#268 - Draw Something You NeedWhen I first saw this challenge (yes, it was a long, long time ago!) all I could think about was Abraham Maslow's theory of the hierarchy of needs. I wished to illustrate this in terms of the first level of human motivation - as in, we humans most need air, water, food, sleep, etc. I was planning to get quite "cute" about this, but couldn't quite put my finger on how.
Meanwhile, I'd fallen into one of my extended periods of funk, which always coincide with artist's block/existential depression. For me they are one and the same, just something about the way I am wired. So, looking back to the date of my last post here, I "blocked" around Thanksgiving of last year. Between then and now the rest of Maslow's levels, as regards my life, have all been threatened by the depth of my bad moods and miserable behavior. That is to say: Level two - safety, (employment); Level three - love and belonging, (marriage); Level four - esteem (sense of achievement). It's not until the last of these levels - five, self actualization; that creativity comes in, according to the master. And yet for me...
Something I need - hummmmn - at first I thought I would illustrate a still life of art supplies. But I do not need those, I have more than enough. Nor do I need the time to use them, I have that, too. I just need "permission" to get myself into the studio and JUST DO IT!!! Yet I've recently spent seven months spinning my wheels, trying to do only that, and swimming in self loathing all the while and making those around me nuts.
Recently I sat myself down with the least worthy of my supplies stash (Crayola poster paints, to be specific, and toned bristol cover stock) and forced myself to do nothing more than push the paint around the page, and to play. And this came into being, a weird non-symmetrical mandala, which I sort of like. So that's what I need, most of all, to stay sane. Just to do something, anything, to create.
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