Creative Resolutions

I don't normally make new Year resolutions, but this year I have decided to make some creative ones. Over the past year or so, I have increasingly been trying to find my creative roots again, but although I have I think made some progress, I've been quite frustrated at the lack of time to really get stuck in - it just feels like I'm dabbling the whole time. With this in mind I recently bought myself a new book: Creative Time and Space: Making Room for Making Art

Again, I don't usually buy art books of this kind - you could spend your whole life thinking about art without actually producing anything.  There's a lot of navel gazing going on amongst artists, and although I'm probably guilty of it too, I try not to over-indulge. Sometimes I think a lot of creative people are just in love with the idea of being creative, and think about 'being creative' a lot more than actually being creative, so I try to avoid that.  Anyway, the title seemed to hit the nail on the head for me, and although having read it, it's not rocket science, and is mainly common sense, it has at least spurred me on to try and make a few changes this year.

So my creative resolutions for 2011 are:

• To sort out a more effective 'studio' space.  For the last 2 months, our office/studio/gym has looked like a bomb has hit it. You can barely enter the room let alone do any work in there, as it has become a dumping ground for the rest of the house. My aim is to sort this out as soon as possible. Get some hard flooring put down (I've already trashed the carpet, so hard flooring where I can easily clean up is a necessity). Get rid of all unneccessary junk, put up lots of shelving, paint the walls white, and see if I can get hold of a plan chest.
• To organise my creative time a little more effectively.
• To go on the occasional course - for example I've recently discovered that there is a print workshop locally that runs short courses, and where you can use their facilities really cheaply if you are a member.  I've always loved prints, and would like to explore that a little more, so a short course might spur me on.
• To look at actually producing some personal work for sale again, rather than just playing and experimenting.
• To approach some galleries.
• I got an iPad as my Christmas present this year and I'm really keen to learn to use this to produce artwork 'on the go'.
• To get back into the discipline of sketching and drawing more.

Not quite sure how much of this I'll achieve, but my younger son starts school in the autumn, so hopefully I should have a little more time by then at least.