This weekend is Central Coast Grammar School‘s Spring fair and Art show.

I was excited to be invited to exhibit this year, I have 4 coloured pencil artworks in the exhibition this is my first time in this exhibition so I am looking forward to visiting all the artworks on opening night and seeing some fabulous art.

“An exhibition of work featuring painting,
drawing, sculpture, photography, mixed
media, glassware and jewellery, by prominent
artists from the Central Coast, Sydney,
Newcastle and Wollongong. All works
are for sale and general admission is free.”

The art exhibition is open from 3-5th Saturday and Sunday,  Carlton Road, Erina Heights.

Please visit the Grammar Schools Website for more information.

“Rose Alike” – Belinda Lindhardt
Artwork size: 44   X 68 cms
Framed: 78  X 91cms

I think we are done

This artwork will be on display and for sale this coming weekend at the Central Coast Grammar School Spring Fair Art Exhibition.

Details to come

Rose Alike Work in Progress – Coloured Pencil by Belinda Lindhardt

It’s past the middle and towards the end in the creative process when I often take the time to pause. It’s tempting to sign it off as finished tick another thing off the list.. but I “know” whether its done yet or not. “Knowing” is not dialogue its a gut feeling I have learnt to trust my gut and know when I am truly done, only then I can be satisfied and move on.

At the moment I am not done I am pausing to absorb what needs to be done further before I take the next step.
Technically I have sprayed with a few coats of workable fixative, this allows me to seal whats there already (the green was smearing everywhere as I was working) as well as allows me to add more layers particularly on areas where there is quite alot of pencil already. It kinds seems to put a bit of grit onto whats there if that makes sense. I find this spraying process also helps later on when I give some final coats of protective & UV varnish to my work for added protection Some artists I know have had problems with wax of the pencils showing through, but I have never had that problem I think the workable fixative at this points prevents this somewhat.

The is an art to pausing,  I am learning to love it

Life is a difficult thing, none so much as I have found out in the past few years. As I have progressed through my life I have also progressed through my art and my business.
In these areas I am not entirely sure how things are ever going to turn out. I have gone from step to step sometimes unconsciously and then realised that I have achieved what I was planning  to do and other times I haven’t.

The beginning is often fun and exciting.
It’s where you get motivated, feel  invigorated and alive! It’s where you plan where you are going to go and take action to get there.

The end result can be satisfying and disappointing.
Either you have achieved what you had originally envisaged or you haven’t and your feelings are often based on that result.

The middle is where the tension lies and it’s the hard bit.
In the middle you sometimes get frustrated and want to get to your vision quickly but you know you have to do the hard work to get there. It’s also where decisions can be made based on how you are progressing -Are you on track for your vision?

If you skipped the middle part it wouldn’t be as satisfying when you get to the end and how would you know if it was the correct result if you haven’t been through the process? The middle is important!
If you give up in the middle which is easy to do,  you will never get to the end and I ask you this -  Where does that then leave you ???

Furthermore, if you haven’t envisaged  your desired result  in  the beginning  how do you know when you get to the end ? You will be in a never ending battle of endlessness. YUKKK! its awful .. trust me I have been there!

So, at the moment I am in the MIDDLE, in the middle of multiple things!
I am doing the hard work, my motivation is that I MUST continue I have no other choice.
If I don’t the artwork and *insert XYZ* will never end and there will be no result good or bad.
No satisfaction, no scope for learning on the next thing I undertake.

The middle is hard but it is necessary, I think the key is to try to appreciate the middle for what it is and KNOW that through the middle you will come to the end.. your vision will evolve and it WILL become a result….  and then maybe the key is to stop thinking about it and push on!

Work in Progress – by  Belinda Lindhardt

My Rose is forming This part of the creative process I struggle with. Its the middle. Its great in the beginning the planning, great at the end when you finish but in this middle piece its nothing but hard work especially on a coloured pencil peice this size. I estimate I am at around 40 hours so far and still a way to go.

