Sandra N.

“a predetermined idea of the outcome. And if you don’t know how your drawing will (or should) appear, you will be forced to observe with more concentration. Finally, your drawing will have a contemporary quality because it is most certainly of your time. One of the many problems with traditional still-life concepts is that they are felt to be based on some vague historical aesthetic and, as in all noncreative revivals, are irrelevant to contemporary art.”
― Anna Held Audette, The Blank Canvas: Inviting the Muse

“You get so close to, and so wound up in, what you are trying to do that you can lose perspective. Your mind may trick you into seeing what you want to see, not what is really there.”
― Anna Held Audette, The Blank Canvas: Inviting the Muse

“Walk as if you are kissing the Earth with your feet.”
― Thich Nhat Hanh, Peace Is Every Step: The Path of Mindfulness in Everyday Life

“automatically. What are the characteristics of your surroundings, and which of these are significant to you? Are there certain views across some lawns, over some factories, or down a street that you habitually look at? Do they elicit pleasure, revulsion, or depression? Or are you intrigued by more abstract responses, such as color relationships, repetitive patterns, or sequences of overlapping forms? What time of day is it? Or doesn’t that matter? (See fig. 14.) What is your viewpoint? Are you observing your subject from below some high cliffs, or are you standing on an elevated subway platform? Do you see ten miles of verdant farmland, a gas station, or a piece of newspaper caught between trash cans by the curb? How much of the view should you include? Here you have to employ another example of editing. To draw everything indiscriminately may be too complicated or too boring, or both. If you’re in doubt about where to set the limits of your composition, use an empty 35mm slide frame. By moving it around and holding it at varying distances from your eye, you can isolate the section of what you’re looking at that interests you the most.”
― Anna Held Audette, The Blank Canvas: Inviting the Muse