Belonging Somewhere as an Artist
This week, I share my word for 2024 and thoughts about the good and bad in the sense of belonging. I also have a new finished painting!
See more pics at the Taiko art store!
I haven’t used acrylic paints on a canvas for a long time. But now I wanted to paint faster and not wait for the layers to dry.
Painting Freely
This painting took me a couple of long evenings and I deliberately left it abstract, because the subject of the painting is not about the flowers, but about the power rising from the ground.
Here’s how the painting started: loose strokes and juicy colors.
It’s easy to fall in love with colors, but when you want depth, you also need muddy colors: browns and greys.
I like to use several different brushes in one painting, and my favorite brushes are very thin.
The title “Muutosvoima – Driving Force” sums up what I want to tell with this painting. Muutosvoima could also be translated as “power of change.”
I believe that the best power of change is not the hype created by others, but the inner enthusiasm that has a grounded tone. Because isn’t it so that flowers only bloom when the earth warms up? Sunlight alone is not enough.
Belonging Somewhere – The Good and The Bad
I’ve been thinking about togetherness lately. It’s a wonderful feeling. For example, last week when many people commented on my post, I felt happy that this blog brings us together. One of the best things that has come with the internet is that you can be pretty weird and still find like-minded people.
However, the sense of belonging has its danger. Art is about walking your own path. Encounters are important, but you also need to go in the other direction to create something unique. As a teacher, I have often thought about how I could better guide people in their own direction.
Art is like a pot that you have to break first and then put together again. The pot can be broken in many ways and at best, you find your own way to put it together. You need a driving force to break the pot and then persistence to rebuild it.
Finding Your Places in the Art World
In my career as an artist, I have often wanted to be like someone else. I have envied popular artists and then later realized that I wouldn’t want to create the kind of art that they do. I realized that I would like to be popular in creating something else and somewhere else.
With experience, the art world opens up. Instead of one hall, you begin to see numerous smaller rooms. What is popular in one room can be overlooked in another. Being an artist requires a lot of self-esteem and the power to move from one room to another.
When you find one room that feels like your own, the sense of belonging is at its greatest. However, it’s better to move between several rooms and find many groups. At best, the artist acts as a bridge between different things.
My Word of the Year – Do You Have One?
My word for 2024 is Integrate. This year I have allowed myself to do more diverse things, but on the other hand, I have tied all the pieces together so that one benefits the other.
Have you chosen a word for this year? How has it been realized?
Designing Cross Stitch Patterns
This week, I have something very different than before: cross stitch!
Buy my first commercial design Primavera from my Etsy shop called Needle and Peony!
There are two main reasons for designing this pattern. The first is the need for creative play and the second that I couldn’t find anything like this from other designers: a fantasy woman’s facial portrait that wouldn’t be a huge project.
Playing and Drawing in the Stitchly App
My need for creative play comes from being very serious with art this year. I have spent a lot of time in programming computer art and I have been painting a bit too. It’s all great but I started to miss drawing, and especially, making something that is purely illustrative and not so abstract and artistically challenging.
So because I have had cross stitching as a hobby almost all my life, I bought an app called Stitchly and started drawing there – on lunch breaks and such, a few stitches at time. First I just doodled freely with the Apple pen to get to know the app.
Stitchly is easy to use and with the pen, drawing is fun and the squares get filled nicely. Of course, you can also import a photo and let the app create the chart automatically. But to make the image look realistic enough, the stitch count needs to be high and the design … well I don’t think it would be a design anymore, just a pixelated photo. So, when I design, I like to draw with the pen and if I use references, I only use them as inspiration and draw every square myself.
I also like that you can have a custom palette in Stitchly. I have made a palette that has all the DMC colors from my stash, so I can also check the real color when designing.
Drawing and Stitching Faces
When people begin drawing in adulthood, they often start with faces. Eyes, mouth, nose too. Facial features create a connection to the person born on paper. It’s also fun to draw hair and add decorations there.
So, one day it hit me that even when doing cross stitches, I can get company from the character I am stitching. However, couldn’t find a cross-stitch pattern that was a reasonable size and where the character was naturally asymmetrical, but still sparked the imagination.
My stitching time is lonely time in the evening. I clean the studio if I have been painting, and then pick extra glasses and while stitching, watch other cross stitchers’ videos on Youtube, so Flosstube as we cross stitchers call the channels.