Its the part that you have to keep pushing yourself forward and keep your “vision” in mind. A bit like life, I am getting better at it

Work in Progress – Coloured Pencil – Size is 440 X 680mm
Slowly getting there

“Rose Alike” - (Temp name) Work in Progress

Where did July go?

It seems somehow I lost a month somewhere in there, I can’t believe its really August is time speeding up or is it just me?

As I mentioned in my last blog post, during the past month or so I have been locked up in “webdesigner” mode redeveloping the Australian Coloured Pencils Website.

The site redo has been a really interesting process for me. For once in the 14 years I have been building websites I became my own client. Frustrated with the fact that it took longer than had been anticipated, annoyed with the fact that during this time WordPress decided to upgrade its version so it meant all sorts of conflicts and problems with plugins after I had already spent hours getting them working how I wanted. As well as trying to keep my members happy during the upgrade process and them experiencing errors that I wasn’t experiencing. Having issues with the “way” things worked wasnt quite how I really wanted them to work but limited by the functionality and trying to tie mulitple plugins and functions together.   Fun fun fun.
During all of this I kept remembering the 80/20 rule. As long as the site was 80% right then that was good enough I could fix the other 20% after. This is VERY hard for me to do as I am a bit of a perfectionist (not in a good way) as it comes to these things.

ARTWORK: As you can see I have started a new artwork as per the above. It’s my biggest coloured pencil work to date  – 68cmX44cm, and its being created in preparation for an exhibition I have coming up in September.   I hope to be having 4 coloured pencil pieces exhibited. I think it will be interesting to showcase a few various sizes and pieces in a show like this – stay tuned for the details.

I am also videoing this one as I work – those of you who follow me on facebook will have seen the video already. I hope to compile all the video together on completion really interested to see how it turns out.

Here is the video as posted on facebook a little while ago.

Pencils, pencils and more pencils

So this past month I have been busy, has it really been over a month? Oh yes it has.

Unbelievable. Anywho, I have been very busy this past month with pencils on the brain though I havent been doing any artwork.
Many of you may be aware I have started a while back the Australian Coloured Pencil network website. The site has been through a few changes and discussions regarding its future during the past year, everyone wants an Australian coloured pencil society but logistics of creating and managing one are somewhat restricted given logistics and location of willing members plus due to the fact that we are still a relatively small group of people.

Next best thing  was a redevelopment of a website, moving the existing site into more of a paid membership site. I would really love to continue providing the service for free, but I am not in the position to be able to provide this at the moment. So the choice was either redevelop or close the site all together.

So I have been busy building a site which contains: a forum, a member gallery, a directory, a membership system, a blog and other stuff to go along with it.
Anyone thinking of creating a website like this, even myself who is an experienced web designer and developer of over 15years has been surprised about just how long it has taken me to do and I am still not there yet! Tweaks, bugs, downloads updates the time to sort some of these out has been much longer than I would have thought. So I know there are a couple of business people reading this,  if you are thinking about this for your business be prepared!! And also be prepared that your web developer would have to charge for their time to sort these out. If  I had been charging for my time it would have been a costly exercise or I most definitely would have lost money – grrrr technical issues.

Now, the site has arrived at a workable stage – I have been so pleased to have the support of existing ACPN members who have supported me in the change over and become members of the site its been fantastic!

Head over to www.colouredpencils.com.au. You can visit the blog or signup for a limted time FREE membership. While I iron out all the bugs!

So that’s what I have been up to. I am glad to have a bit of a breather, still working on it but not as frantically as I have been. I am now able to concentrate on preparing for quite a few exhibitions I have coming up in September and October.  I have an idea for a new artwork but I am debating on whether to tackle it yet or get some other tasks out of the way first.

I have also had lots of inquiries regarding my workshops so I still have on the cards to offer some of my classes or workshops online. I am thinking it maynot be until the new year however? Or maybe in time for Christmas!!! Now there is an idea!

