Because all we need is love

I love painting intuitively. Often, I start by picking up a bunch of different kinds of paints – heavy bodied, inks, fluids – in a variety of colors. I always have a variety of mark making tools on my table, ranging from brushes and pencils, to catalyst blades, palette knives and my fingers; and a variety of mixed media supplies like colored pencils, oil pastels.

Just throwing everything together, following my impulse, and seeing what arises brings me immense joy. Like on this piece – finding those little hearts within the layers of paint, and then noticing so many more abstract heart shapes peeking out throughout this piece.

Plus some scenes from around the studio.

I spent most of the weekend in the studio – painting, writing, creating. Completely engrossed in the paintings and projects before me. Flowing between paintings and projects and journaling and enquiry.

Not every weekend is like this, though I wish it was! Not every painting session goes so beautifully. And that got me to wondering.

At the end of each year, I do an annual studio clean up: clear out the mess, scrub the dried paint off the table, and throw out the junk that tends to accumulate over the months. I thought I’d give you a little before and after of the process, plus a quick little studio tour!

My art studio is in a spare room that also doubles up as the husband’s study area, and these days as my home office.

Notes from a recent intuitive painting session

Some days, you just feel so directionless, y’know? Like why are you here? What are you doing? What is the meaning of all this?

And those big questions make you feel scared and hesitant about everything. This is also something that shows up when I paint intuitively.

When I started this painting, I was just splashing paint, making marks, having fun (swipe to see – you’ll see a little arrow on the image below), and then I started getting scared.

What influences your painting process?

For me, it’s often the music that I choose to listen to while I paint. Happy, upbeat music, for example, lends itself very well to fun mark making. Hand pans help me get into a more happy, floaty, flow-like painting state.

Needless to say, I’m always experimenting with the music that I listen to while I paint.

When I started this particular painting, I was listening to a Coke Studio playlist on Spotify. When Bismillah by Salim – Sulaiman, featuring Kailash Kher and Munawar Masoom came on, it captivated me and inspired the piece I was working on.