Tag Archives: nicholas wilton

i made it to week 9 of cvp!

Posted on by

we are in the homestretch now in the online art course i’m taking (cvp), in the middle of week 9 (out of 12). since i last posted here, we’ve covered a lot of color theory – color value, harmony, temperature, saturation, compliments, etc. – and had a week on texture. there was a “rest” week in there too, where we didn’t have any assignments and were supposed to either rest or use the time to get caught up. i did a little of both.

i wouldn’t say i’m entirely caught up with the course but i’ve muddled my way through it. i’ve watched all the lesson videos, done most of the lesson exercises, watched all the zoom coaching calls and done the exercises from those. i’ve even watched most of the bonus videos in the portal and gone through all the “helpful hints” pdfs – the written supplements to what we are taught in the lesson videos and coaching calls.

and i’ve done a pretty good job of painting in my journal regularly, not always daily but most days. i also began in my art journal, when we started the class, a daily gratitude practice, writing it down. and that i have done every single day since i started cvp. it’s how i start my day each morning while i’m drinking my coffee and/or eating my breakfast and i do really think it’s helped shift how i feel and start my days.

my first cvp journal is now full (the one on the left) so i’m starting a 2nd journal!

but what has fallen through the cracks is all the actual weekly assignment boards – usually for each week/principle we are supposed to paint 1-3 boards to integrate that knowledge into our painting practice. i did ok for the early weeks when we were working in black and white on value and contrast but once color was introduced, i got a little overwhelmed. i haven’t really “finished” any of those and some weeks i maybe only started one board instead of 2 or 3.

but it’s ok – i’ll go back to them. i’ve wanted to just keep moving along so i could keep up with the pace of the class and the live calls. but this also means i haven’t been participating as much in the social media/community portion of the class, at least for the last few weeks, since i haven’t had as much to share. (we have a class-specific social media forum on a platform/app called circle, so the course could be moved off of facebook. this is where we are supposed to be posting what we paint, sharing with the other students, offering feedback to each other, etc.) i’ve tried to keep posting on my instagram feed, mostly stuff from my art journal, and have found a handful of other cvp students on insta and we interact. but it’s not the same as participating on circle where all 3000+ of the cvp students are.

oh well. i think i’m doing pretty good considering i have a full time job and there’s been a lot going on to distract me, i.e. jazzfest. (you’d have to have no job/be retired and have no distractions for 12 weeks i think to have the time to do everything to completion in the weekly timeframes. it’s really a lot of information, which is why we have access to the materials/videos/portal for an entire year, so we can go back through whatever we missed.)

anyways, here we are in week 9 and for the rest of the weeks, we will be working on our final series of paintings. this week we are to start them, give them a first and maybe second pass. just get something going. play. experiment. we don’t need to know where it’s going or have a plan. so i jumped in and did so, on monday. i have 3 boards and a throwaway board (the one furthest away on the table in the pic below) that all have a first pass on them and they don’t even look awful! i actually kinda like some parts of what i have going on them!

(i’ve now done a second pass that i didn’t take a photo of, but this is where i started.)

last night i began a 7 day overnight pet sit for a geriatric dog and cat, so i won’t be at my house a lot and therefore won’t get to spend a lot of time in my studio for the next week. but this class has taught me that all i need is 20-30 minutes at a time… so maybe i’ll be able to keep working on these a little. and even if i can’t, i have at least done what i was supposed to do for week 9, and the sit ends on tuesday so i’ll still have time in week 10 to do the next step.

so yeah, that’s what’s going on. this week’s lessons have all been about process, understanding what the art2life/nick wilton process is for making intuitive abstract art. it may not end up being the best process for me or any one individual taking the class, but i am hoping it can be mine… at least for abstract work. i hope i’m absorbing it, because it’s all about being present, paying attention to what you like, what lights you up, gives you energy, makes you feel alive, and then infusing that into your work. and if i’m to be honest, i’ve spent much of my 40s and 50s not feeling very alive. on auto pilot. shut down. checked out. and my inability to make art that i like, that feels like me, has been the result. sure, i’ve had a few blips in there of inspiration, of connection, of feeling that flow of the universe… but it has been fleeting.

so the whole reason i took this class is because i knew it was more than just an art class. it’s kind of an art class mixed with a self-help/self-discovery woo-woo group experience, perfect for my midlife crisis. it’s teaching me how to use my art practice for self discovery, to find the me that’s been buried, while i still have time to explore and enjoy it. and when i do, the art i make will be an artifact of that journey.

i’ll leave you with this quote from this week’s lessons on process: “try to look at your art practice as a journey of healing and a way to stay present.” yes indeed.

stay tuned to see where my final series of paintings go!

