The Purpose of this Blog

This blog is the result of teaching my little sister art for a week. Haleigh came up to Idaho with the intent of going home with a few good pieces for her portfolio and we had talked about me giving her weekly assignments so that she could continue to build a great collection of work. She mentioned that my dad would also like to do the assignments with her. You can visit Rett Ashby's gallery (my dad's paintings) here. While my little sister is just starting her portfolio, my dad has been painting for...a long time (maybe 30+ years?) What I'm getting at is, you can be a beginner in art or an advanced artist of many years to join in The Creative Core experience. With two people dedicated to the assignments, I decided I would also dedicate myself so that we can share our adventures in art together. I look forward to the critiques and opportunity at viewing everyone's artwork.

I've also started this blog with the intent of expanding past family members. Too often I hear these dreary phrases from others:

"Don't stop painting, it's hard to start again."

"I wish I had time to do art but I'm so busy."

"I don't know where to start because I've slacked so much in doing art."

"I lack inspiration for art so I never get around to doing it."

"I have too much inspiration and have too many things I want to do that I can't decide where to start."

And the one I'm guilty of using too often:

"I don't have any deadlines so it always gets put off."

The purpose of this blog is to eliminate these often heard phrases. The assignments are given to get your creative juices flowing and allow for guidelines and deadlines. It will help those advanced artists get back to basics and push the newer artists into more unique and unchartered creative areas.

Although the assignments come with a due date, the amount of time you really put into it is your own choice. Whether you put in ten minutes a day or an entire week's worth of work is your decision. It's always nice to see people go above and beyond but if you only have an hour of time to spare then spend that hour wisely on the week's assignment.

This blog is titled "The Creative Core" for the purpose of delivering assignments with core basics in mind: line, shape, space, value, and color. It will also allow for originality, creativity and use of various other elements of art.

I hope all artists will participate. Most assignments can apply to any medium. Most will be able to be transfered to pottery, fabric, jewelry, photography or canvas. Please work the assignment into your medium because I'm sure we'll all be interested in seeing the extra creativity.

Feel free to join in the creative core process at any time and if you miss a week, please don't give it up or you may descend to living the dreary phrases.