Happy 1st year, Art Part!

The Art Part of my Heart was born and my first blog post published one year ago. What a great experience it’s been. I didn’t know what to expect, how things would evolve. I’ve enjoyed writing and have slowly been crafting, honing that skill; it’s been enjoyable to express myself through this medium.

It has helped me find beauty and write about it. I’ve made seeing beauty a daily practice, this helps me keep up the momentum on Instagram where I try and post a photo daily – a little easier than writing.

When I look at my IG gallery – just reached 200 posts – I see this style, MY style, showing through. A consistency, a certain quality….I invite you to check it out! Same name, just add underscores: the_art_part_of_my_heart

When I look back on my 60-something blog posts here on WordPress, I feel a sense of pride. Some of my favorites are: Food for the Heart: 3 movies: one of my earlier blog posts about great foodie movies, Words to Live By: about my love of poetry, and Spicy Salty Sweet: a recipe for glazed nuts that everyone seems to love.   Long Live the Kingsway is about my commute some days to my client’s office on a historical iconic road, Mom, got any books I can read? takes a spin around my library shelves, and Mom-Son, Art-Heart: is about my son recognizing and “getting” what that phrase means….

I recently attended a Vancouver Writers Festival event called “Platforms”. We were treated to a relaxed, candid discussion with our guest authors: Elaine Lui, who is behind the extremely popular blog LaineyGossip.com, and Paige McKenzie, who’s YouTube Channel, The Haunting of Sunshine Girl, has had 150 million views. They have both recently written books (Elaine’s is about her mother and Chinese culture, and Paige’s is a companion book that follows her YouTube video series about a young girl and her experiences with paranormal activity in her Pacific Northwest home).

Of course audience members asked them: What is the secret to success? They answered as others have answered before: hard work, dedication, authenticity, consistency in delivering. I guess it really is one day at a time, one post at a time. One follower, one like…at a time.

Linda Lomelino, a fantastic young, creative Swedish cake maker and photographer/blogger, with 500,000 followers on Instagram, me included, posted recently about her 6^th anniversary doing what she does, saying: “I started six years ago with hardly any experience”…

Perhaps there’s hope for us all! Whatever you do, do what you love. Keep at it. I will too.

Styling in an Instant

I’ve found a new art form. One that is immediate, easy, fun, and infinitely creative.

I worked in advertising prior to returning to school to study design. In design school I found our Theory Plate exercise (dubbed Pinky Plates for the U of M professor who initiated this process) such a fun exercise. It allowed me to use my nascent skills and understanding of the principles and elements of design and put them to work: organizing a layout, finding balance, playing with scale and colour, as well as shape/mass/form.

It’s been a while since then….I’ve spent 25 years as an interior designer by day and an artist by night. In the last ten years, single home ownership and motherhood has taken a lot of my free time – there hasn’t been much space to create art, in the form of painting, although I keep saying “I’ll start soon”.  I’ve realized though, that I have been “creating art” continuously, as I carve out a creative existence and live artfully every day.

I’m loving working on a book right now, which is the documentation of that creative experience, and I’ve chosen this as my priority to pursue right now. I’m really enjoying it. Along with that, and to support that, I’ve been blogging here on WordPress and posting on Instagram. Instagram has opened a door to a whole new world of visuals and inspiration. I’m following food bloggers, stylists, photographers, and foodies from all over the world.

When I first saw some of these stunning images, in particular a gorgeous aesthetic that’s coming out of Scandinavia right now, I thought: “OK! I GET this…I can do this….” It had never occurred to me to take, let alone stage, photos in such ways. Of course at first I thought I would mimic or replicate some of the styles I saw, but I quickly realized that I had my own style developing.

Now I go through my day and I find all kinds of opportunities to capture and document beauty and design. How to show a particular meal in a beautiful way, share a gorgeous view of something, a captivating leaf or flower. It’s made me up my game. And I’ve found that it is second nature, and it flows with ease.

I pull a piece of beautiful fabric for a complementary background, I wander into the garden for something to add that accentuates the visual. I look in the cupboard for a beautiful dish or plate. All this happens in five minutes or so.

I usually lay things out on the back porch, where natural light abounds, but is soft and gentle, without hard shadows. No additional light required, and usually no filters needed….

I find it’s like painting….instantly… I snap a shot or two with my phone. Then, if it’s a meal, I sit down to eat. Maybe it’s a visual blessing of sorts; creating some reverence for the bounty we usually consume in a less mindful state….As I try to eat healthier, slower, more mindfully, I find this practice enhancing that experience.

I dug up my original Pinky Plates, from my first year in design school, 1987. I still like them.

Inspired

I’m having a blast. I’ve gotten organized on Instagram (the_art_part_of_my_heart) and I’m having so much fun, thanks to my friend Alison who showed me the ropes and explained how it works…. She just knew it would be a fabulous medium for me.

Wow! There’s a whole new world out there…I’m exploring food bloggers, stylists and photographers – the Instagrammers I’ve found, from all over the world, are spectacular! I’m in awe and so inspired.

Inspired to play with my blood oranges I was cutting up for a salad last weekend; they were so beautiful…so I grabbed a plate that matched and played with this composition.

I’m also inspired by my wonderful friend, Kathy, who’s doing the photography for my upcoming book. She’s showing me how lovely it is to shoot almost everything in natural light. I’m learning.

Inspired because it’s spring – and the beginning of my favorite six months. What bliss…I will savor each approaching week….and welcome the warmth that comes with the months ahead.

….and thanks Meryl for inspiring me to write this today!