Hello friends, 

Are we holding up alright?
It's day 48 of isolation for me and time has become a meaningless construct of the past.

April was quite the month. Spring is my most creative season and being stuck inside creates a lot of pent up energy. I started the month off by revamping my website, which led to a massive studio purge and reorganization of my inventory. Also, working on the colouring pages and time lapse videos has rekindled my love of drawing and inspired a new fondness for watercolours.



The last few weeks have been rather... existential. I attach so much of my identity and purpose to being an artist. In a pandemic though, art is not a priority and I've been questioning the purpose of what I do and why I do it. My original concept for CAVEART has taken on a profoundly relevant meaning. In a world where the daily priority is survival why do humans take time to draw pictures?



In a society of hustle culture, people wear their burnout as a badge of honor for working so hard. I have the privilege of doing what I love for a living and sometimes that makes it hard to find balance between the work and play aspects of it. Without the distraction of a part time job I've been especially hard on myself lately to use all this extra time to work harder. When you get to do something fun for a living it's easy to feel guilt and shame for taking a break. I often feel the need to work extra hard in order to justify my existence.



The trouble with creative projects though is when you work too hard and try to push them it just doesn't work. I ended up scrapping half the paintings in my series because they didn't fit and finally took a break. This past month my focus has been on making art just for myself, doodling in my sketchbook and playing with watercolours just for fun. After a few weeks I figured out what I've been trying to say with CAVEART, finished a new painting for it and now I'm one piece away from completing the series. Once I stopped trying to control the situation everything that I've been working towards just fell into place and revealed the story I've been trying to tell all along.

I know we're dealing with a frustrating, uncertain situation but the more you try to control it and stress about it, the less you will accomplish. Don't swim against the current, just find the flow and create balance in your own life.


The Force is with you.

Lana