So when I wanted to stitch a facial portrait of an imaginary person, I decided to draw it in Stitchly. After making the chart, the fun started – I was stitching my own pattern!
Primavera can be stitched in the colors I suggest in the pattern, but since there are only 11 colors, it’s easy to change them as you like.
Although Primavera means spring, by changing the colors you can associate a different season or different theme with the character. The decorations are designed to be so general that they don’t limit the character you create.
The hair has three colors of different darkness, the skin has four. The hair band has two colors close to each other. It is easy to change the accent colors of the mouth and eyes, and also the colors of the decorations.
You can buy the pattern for Primavera in my Etsy shop!
Needle and Peony
It feels nostalgic to have something on sale at Etsy again! Long before I became a full-time artist, I opened the Etsy shop called Kukkilintu, then later changed the name to Peony and Parakeet. That little shop had a major impact on my career and life. Most of my customers lived outside Finland and I started communicating more and more in English.
Maybe some of the current readers of this blog were my customers over ten years ago when I sold folk bags (currently available as a knitting pattern), handknitted doll clothes, hand-decorated papers and cards!
Now I changed the shop name to Needle and Peony and intend to add some charts over time. Maybe some slow stitching ideas also, as I have some of them too. Last week, I set up an Instagram account called @needleandpeony to show my cross stitch projects – also what I have stitched from other designers.
My other instagram accounts are @peonyandparakeet for fine art, @paivipeony for quilting, and @paivipioni for knitting.
Which Design Should I Do Next?
While designing Primavera, it hit me that I have a pile of drawings that I have made for classes and that could be turned into cross stitch patterns. When I browsed them, I couldn’t decide what to choose next, so I now ask you – what would you like me to design next? I have picked 5 drawings to choose from, leave a comment and let me know which one is your favorite! Which one of these would make a great cross stitch design?
A) Angel
See how I drew the angel in 2022: Angel Drawing for the Inner Child
B) Girl
This flowel girl was drawn for the course Doll World.
C) Cat
This cat was drawn for the course Magical Inkdom.
D) Leaf
This folk leaf is an older design, from 2015. See more: Art Quilts in a Modern Way
E) Horse
This fantasy horse was drawn for the course Magical Inkdom.
Tell me your favorite of the five – A) Angel, B) Girl, C) Cat, D) Leaf, or E) Horse?
Support me in the cross stitch design journey, here’s the link to purchase Primavera!
12 Spring Art Ideas from Over the Years
This week, I share spring-themed art from the past 10 years and give ideas for creating spring art.
There’s a variety of ideas and I hope everyone can find some that inspire to get creating!
#1 – For Beginners and Dull Moments
Doodle spring flowers with the mindset “more is more”!
See the blog post: Subconscious Art
Course recommendation: Collageland
#2 – For Self-Explorers
Express your spring energy by following this step-by-step exercise: Bursting Circle
See the blog post: Bursting Circle
Course recommendation: Inspirational Drawing
#3 – For Free Spirits
Splash color and let everything grow from there!
See the blog post: Art is Freedom
#4 – For Those Who Want to be Freer
When you want to be freer, the art of seeing is as important as the art of creating.
See the video of making “March Still Life”: Painting in Liberated Style
See the blog post: Painting in Liberated Style
Course recommendations: Liberated Artist Revisited and Freely Grown
#5 – For Minimalists
Pick a small piece of watercolor paper, moisten your watercolor pans, and let water do the trick.
See the blog post: Easter Still Lifes in Watercolor – Video Included!
#6 – For Travelers
Paint a spring panorama. More examples: Watercolor Panoramas to Express Travel Memories
See the blog post: Watercolor panoramas to Express Travel Memories
Course recommendation: Watercolor Journey
#7 – For Beautiful Mess-Makers
Beautify the mess by adjusting the details: paint frilly edges and draw fine lines!
See the blog post: Freely Born Watercolor Florals
Course recommendations: Floral Fantasies and Freely Grown
#8 – For Journalers
Decorate a journal cover with your original art! See more instructions in this blog post: Painted Paper Collage
See the blog post: Painted Paper Collage – 6 Tips for Intricate and Fun Art
Course recommendations: Collageland and Decodashery
#9 – For Bird Watchers
Take this challenge to move from illustration to fine art:
Step out of your comfort zone and think about a bird shape as a canvas for expressing its surroundings.
