Colored Pencil Drawings

Sometimes I wonder if I am on the right track when it comes to my art. It makes me think, do all artists at some point in their career or development question their abilities? Is this questioning always a part of the artist's mind, is it what makes their art so intriguing to those followers of their works?

I am not sure about the answers to these questions. All I know is that creating art in some form or other seems to be in my blood. Just as I cannot do without my blood, I cannot do without being creative. Every day I feel as though I must create. Some days I draw, others days it may be that I want to paint, take photos, experiment on the computer or even writing a poem, a journal entry or what have you. What is at the core of it is that I ache to create, not a painful ache but a thrilling one. I go to bed at night thinking about what it is I wish to create the next day and on many days, more so now that my physical pain is under control, I go about working on that creation I dreamed of the night before. Of course, the first activity I do in the morning is schoolwork with the boys, but after that I start or continue working on an art project. Before my pain and jerky head was under control I only managed to get the schoolwork done. On rare days did I ever have enough energy and less pain did I do any art. This made me very depressed. Now my days are full enough to make me very tired and satisfied when my head hits the pillow. This makes me very happy!

About these two drawings:

I did the daisies this last week with Prismacolor colored pencils on black drawing paper. It took a bit of work getting the flowers to look bright. It was a lot of fun working on the drawing. I nearly used up a whole Pumpkin Orange pencil, mostly because the lead kept breaking. It made me nervous because to get another pencil I would have to go 35 miles to the nearest art store. Not that that would be a sad thing what would be sad is that I did not have the money to get other materials while there. What would be the point of only going for one pencil and nothing else? No point!

The second drawing was actually started several years ago and only finished this week. It was an experiment with tones of grey on black paper. The problem with the paper is that it was cardstock and therefore it is not pure black. All in all, I love the way the trees turned out. At the time I had started this drawing I had finished a drawing of Christ using tones of grey on blue paper, using the blue as the shadows and the pencils as the highlights. I remember this assignment as a trying one, because I was used to filling in the shadows and leaving the highlights the paper or a white pencil and this drawing was the opposite. Perhaps I will try this technique again. Create, Create, Create!!!