If at first you don’t succeed …

I start by pacing the charcoal pencil back and forth, hovering slightly over the sketchbook page.  Waiting for the hand to fall, allowing the charcoal point to make its first mark.  To establish the starting point of this slow, drawn out affair of creative incubation.  The charcoal begins to leave it’s first line, resembling the contrail following a jet plane, it sets about it’s own story.  Of where it has been and the endless possibilities of where it may go.  With this in mind I let the feeling mentor the hand, in opposition of the mind setting stringent rules and boundaries, which may allow the imagination to grow musty and clichéd.  Moments pass and the fury continues in increasing potency.  Scribbling and smudging, erasing and rubbing.  Until there’s midnight black power covering both hands, the thighs of my khaki pants, my upper brow and of course that poor sheet of paper.  The natural euphoria wears off and my worst critic comes into view.  Myself.  I stand back and intellectually think   …..    “what the fuck is that?”

So I tear up the scribbled on page and picked up my guitar instead. lol

© 2017 Joseph Emerson WhatsInsideAMadmansHat.com