Right Brain Redux : Day 1 Projects

Today marked the first day of the thirty-day art challenge we set for ourselves as outlined in our previous blog post. Jessica's first draw from the Challenge Jar was to take a scribble/doodle drawn by our toddler boy and turn it into a finished drawing.  My first pick was to fill an entire page with doodles. Mini-me (our older  son) joined in as well, being allowed to choose between our projects. He chose to do the page full of doodles with me.

Jessica has titled her piece "Sad Flower". The first image is the scribble by Little, the second is her finished drawing. On a day when she draws out a simpler project, she intends to go back and color this one in. I love her line work on this. She gave Little a sharpie and a sheet of paper and let him doodle for a few minutes (Had to take it away when he started drawing on the high chair and his hand). Then Jessica let the paper stay on the table for a good part of the day, looking at it as she passed by, occasionally turning it to different angles until all at once the image leapt out at her. "Once I'd seen it, it couldn't be unseen."

It took a few minutes and a couple of false starts to get Mini-me to understand what I meant by a page full of doodles. The idea we went with was no plan. Just put your brain in neutral and draw whatever popped into it. He was reluctant at first, worried about it being "good", or if it was as good as mine. I told him that he didn't need to compare his work to mine. Only to himself and what he had done before. As he loosened up, he really got into it, and I think he turned out a wonderful piece. It's really a big deal for him to create something so abstract and unstructured, being where he is on the autism spectrum.  I was delighted when I looked at it after he went to bed and followed all the patterns around to the "Bad Wolf".

I began my piece in the top left corner and worked my way down and around the page.  I spent a little time trying to hard in that first crowded corner, but as I went counterclockwise around the page it began to flow a lot better. The last part came out less detailed (top right corner) because time was slipping away from me. I put my project off till the evening because I was gone a large part of the day, and then Little decided he didn't want to go to bed. Lately, he lays down when big brother does and goes right to sleep. Tonight he decided to fight it for over an hour, and I finally had to hold him for half an hour before he gave it up. I know that's not artistic information, but it is life with Spectrum kids. It's part of our process.

It's always surprising to me the things I find in the shapes when I start to doodle. I don't always end up with what I think I'm starting to draw. BEWARE THE BANINJA! (Bananas are ninjas. Really. You ever heard one sneaking up on you? That proves my point.)

Can't wait to see what tomorrow has in store!

P.S. If you have any suggestions for challenges, put them in the comments section.  We may just add them to the jar for the next round.

Jess needed our toddler to draw a picture for her challenge. 

Here's what he gave her to work with.

And here's what she produced from Little's drawing, "Sad Flower."

Our older son joined in on the challenge. He chose "Fill A Paper With Doodles."

Kevin's Challenge for Day 1: "Fill a Page with Doodles"

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Right Brain Redux

Right Brain Redux

(30-Day Creativity Challenge)

Redux- adjective 1. brought back; resurgent; 1650-60; < Latin: returning (as from war or exile)

In honor of back-to-school, Jessica and I have decided to subject ourselves to a creative experiment. I know, School started yesterday and we are a day behind. Trust me, that's early for me.

With so many things going on in our family life over the past year (Moving to a new house, moving to a new state, Starting a Kids' Church Ministry from scratch, Remodeling a house in the new state, moving into the new house in the new state, major surgery-- all while juggling the rest of the usual stuff of living and working and raising two awesome autistic boys.) our creative lives have really taken a hit. We've tried to eke out time to art here and there, but often we just haven't been able to find it. Or we're too worn out from chasing a toddler who has decided he will only answer to "Hurricane" for the day.

So here's the challenge we've set for ourselves; together, we have created a list of creative challenges to be performed one per day over the next thirty days. There are about forty in all and have been printed on slips of paper which are folded and placed into Challenge Jars.

Each of us has our own jar with the exact same set of papers, but to keep it interesting we will each select one challenge per day from our own Challenge Jar. This way, we probably won't be doing the same challenge on the same day, but we should have done most of the same projects over the course of the challenge. The projects cover everything from drawing and painting to photography and writing. One day I might have to write a haiku on a subject chosen by my son while Jessica draws a friendly robot or finger paints with the boys.

The randomness of the challenge is designed to flex our creative muscles and give us a workout. The projects are simple enough to complete in the course of a day. The one-day deadline is to keep us moving. We will be posting our challenge for you to see each morning, and the results each evening. You can feel free to join in and try your hand at each day's challenge if you'd like.

It's gonna be a crazy-fun month!

Kevin

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