NovelSisters

watching, reading, and writing stories

Oct 16

Why do I make Art?

by lydiamhill

I was skimming through old school assignments today and came across this question I had to answer. Here’s what I wrote five years ago:

Why do I make art? That’s a hard question. I’ve been doing it so long it seems like part of who I am. I was always told I was good at art when I was growing up so I kept doing it. I think the satisfaction of someone seeing my work and approving it was what I sought after. But I don’t think that’s the whole reason. I mean I like people’s good opinion, but I think I also like the shared experience of the artwork. When I make a painting of a sunset, or some landscape, it’s because I see it and I just want to capture it. I don’t ever want to forget what it looked like and felt like, and then when others see it too, it makes me feel like I got to share that experience. I also love art because, I feel like it’s worth the work, like at the end of the project there’s a deep satisfaction and enjoyment of the work. When I finish a big paper for class, I never want to see it again, but when I finish a painting, I want to show it off, to hang it up and let the world see it. I guess I also really admire O’Keeffe and how she took something that no one would notice and made it where you couldn’t ignore or miss it anymore, like the everyday flower. I feel like that’s what I want in my art, for people to be able to see and appreciate what I see. To not just see another sunset, but see the purples, pinks, yellows, the beams of light and vibrancy that make it unique, that might never happen again. I just love seeing the beauty in nature, and I want others to see it too, so I paint, draw, take a picture, or whatever. I don’t know if my art is meaningful, if there is some great question or problem I’m trying to address. I guess it could be as simple as stop and smell the flowers, enjoy life, it is so beautiful and amazing. And maybe this won’t always be the case, I’m sure the problems and changes in life will affect what I make and what I want others to notice, but I’d like to hope that I’ll always be positive and uplifting with my art, because that’s who I want to be and what I want others to get from my art.

I think many of these reasons still are true for me. But a conversation I had the other day reminded me of how much more significant artwork can be when it’s used for God. For the past two years my mother and I have worked on making small watercolors to give away to people at prayer rooms. These pictures could have a scene from nature with a verse, or some object or person represented. But the whole point of them was to remind people of truth, not just with words but with images. It’s been amazing to see how God has used these little pictures to encourage people, remind them of His love and provision and speak truth.

So I think the reason I make art has grown, to not just make people notice what they’ve been missing in nature, but to recognize the God who made nature, us, and everything. I hope my artwork continues to improve and glorify the God who enabled me to make it in the first place.

And since I’ve talked about it so much, I thought I’d share a few pieces of artwork.

Advertisement

Art Life Painting

2 Comments »
Apr 18

The Life of a Flower

by lydiamhill

Since it’s Spring now and I’ve been taking lots of pictures of flowers, a friend suggested to me that I should take a picture everyday of the life of a rose. I didn’t quite make it everyday. But I was pretty close. It was so cool to see the small changes over time of the rose. Usually when people get roses from the store, they look like what the first picture shows. But really, that’s only the beginning of this flower’s beauty. When still on the stem, roses open fully and slowly fade and sometimes they get darker spots before finally losing their petals. Or at least that’s what this rose did. So I hope you enjoy these photos. I’m also going to add my poem Rosebud at the end of the photo time lapse. I know I’ve posted it before, but it’s been awhile and I really like it. Enjoy!

Rosebud

 

You’d think I’d be proud.

Everyone knows the rose:

I’m always wanted for weddings,

apologies, Valentines, even the tango.

 

But you don’t know me at all.

I’m sick of that kind of attention:

I don’t want to be clipped,

pruned, removed,

sitting in a glass vase,

dying slowly.

That’s my worst nightmare,

 

locked inside, or worse yet,

hung upside down till I’m  a dry

crisp corpse, then put on display

yet again.

 

You know the real reason for my thorns?

They’ve grown to keep you away.

 

Why can’t you let me grow

and die in peace with my friends?

Simply satisfied

in smelling our sweet

scents mixing in the spring air.

 

Please find a different symbol

for love,

one that doesn’t require my death.

Art Life Poetry

Leave a comment »
Feb 7

Using Your Gifts and Talents

by lydiamhill

This past weekend, I was given the opportunity to make artwork for a women’s conference. I’ve always enjoyed making little paintings and watercolors, but in more recent years I’ve started to see ways how I can use this hobby for God’s glory.

