How to Express Yourself in Drawing

Pythagoras, the little white dog from next door that annoys me so much, seems to be disliked by his owners even more. In the sub-freezing temperatures of late, he's been cast outside rather a lot, and knowing that I'm the sensitive artist type he chooses to shiver on my back step not his owners. Weak-willed I let him in. Mistake.

Didn't you love it when you were a kid and drew pictures in the soil with a stick? Or used a magnifying glass to burn pictures in wood? Or set fire to polythene bags so you could drip their rapidly flaming drops onto something to make a picture? And then you grew up and you were supposed to stop.

Well it's all drawing. Making a mark is drawing. Banging a stick off railings that leaves little marks on each one is drawing. Throwing stones in a pond is drawing - bothe the concentric circles of the water, and even the arc of the trajectory of your throw. Making a mark is drawing.

Pythagoras drew when he came into my house. Clearly with an itchy backside, he waddled around on the carpet - a beige colored carpet so popular here in the exciting Midwest. And Pythagoras made his mark. Now I know what we're supposed to do with our thumbs when dogs have problems with their anal sacs, but this is somebody else's dog. And hey, they're my thumbs. So I arrived a different solution. An artistic solution for an artistic problem.

From my box of vinyl LP's - remember them? - I took out a Madonna album that I'm sure I never bought. And I played it for Pythagoras. Express Yourself.

Paul Dorrell says:

Treat all of these clients well, regardless of their monetary status. They'll appreciate that, and will express the appreciation by buying more work, and by sending friends and relatives who will do the same.

Read more...

Free Book for Bloggers

NOTE: On March 3, 2006 this offer was expanded to apply worldwide!

250 copies of Living the Artist's Life are being given to bloggers for free it has been announced today by the publishers. And there are no particular requirements beyond simply being a blogger!

On the author Paul Dorrell's blog there is a statement from Hillstead Publishing saying where to send your email and details of your blog:
Free Book for Bloggers

I wonder if I should get another copy.

Paul Dorrell says

all I wanted to do was achieve new goals, write new books, and start giving back to the society that had made my success possible

Read more...

St. Valentine's Day Tip in 21 Steps

Forgot to get a Valentine card? Don't want to give money to card companies? Think the celebration of Valentine's day is stupid? And yet you don't want to fall out with your other half? Let Hannibal Lecter show you how to keep your self-respect whilst treating the special person in your life as, well, special.

Not far behind Picasso as an artistic influence for me, comes Jonathan Demme's presentation of the celebrated cannibal.

Here then, so influenced, is the St. Valentine's Day 21-step solution for an artist to love the artist's lover whilst living the artist's life:

1. Watch Silence of the Lambs


2. Study the scene where Lecter escapes


3. Note the distracting impact of hanging disembowelled victim with entrails as decoration


4. Become Hannibal Lecter, artistically speaking.


5. Inform your life's partner that Valentine's Day is dumb, that you don't believe in it, and that you will not be giving a card for it.


6. If still part of a couple, wait for your partner to go to bed


7. Cut out 250 hearts of different sizes. Cut them from newspapers, not from people


8. Make some of the Valentines liver-shaped, kidney-shaped and the shapes of some of your favorite organs. Blind love does not distinguish between painted paper organs


9. Think of blood and paint the hearts cadmium red. The newsprint will absorb the paint and they will fade to pink. Use cheap poster paints or acrylics. Paint the hearts roughly - they will appear very painterly.


10. Attach the painted valentines to strings vertically, with about ten hearts per string


11. Hang six strings of hearts from the ceiling just outside your better half's bedroom door. Put them in two rows of three


12. Hang nine strings of valentines in the main living area between the bedroom and the coffeepot. Hang them diagonally as if setting a laser beam alarm system. Optionally leave love gates for easy passage


13. Hang four strings of hearts in the bathroom in front of the mirror, and in the way of the toilet and shower


14. Drape the final six strings of hearts over your partner's car


15. Do not buy Valentine card


16. Do not wash paint off hands


17. Go to bed


18. In the morning apologize to your loved one for not getting a card


19. Thank the person you love for the Valentine card they bought you


20. Remove bloodied entrails from your face


21. Wash hands, and resume a normal life

Paul Dorrell says that

knowing when to show your work does not necessarily mean showing in a gallery.

Read more...