April Inspiration: Finding Balance, Helpful Art Resources and More

Anna P.
May 5
3 min read

Hello friends! I am so late with this post, but finally it's here. I've been spending a lovely time walking in Wales and taking a break from everything, and this was such a valuable time for me. Now I'm back to work, and I already have amazing news: Cut + Paste Magazine chose one of my works to be published in their autumn issue. I can't tell you which one they chose until August, but I am sooo happy with this!

April was quite strange - after a busy March, I had problems with my right arm and couldn't work for almost the entire month. I was so frustrated with my inability to paint first that I painted with my left hand a bit, which turned out to be quite a freeing and fun experience, and I loved it a lot.

Anyway, here are some inspiring, interesting and lovely things I found in April.

Books:

“Bauhaus” by Magdalena Droste. Lately, I was studying graphic design on Coursera, and this book perfectly fit the topics and ideas I was learning there. It tells a story of the Bauhaus school that took a huge role in the history of design. It contains lots of photos of their works, designs, architecture, as well as teachers and students, all of which were really interesting to look at.
“Owning Your Own Shadow” by Robert A. Johnson. He has a few books about shadow work, but this is the first one I read. This is a very basic explanation of what is shadow - a term that Carl Jung created to describe the dark side of our ego - and how we can work with it. It’s about the duality of everything in this world and finding balance. To be true, I expected a bit more from this book, but I have already found a few other books on this topic that seem interesting to me, so I will continue to explore this topic more.

Everything else:

Bauhaus 100: A BBC Arts Documentary. I watched this in addition to my studies and a book about Bauhaus.
Interesting talk about master copies and how to approach them. This is a very inspiring video where Stephen Bauman talks with Ken Goshen about how artists can approach working on copies with an open mind, try to see why they made particular decisions, which techniques they used, etc.
Another video on Stephen Bauman’s YouTube about understanding values in portrait painting.
Still life painting video by Sandi Hester, where she talks about her entire process.
I rewatched a few films by my favourite Woody Allen. These include “Hannah and Her Sisters”, “Anything Else”, “Radio Days”, “Husbands and Wives”, and “The Purple Rose of Cairo”. I wish I could also have time to re-watch his other films. I was a big fan of his work 10 years ago, and this hasn’t really changed over the years. Each time I find something new for myself in his very reflective movies.
Franz Gordon’s music is so beautiful and really helps me to come into a deep focus and create without any distractions.
Trebah Garden in Cornwall. Amazingly beautiful and peaceful place, I just loved being there, seeing such an impressive variety of trees and bushes is so inspiring. Also, they have a lovely beach there, and they are dog-friendly.
Beddgelert village in Wales is just so cosy, beautiful and has lots of walking paths.
NotanIzer app that helps to study values.
And last thing I want to mention, though I probably already mentioned it in my earlier posts - Draw Brighton Patreon page has tons of resources to draw from. I am so grateful they make this amazing reference library for a decent price. I use them quite often for portrait and figure studies.

That’s it. Hope you had a lovely beginning of May, and I will come back with something interesting soon.

Anna