Day#12 of my Instagram #DailyTwinchieChallenge

As mentioned in previous posts I'm noticing a slight shift in my daily activities since starting up my self-challenge to create one Twinchie-drawing-a-day for the Month of March to help me be creatively consistent on a daily basis. Being consistent is something I've grappled with all my life, and due to a life of putting paying bills ahead of art-and dealing with some ADD issues–I've always had too many balls up in the air to figure out how to structure creative studio time in each day.

Another part of the problem is, when you're not making consistent income off of your art, one tends to diminish it's value, artist's who reconcile and leave this rationalization behind are the ones that become productive and then successful. I really believe this, as long as the artist is someone who worked at the their craft and didn't just pick up a paintbrush and declare themselves an artist without some kind of thought involved in creating their work. I've noticed that artists who stay on course, usually end up successful, this is much harder for those of us who find focusing on one project for a length of time hard. I often check in on CRAFTCOUNT for the successful artist/illustrators on ETSY and all I can think is, they stayed  the course sat down and painted and didn't worry if they immediately sold and obviously had the need to create, which I do and always had this inner desire, but again, it helps not to have the inner critic-so often voiced by real live people-about not making a living off of one's art. Put making art ahead of these mental roadblocks and in fact don't hang with people who say stupid stuff like that, or pop an iPod in your ears to block their smug message.

Today, curiously enough, I had the strong urge to not carefully draw, then trace and transfer a small drawing. This Octopus is pretty much straight from the hand, and though he/she is clunkier than my other Twinchies-there's a fun aliveness in this wee image. I'm glad that I'm not bothered by the rawness of the sketch so much. I've noticed this challenge is helping me to be more consistent in daily activities as well, especially organizing my studio which was getting so messy I didn't feel like walking into it. And if you don't want to go into your studio, well. . .that isn't good.

This challenge is open to artists/illustrators who'd like to participate either every day for this month, or when they can. Just create a 2"x2" work of art and post on your instagram account with the hashtag #DailyTwinchieChallenge. Who knows maybe you will find joining in everyday will have a positive impact on your own creative productive-goals.