The ruminations of an artist on art & life...art quilts, beading, knitting, drawing, painting, printmaking, bookmaking are all my passions, I love to explore creating....

Monday, November 17, 2008

Fire Week and Paper Cutting


FIRE WEEK : Day 17

Banishing the "shoulds" in my life---this was an interesting exercise: take the phrase I should.......
and change it to: I could...but I choose not to at this time.

This made me see in a new way that I was really choosing to not act on some of the "shoulds" in my life at this time...and that inaction is ok for now. For instance--- "I should pack my stuff to move" changed into : "I could pack my stuff to move, but I choose not to at this time." You might try this with the "shoulds" in your life--I found that doing this can be a real eye opener!

Artistically, this week I was inspired by this out-of-print book---which I picked up at a thrift store---

and I created my very first paper cut design--which I titled--"You were born with wings--why not fly?" I chose to use an exacto knife to cut the design out which worked well. The trick is to use a very sharp new blade --and change it often. For the colors, I used gouache piants and painted them on after cutting.


If you like the look of papercutting---there are some interesting blogs on the subject. I love the blog THE HEART OF PAPERCUTS by Elsa Mora---she is the most amazing papercut artist--and has many links to other papercut artists on her blog, also--plus links to tutorials, and supplies.

TODAYS' QUOTE: "You were born with wings. Why prefer to crawl through life?" --Rumi

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

The paper cutting is just gorgeous. What a nice creative outlet.
Changing the shoulds to coulds really is a great little experiment!
Peace~
Dawn

Serena Lewis said...

I figure you must be very patient to do paper-cutting....and you did a wonderful job on your first design!

thanks for the links ~

love, light and peace,
serena

Turtleheart said...

I explored the "should/could" idea today too. It's an interesting new perspective. Are you finding it an empowering change?

Love the paper cut out collage!

Leah said...

what a gorgeous piece you've created! i love the title of it too.

Genie Sea said...

Magnificent! Changing the shoulds to coulds... but choosing not to at this moment, is very liberating :)

Jamie Ridler said...

I found the shoulds to coulds empowering too. And wow, I love that photo!

Suzie Ridler said...

It is an empowering way to change the "shoulds" in life which we have waaaaaaayyyy to many! Beautiful paper cutting idea.

It sounds like the shadow is emerging in your life with your family, that's a hard one. Now that you know, perhaps there is a way to make that better?

Thanks for the positive vibes, I could do with healing energy and I hope that your home is filled with happy pink healing light.