Hi everyone! Happy New Year! I hope you and your family are healthy and safe. It’s been a hot second since I have kept you posted. This was a result of trying out new projects and unable to keep them all at once. I had two other blogs prepared before the pandemic erupted in California but they felt out of place. Even as we are entering a second wave, there are some things we know what to expect.
The year 2020 brought aboard many last minutes changes but it also gave us some insight on how adaptable we could be. While to be honest, everything is uncertain, I cannot help but have some hope that it will be okay in the end. It could be better! Somehow, we will make it through. One of the big things I took for granted was human interaction, even though I am perfectly fine secluding myself, I was not prepared to the extent the situation would require.
As a recent undergraduate, the world around me just feels like piles of sand slipping from my hands. At the beginning of 2020, I had most of my year planned out, mainly because I had just enough saved up to visit my fiancée and friends. Early 2020 came around and all plans came to a halt. I then scrambled to reconfigure my plans keeping in mind my home workspace. Like many other people, my day job had us transition abruptly to working remotely. Once an unthinkable possibility, we sought it to happen within weeks.
It seemed like each time, my workspace (both for personal projects and work) kept downsizing which became very uncomfortable to work in the first place. There’s no right way to plan or organize for this drastic change. The most I could do is just evaluate my space and configure it to my new tasks. This also meant that I would have to pause certain projects for the time being until who knows how long.
After evaluating my home workspace, there’s a limited number of things I ended up doing comfortably. Since I could no longer go to the print studio due to the mandatory lockdown, my main attention shifted to illustration and print planning. The number of finalized sketches grew but so did my anxiety. My self-awareness against time became a burden. With the larger uncertainty with COVID-19, there’s the constant fear that I’m against the clock. There’s still so much left to do, see, and create. My fear of having an opportunity taken away just felt like red sirens blaring into a deserted town as I continued drawing. Who am I, but a mere speck, creating among the chaos. What can I do? I create as I witness my town burn, I create like there’s none tomorrow, with a minuscule glint of hope left in my eye as everything crumbles. I continue creating because it’s what remains of me. It will be okay.
Here are some New Year Resolutions ™ and observations I’ve been cultivating since the start of COVID-19 in March 2020:
Yearly Project Planning: Getting Better at Art ™
It’s good to have a long list of ongoing projects so you can just switch over to the next one if you’re not currently vibing with it. Of course, each project requires various amounts of effort and time, but having some long term projects and due dates will work in your favor in the long run. I have several projects that feel too generalized but once I identified some tasks that were manageable, it finally felt like I was going somewhere. For example, I want to get better at art. Where do I begin?
A. Look at current art progress
B. Find 2-3 artist I admire and look at sections that stand out
C. Understand that using reference is a tool to help enforce my mental visual library. It is important to breakdown a 3D space and translate it to 2D.
D. Make my own reference: both photography, and video.
This is a starting point!Being emotionally honest
A. Is going into hyper-productivity just a means of escape?
B. How is a current task draining my energy?Taking breaks
A. Being open to watching new content is also helpful when researching potential material
B. Taking a breather away from the internet/computer. This is especially difficult since my main work switched to working remotely as a long-term solution. But this makes me look forward to going to the office in person.
C. Check in with friends, make sure they are okay and they will do the same to you.Creating art like it’s the end of the world: Critically evaluating Self Indulgence media to keep art practice forward.
A. My drawing mindset was placed on how fast I could get better in art but I was not able to enjoy the process. Since the topics of interest aren’t focused on a related subject, just connect it to a current interest. For example, since I’m in deep hell in Invader Zim, drawing Dib for practicing male proportions is a good segway. Or redrawing my favorite comic panels from manga, therefore I am learning why it caught my eye! Why did it catch my attention? Was it the typesetting, the framing, the flow, the negative space, the emotional buildup?Long term art planning
It’s still too early to say when large gatherings will be allowed again but in the meantime, it doesn’t hurt to prepare for the following:
A. Convention preparation
B. Art grant and residency search
C. Print studio shows
Even though everything is uncertain, continue to plan out your year and projects to keep you in lighter spirits. Keep moving forward, keeping creating, continue to love yourself, and others. Stay safe and warm. I’ll see you soon. 🌟
Zim, Burb, and I
