Checking in with Creative Antics

It occurs to me that I have not done a check in post on my own creative antics for some time now. So here's a quick sum up:

The Ravens Crossing (TRC), the young adult science fiction/fantasy adventure I've been working on with Andi Lea and West Thornhill, is still going strong. We are on week 20 of 21 of the first season, with our big 4th of July finale week right around the corner. Head on over to read Morgan & Holly's story today. And here's the link to start at the beginning and read everything for season 1. There's a nifty story button in the top bar with links to all the weeks in order. Keep a weather eye out for our upcoming anthology scheduled to publish very soon and coming to an ebook provider near you.

I am happily working on several spin off stories from the TRC world that will soon be published by Thursday & Co.. Morgan & Holly will have one, as will Sharon & Alex, and Darien is going on a big adventure with his family, as well. Some of the spin offs are also adult romance. The first of these, called Cory's Pride, is part of the "Love is Always Write" event on the Goodreads M/M Romance Group. They are offering 150 free reads this summer on their group. You have to join to read, but it's totally free of charge. 

The divers story I posted on this site back at the very beginning of Creative Antics time has been getting a serious overhaul. I have changed the story to a linear time-line and worked to bring more depth to the characters. It's a much better story now. I've already created a simple cover for it, which I will unveil as soon as I'm sure I'm satisfied with it. I have to stew on it for a while first. The original title, which I grew to hate, was La Playa Blanca. Then, it spent many months as the story with no name. The new and much better title is Down Deep. My current working plan is to self-publish that story as part of my one year anniversary celebration of this blog, which incidentally is right around the corner in the fall.

Another of my creative non-fiction stories was published over at The Canary by Hip Pocket Press last week, as well. Head on over to read Bonding with Hondo, a true story about some chimp friends of mine.

And, as for the visual art antics. Well, I had a couple of shows and sold a few paintings recently. One is winging it's way to Manhattan as we speak. I'm very excited about that. I'm working on a series of illustrations for a children's story. And, I've been happily deconstructing and reconstructing some of my older abstract paintings into new and interesting collages. So, my antics continue to go strong, and things should be cropping up for sale here and there around the net over the next few weeks. I'll be sure to point you in the right direction when the time comes. 

Thanks to all who continue to support my creative antics. You know who you are. There are not enough words in the universe to describe how much you all mean to me. 

Gotye and the Art of Making Mirrors

While I'm on the subject of deconstruction of art, I couldn't help but think of Gotye, another interdisciplinary artist who has made quite a name for himself deconstructing music, recording samples of it, and building those samples into a magnificent collage of sounds. If you don't know who I'm speaking of, you will most likely recognize this particular song, "Somebody That I Used to Know," Here's the lovely video, which also happens to illustrate the idea of building and deconstructing art. 

I am fascinated with Gotye and his creative process. I particularly love that he is making art from found objects, in a way, by going out and collecting old vinyl albums to sample for his sounds, and then building a collage of unique music with a style all his own. I'm also enamored with the fact that he often incorporates his own and his father's visual art into the making of his albums, not simply using them as inspiration, but also on his album covers, in videos, and as visuals for his tours. There is always a visual element to his work. Here's a short documentary from Gotye's website about the making of his award winning album Making Mirrors. It was filmed and edited by James Bryans and directed by James Bryans and Wally De Backer. 

The Power of Deconstruction: Giving the Muses Time to Think

I've been desconstructing my art these past few weeks. I didn't realize I was doing this at first. I was just deep in my thoughts. This is slowly becoming an accepted part of my creative process. My muses and I have agreed to disagree on it. I would rather we just create happily all the time. They need periods of introspection. They seem to be rather cyclical. Of course, I am fully aware that my muses and I are not separate entities. It's just a nice way of saying different parts of my psyche. Anyway, there are periods where I am churning out more art than I ever dreamed possible. And then, just as suddenly, there are the periods of thought.

They are no less important, these periods. In fact, I would say they are the most important part of the creative process. But, it's taken me some time to recognize that the thinking is just as important as the doing and not just something to place in the category of one more example of my procrastination. No, there actually does have to be some directed thought processes, some contemplation of the actual art projects, and sometimes even some serious deconstruction of things.

Organic Deconstruction #1 by Amanda Corlies SandosSo, what got me thinking about all this process of the process junk you ask? Well, a very overt act of deconstruction happened and I found myself mulling over what I was doing and what it all meant. I was in my studio, feeling very frustrated, once again, over the lack of doing, creating, producing. I get into these, "I'm not being productive," modes where I feel bad about my lack of productivity. And this makes me want to create something even less, and, well, you get the idea. It's a vicious circle. So, in this frustrated state, I pulled out some of my abstract paintings, the ones that I had stopped creating in various stages because they just weren't working. Two of them, in particular, were pissing me off. I guess browns were just the thing to push my buttons. Who knows. So, I took scissors to them. But, as I was cutting these funky shapes, I found myself rebuilding the two paintings that didn't work, putting them back together, and coming up with a collage that rocks. The photos really don't do it justice.

Organic Deconstruction #2 by Amanda Corlies SandosSuddenly, I was productive again. Suddenly, I had something worth looking at from the ruins of two paintings that were making me want to rip my hair out because I couldn't figure out how to fix them. So, high on the success of the first, I took four more failed paintings and turned them into a second, larger collage. I'm calling them Organic Deconstruction #1 and #2. I'm sure there will be more where these came from.

Anyway, I started thinking about this kind of deconstruction process in my writing, as well. And I realized I do this all the time. A story gets to a certain point, and I begin to tear it down. Sometimes only a little, and other times I shred it. But, always, I put it back together into something much stronger than I started out with. And this takes periods of thought. So, now to the part where I allow my muses their time to think without nagging at them to get busy and be more productive. When I have that nailed, I'll get back to you.