Many artists, designers and crafts people struggle for inspiration and creativity at some point during their design processes and thoughts. With me being one of them recently, I dug out this book by Carolyn Genders – Sources of Inspiration – a brilliant visual source for applied artists working in any medium.
I usually find that looking through my collection of books gets me going, and new ideas begin to flow. After having a good flick through the pages and taking in all of the influential images in this book, I’m starting to feel really inspired and excited to start making new work again, which is about time considering I need to get a move on with my Christmas stock! Look out for my latest work over the next few weeks.
Carolyn Genders is a ceramicist herself, so I can really relate to a lot of the things she writes about. What I am most impressed by are her sketchbook pages, which she shares in snippets and shows how images can be visually abstracted and then refined and developed to create other beautiful patterns, designs and forms. The result is not only a useful guide to how the creative process works but also a glourious sourcebook of images, of both natural and manmade objects.
I really like these pages below, full of colourful observational drawings of pumpkins and gourds, all generated using different drawing techniques.
Talking of pumpkins…!
These 3 beauties were taken off the vine last week. They weigh a tonne! Does anyone know why 2 of them haven’t turned orange? I think it’s because they didn’t get as much sunlight. They are now in the conservatory so will still get some sunlight, but I’m not sure if they can still turn orange at this stage? Pumpkin soup will be on the menu in a few weeks, and 2 of the pumpkins are going to be carved out at Halloween. I found this site for pumpkin carving ideas which looks quite interesting.
Watch this space for carved pumpkins!
Oooh I love my pumpkin soup – I'll pop around in a couple of weeks for some! They look great pumpkins too. I think they might ripen a bit more if you leave them somewhere warm & sunny, a bit like tomatoes I think – though I'm not an expert!