It all started with my mom’s birthday a few years back. She wanted to celebrate with a lot of people, but she didn’t want a bunch of presents. So she thought we could have a few donation options for people to give to in lieu of presents. Our church had been doing a similar thing with Christmas where you could donate to a charity and get a small ornament to give to a friend or family member and let them know that you gave the gift in their honor. My mom set up the church’s charity as one of her options, so people could get an ornament if they gave to that. (Maybe I should mention my mom’s birthday is in December). Anyway, she had a couple of other charities that she wanted to support and she thought it would be fun to have something to give if you supported one of those. Since all of the girls in my family like art, we decided to make several small paintings. Then if someone gave $50 or more they could have their pick of a little painting.

Here’s a couple of the paintings:

img_1019 img_1021

These were my first attempts at more inspirational artwork. And one lady at the party asked if we had ever heard of or done prophetic art. The idea sounded a little weird to me at the time, but I think I kind of understand it a little better now. We all have different gifts and talents in the body of Christ. And art, just like any gift can be used for God’s glory. He can sometimes speak to people in pictures instead of words and I’ve found that combining the two is especially meaningful to me.

So fast-forward a couple years and my parents got involved in a Healing Ministry that wanted to give artwork to people who came to be prayed for. My mother volunteered and got me in on the reoccurring project. We decided to make watercolors since they are quicker and cheaper to make, especially if you need so many for one month. As I began with these paintings, I started to focus more and more on God’s Word and verses that spoke to me. Sometimes I’d start with a verse and try to paint something to match it, other times I’d start with an image and then find a verse to go with it. But each time I was excited to see how it would turn out and how others were impacted by it.

Here are some of the watercolors I’ve made:

img_3145 img_3146 img_3148 img_3149 img_3150 img_3151 img_3152

So when the opportunity came to do some more for a conference, I said yes and got to join with a friend and do it together. It was a little new for both of us to be making art with other people around, but it was also fun and I hope all the women at the conference who ended up with one of the paintings or drawings was blessed by it. In any case, I’m excited that God has given me these talents and opportunities and has more in store for me in the future.

So whatever your talent or gift is, I hope you look for opportunities to bless others with it and glorify God.

Art Christian Life Painting

2 Comments »
Oct 8

Art and Asking Questions

by lydiamhill

Exhibition, Art Gallery, Gallery, Arts, Art, Painting

Image Source: https://pixabay.com/en/exhibition-art-gallery-gallery-arts-362163/

Recently I went to an art museum with a friend and as we were walking around, looking at the exhibits, my friend asked “Why is this considered art?” I’ve been out of college for over a year now and my brain sought frantically for some explanation from my professors about modern art’s purpose. I mumbled something about art being made by an artist because it was important to them in some way, and explained that maybe the artist was exploring something, but that an audience might not understand all of why they did it.

Anyway, fast forward a few weeks and I came across this You Tube video.

After watching the video I thought back to that conversation with my friend. While I don’t think art’s purpose is to make people better at noticing little details for their careers, I do think it has something to do with asking questions.

It could be that the artist is asking questions, and exploring answers through their work. But whatever the artist’s purpose, it seems like the viewers of art always ask questions. And that isn’t limited to the art you see in a museum. People ask what the author meant when he or she wrote such and such. And we usually have to come up with an answer for ourselves for why things are the way they are. Even children ask questions; from a young age they start to ask the “why” question about almost everything. And in some ways it’s not the answer that’s important, it’s the curiosity.

It’s easy to go through life oblivious to what’s around you, just going through the motions, doing what you’ve always done. Once you “grow up” and leave school, it feels like you should know everything now, you’re an adult. But even adults still need to ask questions.
So maybe that’s part of what art does, it reminds us that we don’t have everything figured out, we don’t understand everything, but we can still learn and explore and ask questions.

I’m not sure if that makes sense, but I guess the reason this has been rolling around in my head is because of something going on in my home town right now. A large group of churches has joined together to start exploring several big questions. Here’s a link to the page if you’re interested: http://www.exploregod.com/

For the past several weeks I’ve been talking about deep questions like “Why is there pain and suffering in the world?” or “Is there a purpose to life?” And the goal behind these questions isn’t so much to give a definite answer, but to start discussion. It’s kind of like the artwork in a museum. It doesn’t say why the artist made it on the little description but it starts a discussion. It makes us start asking more questions, start exploring, and maybe start learning something in the process.

Art Stories

Leave a comment »
Create a free website or blog at WordPress.com.