Last week’s Art Journal Adventure prompt was “change” and I immediately thought of the changing seasons because Spring is finally – finally! – here. We have (I assume and hope) seen the last of the snow, there are buds on the trees, small wildflowers are beginning to appear among the blades of grass, the bird song is louder in the mornings, and there was tree pollen all over the bonnet of my car this morning. I have seamlessly segued from snuffling because of winter colds into snuffling because of seasonal allergies but I will embrace it because I am so ready for Spring.
My Art Journal page is simple: an abstracted and silhouetted tree divided into four sectors, one per season. I have a mild OCD about needing things to be clockwise (I also have one about even numbers) so I tried to force myself to depict the seasons cycling anti-clockwise. It’s a sort of “flooding your fears” kind of theory that obviously has no substance to it because it failed miserably as therapy. I felt twitchy as soon as I finished the page. Now it is supremely annoying to me that I have the seasons cycling anti-clockwise. I almost wanted to repaint all of the sectors to make them clockwise but I don’t have time for that so, instead, I am just going to turn the page in my art journal and pretend my psychological experiment never happened.
A Pict in PA 
Your narrative made me laugh…a good practice of letting go. I like the order of your seasons…beautiful!
Thanks, Sharon. I don’t know why I keep trying to force myself out of my patterns. A few months ago, I tried to force myself to shop in the supermarket taking a reverse route. I couldn’t stand it!
haha, go with “your” flow!
I love it and it forced me to think of the year in different ways ( I think everyone thinks clockwise when they think of progression and circles, we are trained that way). For one thing, it is a looking to the past kind of experience – reflecting on the year, working back season by season (you could go back as many years as you like, the circle continues…) And I also feel that there is a natural fit with the colder months (winter and spring) and the warmer ones (summer and fall) that your color scheme emphasizes here. I also think it is interesting that in your system, the year can start anywhere – there is not an official starting point as there is in a clockwise system. So, I liked this tree a LOT, you can see that. To look at, and to think about what time passing means, from a different perspective.
I love the perspective and interpretation you bring to my doodlings, Claudia. I especially like that idea of it being reflective.
It’s what I thought of when I first saw it, I think the circle gave me the idea.
Do we know where the seasons start or end. ??i like yur tree …but I can see your point. I may have a touch of OCD myself.
Well, I’m Scottish so really there’s just rainy season all year. I’m still learning what the real signs of change are here in PA. I thought spring was here but today I’m cold to my marrow so maybe it’s not fully arrived.
Whatever the order, it’s beautiful – like a stained glass window. I do have a love of order and symmetry myself so I know how you feel though!
Thanks, Anabel. I really don’t know what I was thinking with my daft “therapy” plan. I love stained glass so I like that interpretation.
Clearly, you are mental, but I like you anyway, neurosis and all. The ones on the left make sense as fall and winter. I assume the pink means flowers for spring? I see the logic. I’ve heard that summer in most states is verdant with trees, but in Texas, however, everything is parched and dry and brittle and yellow and looks like hay all summer, as we suffer through drought, so yes, even the yellow does make sense. Bravo.
Seen through the eyes of this church girl, I also see stained glass, and it reminds me of “To everything, turn, turn, turn, there is a season.” Scripture or the hippie song, take your pick.
I love that interpretation. That Bible passage is one of my favourites (I think it is a favourite with many people) and I love stained glass (and ecclesiastical architecture). I have so many weird neuroses and no real idea where most of them stem from. I blame my Dad’s DNA – he has a phobia of turkeys and bellybuttons and a recurring dream about a disembodied hand.
Wow. That is very specific. I take it he didn’t blow on any baby bellybuttons with your boys.
He was terrorized by a one-legged turkey as a wartime evacuee. There’s no explanation for the other things. We sometimes used to get our own way as kids by threatening to touch our bellybuttons. But, yeah, very weird family neuroses.