See the blog post: Pros and Cons of Becoming an Artist
Course recommendation: Floral Freedom
#10 – For Art Lovers Who Procrastinate
Reduce watching those photo-realistic colored pencil videos and start coloring freely. One heart shape can lead to many and start your flight to the world of imagination!
See the blog post: 5 Reasons Why I Love Colored Pencils
Course recommendations: Intuitive Coloring and Fun Botanicum
#11 – For Wannabe Fantasy Artists
Find the story first, then its surroundings! A character is not only described by his face.
See the blog post: Wonderland Art – Inspiration from Alice in Wonderland
Course recommendations: Magical Forest and Magical Inkdom
#12 For Artists at Heart
Our creativity has winter and spring too. We need each other to keep the inspiration going – to turn the winter into spring.
A challenge for you: How can you make a new start – create a new spring for your art?
See the blog post: New Beginnings in Art-Making
Course recommendations: Liberated Artist Revisited
Bonus Idea #1: Spring Art Display
Gather your art on a side table for display! Make a collection of all kinds of pieces – even the smallest drawings and collage pieces can look fun this way.
I have a plastic plate that is the same size as my table.
It protects my art, and it also protects the tabletop when painting in watercolor.
Bonus Idea #2: Listen to This!
I also have a music recommendation: “Kevät”
Kevät is spring in Finnish and the song was presented by a Finnish girl band Tavaramarkkinat in 1985. Here’s an English translation of the lyrics. The tone of the song is melancholic. This kind of controversy between melancholy and joy is one of the most inspiring things in spring, I think!
P.S. PostScript for Spring Art Ideas
We still have a lot of snow in Finland, and I miss spring so much! In these spring art ideas, I wanted to combine my yearning for spring and the celebration of being a full-time artist for ten years. The actual anniversary is in September, but I want to celebrate this life span the whole year of 2024.
One part of the celebration has been making the course Liberated Artist Revisited where I invite you to paint with me – to follow directions from Paivi many years ago, and then create more with the current Paivi. At the same time, you can ponder, how your art-making has changed and will change.
Because of the 10-year celebration and the nature of personal stories, Liberated Artist Revisited is a limited edition – only available for purchase until the end of March 2024! >> Buy Now!
Ninety-Ninety Rule for Art-Making
This week, we talk about the agony that’s associated with finishing.
Last fall, I had a turning point when I started making digital art. I’m not giving up painting, though. There will be just fewer oil paintings this year.
New Start
This year’s first oil painting started already in October last year. First, I made a mess with pastel hues. Then I began to figure out what kind of personality the painting could be.
This kind of intuitive painting is wonderful and for example, my latest course Liberated Artist Revisited is based on it. Instead of the model, we study the painting itself and let it go in its own direction.
When I paint, I often listen to some talk or music program at the same time, that’s why the iPad is also visible in these pictures.
Ninety-Ninety Rule
Programming and painting have a lot in common. One of those is definitely the ninety-ninety rule. It states that 90 percent of the work is done effortlessly and takes only 10 percent of the time. And the remaining 10 percent is difficult and takes 90 percent of the time!
For example, in this part of the painting my intuition was working fluently, and finishing these details was also easy. I especially like that beige flower near the edge.
But the further the painting progressed, the less often I worked on it. I wasn’t satisfied with the center and the soul of the painting was missing. I looked at it every day, but all my ideas seemed too ordinary.
Then when I finished the video artwork last week, I suddenly got ideas for the painting. First, I brought similar greenish tones and then, by keeping my mind on the video, I solved the puzzle stroke by stroke!
The name was now easy to find: Käännekohta – Turning Point.
The ninety-ninety rule applies to the fond factor as well. It’s easier to like an unfinished painting than one that is close to a finish. When under 90 percent, you can see the potential and ignore the unpleasant parts by saying that the piece is not ready yet. When working on the last 10 percent, things get more complicated and there are times when you hate the piece!
Old Supports New
During big changes, I have often thought that I leave the old completely and jump fully into the new. But this time I feel that the old and the new support each other.
Life is an interaction between the past and the present and that applies to art-making as well.
Liberated Artist Revisited
With the newest course Liberated Artist Revisited, I invite you to paint with me – to follow directions from Paivi many years ago, and then create more with the current Paivi. At the same time, you can ponder, how your art-making has changed and will change.
Liberated Artist Revisited is a limited edition – only available for purchase until the end of March 2024! >> Buy Now!