The end of the year will be here before you know it!

During the past few months, I have developed myself a little system for keeping myself on track. Before you roll your eyes at another way to make yourself feel bad for not achieving your goals -  have a think…At the end of the year do you want to feel great about getting all your “stuff” done? Or will you feel bad feeling like you failed ?

It’s really not THAT hard. 3 bullet points!

I am a mum with a young family, artist, business owner, etc etc etc. 6months – to a year is a long time in my little world it flys by so fast, (I am already aware of  Christmas looming, organising birthdays etc it feels like I have only just gotten over all of that) and yet here we are mid year.. how the hell did that happen?
My focus I set at the beginning of the year is  different to now only 6months later, it’s hard managing myself and to keep on track.

My focus changes regularly (but my underlying goal stays the same) -  case in point – 2 months ago,  I was all about my new business direction, don’t get me wrong that is still on my agenda, but in the past 2 months I have had coloured pencil workshops other things that have pulled my focus, so I  have been able to move that goal up a notch to be “an bigger goal” while I deal with a few smaller ones which have become a priority.  (keeping in mind that before I undertake any new projects I make sure that they connect with my goals for the year, I ask msyelf do I really need to be spending time doing this ? does it fit in with my direction of where I really want to go?)

Last year I found I lost focus during the year when I realised it wasn’t working I was trying to coming up with a way of keeping myself in check – I observed that a month is a decent time period for me, it’s long enough for me to have completed some tasks, be able to now move onto something else or continue in order to get something done. Interestingly it’s also long enough for me to have forgotten what I have achieved for the past 4 weeks. (my life is so hectic since my oldest started school this year).

One thing I know about working in a small business and mostly on my own, no one tells you if you are doing a good job.
It’s sooo important that you acknowledge what you have achieved and you give yourself a pat on the back cause its rare that someone does it for you.
It’s something we forget to do, and something you need to do regularly. If you create a system to allow you to do this I think you will be surprised with the results if your not doing this already.

So my little system allows me to Review what i have achieved, Outline the focus for the next month and most importantly Set a goal to have completed by the end of this Month.

So here is what i do.

I start with a word document at top with July Goals in big letters at the top.

(I print out one for each month at the one time so I can just grab one when needed – you would be surprised at how much just being organised like that supports you in keeping on track if you are struggling).
On the page I have 3 bullet points they are the same each month with lots of space in between to write under each one. Points are: (I purposely keep these in words like I am having a conversation with myself).

* How did you go last month?

* What is the focus for this month for business & direction?

* What do you need to have achieved at the end of this month?

That’s it! Its not THAT hard is it?

After I do that i pin it to my cork board next to my desk where I can see it. Periodically I will look at it during the month (without realising it) and remember what my goal is for the month, I have caught myself out a couple of times working on something that was taking up time that wasn’t on my list.

Then at the end of the month I replace it with the new one.
Having the month at the top of the page BIG reminds me that I MUST renew them at the beginning of each month – it forces me to do it. – I also put it in my diary “Business Direction” at the beginning of each month meaning to fill this sheet out.

I file all of my “monthly goals” in a file, that way at the end of the year I can do a review and I won’t have to think back on what I have achieved for the year – I have it there for me!

I have found this works for business / work as well as my personal goals and my art. For my art it can be about finishing a particular artwork or getting my website up to scratch.

So if you are struggling to keep yourself on track perhaps give this a go? Change the questions to suit you but rememeber the last one is important so you actually have something tangible you want to work towards for the end of the month.

p.s. Let me know what you think?

“Life’s Lessons” – Belinda Lindhardt – Acrylic on Canvas
Copyright 2010

As we grow we teach others our life’s lessons learnt.

In our passing our teachings will continue to grow in those generations yet to come.

Those lessons learnt are our legacy that will live forever.