December 2024: For fun ✨

One way that I foster a creative-block-resistant practice is to have yearly rhythms to my art. In the spring I paint flowers, in the summer I paint self-portraits for my birthday, in the fall I paint a new series of large pieces to sell around the holidays, and then once the holidays are here and things with the shop start to settle down, I put on Christmas movies and eat cookies while I paint wintery things.

Painting seasonal subjects is a way that I use art to stay connected to the moment, as well as to welcome an open stream of new ideas. Looking for seasonal subjects invites us to try out making images that we otherwise might not.

I follow a number of artists who have a favorite winter/holiday subject and the tradition of seeing their new but familiar work each year feels cozy. (The first two who come to mind are @jeremy_miranda_ and his nocturne string lights, and @teddiparkerart and her baubles and ribbon.)

My wintery sketches are no where near as cohesive and beautiful as theirs, but I still find that making them plays an important role in making this dark and quiet time of year merry and bright, as they say.

Since this kind of art is outside of the work that I now make "professionally" – I don't sell this, it's not part of my "brand" or the kind of work people expect from me – it feels like the kind of sketching I started out with a decade ago. It's not ambitious, and it's not serious. I'm not doing it to explore deep feelings or to heal from trauma or to tell a story. I'm not even really trying to learn or improve. I'm just doing it for fun.

Last December my focus was shifted toward some health crises in my family, so I ended up spending time out of town and away from art and missed out on this tradition. This year, I really wanted to reconnect. I often paint from reference photos on royalty free sites (if you missed it, I did a whole series of posts on reference photos back in May, starting with this one), but this year I tried setting up my own.