Pushing the Boulder Forward

I realized this morning that I hadn't posted in a couple of weeks.  Why?  I'm not sure because I have been doing a few creative things.  I seem to have lost interest in the Daily Paper Prompts.  I'm not sure why.  I should go back to the list and see if there are any I want to do and maybe that will get me going again.  Here are a few that posted at Flickr but didn't post:

Stitch Paper 

I really hated doing this one.  I started out with the idea to stitch a landscape but half way through I found it to be tedious and in fact I didn't finish it for  a few days.  Once done, it didn't look too bad but I'm not doing that again! 

Ogee Pattern

This one was more my speed.  I drew out this pattern from my area rug.  I painted it in my craft room, doing the colors from memory. It's interesting how I remember the colors brighter than they actually are.  The colors in the rug are blue, brown and green but much more muted.  And I left out beige all together!  

Round

I used the "faded" card as the background for this one.  Worked out great.  I started by painting free form circles, added the blac doodles then used a bottle cap to make the white circles.  I was just making it up as I went along and I like what I got.

Grid

Nothing too creative here.  I was trying to do something interesting with the colors but all I really did was fulfill the theme.  Wish I had tried something more creative.  I could feel myself losing interest in the prompts here...I liked it better with the ICADs when I was just doing what moved me each day.

Saturated Color

I'm always intrigued by the very simple abstract paintings at modern art museums. I think "how did that artist get such a simple painting into a major museum?". You know, it's not as easy as you would think.  Besides the mechanics of creating it there's the whole decision process. Colors and shapes. Composition. Making it interesting. Not so easy! You can't just throw stuff on there...there actually has to be a thought process.  

My thought process here was cool against warm.  Blue/black against orange/red. I like that I thought it out and I do like the that stripe of blue against the warm colors.  River through the desert? Canal through a field of flowers?  Those weren't in my mind when I started this, but that's what I see now. I may try abstract again, but start with a real image first and then turn it abstract.  

The Boulder

So the title of my post was the "Pushing the Boulder Forward". As in, I suddenly came across a boulder in my creative path. In this case, I think it was work. I work in a retail store and both the hours and pressure to meet sales goals is really stifling. I seem to go in two week cycles of happy/unhappy. Something happens that makes me mad/unhappy at work and then slowly I make peace with it and I'm feeling OK about work and then something else irritates me or sets me off.  And over two weeks I make peace with it and the cycle starts again. Each time though, the scar left from the cycle becomes more prominent and the funk is a little deeper. I need to get to happy place and that's not going to happen in this job. In the meantime, while I'm searching for something new I need to reach for my creative tools and use them to lift me up. So really I shouldn't push the boulder forward...I should push it out of may way. And I will!