heading into week 6 of CVP…

Posted on by

it’s been a whirlwind so far. keeping up with this class is harder than the last one i took because there are more weekly live zoom coaching calls and much more video content. it’s a lot to physically get through and even more to really digest.

the image above is just a little montage of some of the work i’ve done so far in the class. (you can see continuing updates and more explanation on my art instagram feed.) unlike FYJ where we worked on watercolor paper, in CVP we are working both in an art journal (a modified bullet journal where we take notes as well as paint) and on 12″x12″ birch plywood panels. painting on wood (prepped with gloss medium to seal and then primed with 2 coats of gesso) is really different than painting on watercolor paper with 1 coat of gesso, in terms of how the paint acts. plus we aren’t doing as many multiples as we did in FYJ where we worked on six pieces at a time (from one big sheet of paper taped off); for most weekly CVP assignments, we’ll be working on 2-3 boards at a time (front and back) as well as doing various smaller exercises and a daily art practice in our journal. it feels like a very different process and my results feel really different. not better or worse, just different.

you may be wondering why in the world i’ve chosen to spend so much time and money taking another online art class that is basically going over much of the same material as the last one. well, first of all, i feel like i need to really master the basics. i didn’t go to art school and so have always felt like i missed out on basic art education. i did go to a liberal arts college (almost 40 years ago!) that had some art studio courses as part of an art history major and i took as many of them that i could, but they were for the most part intro level and i don’t recall any of them really teaching me basic art theory principles. we were kind of just given supply lists and basic assignments and told to go create. we did group critiques and got some feedback from our instructors, but i never really felt like i was learning how to make my art better. i also spent a LOT of time comparing myself to the more “talented” students and feeling like an imposter, which was not conducive to me really exploring my creativity fully.

we definitely did not go as in-depth on anything the way FYJ and CVP have done. and we certainly did NOT cover “mindset,” which has been invaluable. in CVP, in terms of the lessons covering an art principle (i.e. value, design, color value, etc.) we are shown art historical examples as well as contemporary art examples on coaching call presentations, plus given examples from the work of our 9 coaches who lead those calls as well as live demos. there are also 7 teachers, and 3 guest artists as well as 10 CVP ambassadors (alumni of the program who monitor the various online forums and answer questions)… not to mention the 1500 CVP alums who are taking the class again, who are all contributing. there’s a lot of collective knowledge in the community of the course and the general vibe of the community is so open and helpful and encouraging. every day i get to see a wide variety of art being made, from super beginner to acclaimed professional and everything in between. there’s also a lot of modeling going on as to what different stages of an art career can look like, different paths one can take as an artist to grow your art practice and make a living (or not), etc.

second, taking FYJ and now CVP – as well as all the little free classes i’ve been taking for the past few years – has really helped me establish an honest-to-goddess art practice, which is something i never really had before. yes, i’ve been an artist in various mediums and styles off and on for my entire adult life, but it was just that – off and on. inconsistent. when inspiration struck… which sometimes was not very frequently. at times i went YEARS without making anything. or i would have a productive spurt and then would be frustrated to not have any new ideas for months. i did a lot of staring at blank canvases/sketchbook pages. but now i have learned to show up every single day for at least 5 minutes. (yes there have been days i haven’t painted at all, due to life circumstances. it happens. but for the most part, i show up most days in some way.) i don’t wait for inspiration to strike – i show up so that i’m already there in the studio working when it does. and i’ve learned i can nudge inspiration along by just doing.

however, the main reason i am taking CVP is that it is teaching me – and i am slowly absorbing – how to critique and edit my own work. how not to look for outside validation or feedback but how to think in a way that allows me to apply the art principles we are learning so that i always know how to critique myself, how to proceed, advance, get unstuck, and make my work better. that is really the end goal because that is the key, to me, to being a working artist.

i think i’m still a ways away from that but i can feel myself getting better, that some things are becoming more intuitive. and that i am learning to just keep going when i start feeling stuck or unhappy with how my creating is going. and if i can really get to the place where i can successfully do that with each painting i start – then it will all be worth however much money i’ve paid. because i’ve spent the better part of the past decade bashing my head against the wall in frustration, starting a million paintings with a lot of energy and excitement, only to get to a certain point and lose steam, not know where to go next, or worse yet, completely ruin whatever i had started because of bad decisions made when i didn’t know what to do. and i’ve relied way too much on the validation of friends and collectors, which often is at odds with my own opinion.

so yeah, that’s why i made the decision to do it. and so far, i’m loving it despite it being fairly overwhelming. i look forward to getting through the rest of the art principles and on to our own series of paintings that we work on for the last few weeks of the course. i can’t wait to see what i come up with!