LifeBook Week 47: Intuitive painting

Week 47 of LifeBook brought us yet another intuitive painting lesson from Chris Zydel.  Interestingly (and alarmingly!), there was no demonstration of the technique, so that we wouldn't be influenced by somebody else's process. I totally understand this angle, however, I was completely lost as to what we were "supposed" to do! But that's the point. I guess: we are not supposed to do anything other than follow our intuition!

 I love the idea of intuitive painting, but I always expect myself to produce something amazing, or at least good. Because of these expectations, I can't really let go and I fall back into well-rehearsed practices, which is the death of intuition and creativity.

At first I thought I managed to get in the "zone" - I was smushing paint around without thinking too much about it. I kept adding layers and I was having a good time. I tried not to think about the outcome. At a crucial point, however, I had to go and pick up my son from school and I inevitably fell out of the zone. I came back home with a clear vision of what I wanted my painting to look like and lost all aspect of spontaneity. As a result my painting ended up looking anything but intuitive. I still quite like it - but it's not what I hoped to achieve.

I haven't given up my quest for finding my intuition. I know it's there somewhere! I'm just not quite ready yet to unleash it. When it's time, I'll open the floodgates! For now here are some photos of my (non)intuitive painting process. I abandoned my intuition around the time the blue layer appeared, which is when the painting became more calculated.