Day 7 Prompt: Let’s Face It

Choose how you interpret this prompt. Focus on faces OR face your inner critic. Which feels juicier today? I can’t wait to hear about it or to see what you come up with.

In a way today’s piece did both things for me. I painted one face, covered up two faces and faced my inner critic all in one journal spread. Not a bad days work!

A little history if you will. I’ve been fascinated with painting and drawing faces since I had my first sketchbook. I have a vivid memory of one of the faces I painted in first grade, but I’ve been largely unhappy with my results since then. Thanks to some intuitive painting during the last Painting the Feminine Workshop with Connie Solera, I’ve been feeling more comfortable with the process of painting faces. The workshop isn’t about faces but that’s one of the things that came up for me during the painting/learning process. (Side note in case you’re interested. The latest 21 Secrets is all about faces. I’ve already signed up and can’t wait!)

For whatever reason, the inner critic was strong today while I worked in my art journal. It’s usually a space where I play and experiment and things work – or they don’t – and either way is fine. Today the inner critic was sitting on my shoulder and boy was she having a field day. I’ll spare you the running commentary, but it wasn’t pretty and it ended with “You can’t share that with everyone!”

Well, I AM sharing it because I painted over all her mean comments on the right page (I still see a hint of a face) and I left the face on the left page. It’s really a win-win because I chose to interpret the prompt both ways!

I hope you’ll make time to create today.