Do The Big Painting First
Why have I never thought to do it this way before?
This is a quick note to say thank you to Black Lawrence Press for giving my book Rapid Transit a second shot at shelf life. Rapid Transit was originally published in 2018 by Nomadic Press. Looking back, I feel amazed and undeserving of the thoughtful and lauding blurbs I was able to get on this collection of micro stories about riding public transportation. When Nomadic ceased operations last year Black Lawrence graciously offered to keep its catalogue in print, including my little book.
All of my books have been published with small independent presses. I love working with indie presses because I understand the passion behind them. After all, I have my own indie press! We’re not out here to make a ton of money and we’re not watering down our aesthetic to better cater to trends. We choose books because we love them and believe in the individuals who write them. Thanks again, Black Lawrence Press, for letting me join your team!
I have seven half written drafts just sitting on my dashboard. Aside from the weird dream I typed out and posted on Halloween, I really haven't updated in quite a while. Yes I've been busy, just living my life, which I guess means I've been too busy to write on here. It’s debatable how true that is, because if I really wanted to I'm sure I could find more time to write. And I am writing. But like always it’s slow-going and I have to push myself to grab the laptop and dive into my work whenever my daughter is asleep or being watched by my parents. I’m going to paste one of my half-finished entries below and try to finish it now.
Currently I’m trying to finish a big project while also working on a group novel that I’m writing with two other people as a part of #antiwrimo for
. I’ve never done anything like this before and it’s nerve racking in a way I’ve not experienced since doing group work in college, getting everyone on the same page and waiting for feedback, but it’s also been very refreshing to get insights from others on building a story with ideas I wouldn’t have thought of myself if I were working alone. We have to the end of November to finish writing, and I’m excited to see what comes of it.
In college I had no idea what I was doing.
I still don't, but we're not getting into that today.
For the first three semesters my major was Spanish. With no aspirations of my own, I decided to do what I thought would be noble and find my way somewhat haphazardly to becoming an educator in the Philadelphia public school system. It's not something I planned out or put much thought into, but it seemed sensible and easy enough, particularly after hearing a student in one of my Spanish classes, an older woman who started pursuing her bachelor's degree after her kids had grown up and started having their own kids, say out loud to another student and anyone who was listening that all you needed to be a Philly public school teacher was a BA.
Maybe I'll do that too, I thought, and then did absolutely no research into whether or not this tidbit I’d eavesdropped was true. It ended up not mattering because three semesters later I switched my major to English Literature and decided to go after a writing certificate after a girl in my creative writing poetry workshop mentioned that she was working towards one. This is something I actually did speak to an advisor about in order to apply for the correct classes that would count towards the certificate, though I did not look into what the certificate would be good for, if anything.
I did complete the credits needed for the certificate and I still don't know what is good for.
But back to being completely directionless, as I was in my first few semesters, rather than merely aimless in the latter portion of my college career. When I first started school I took a lot of random courses, like Greek Philosophy (what was I thinking? it was really intense and I ended up dropping it after the first class), Geology (why? I needed a science credit but why did I take the most boring course I could find?), and Intro to Drawing.
I enjoy drawing, even though I’m not much of a visual artist. I love working with ceramics too. Intro to Drawing was a life drawing class with nude models, an elective course that didn’t count towards my major. Twice a week we would meet in a studio on campus and draw some naked dude using charcoal on newsprint paper.
My teacher was an abstract painter who told us he used “oops paint” from Home Depot (the cans of house paint that get mixed and then returned to the store for not being the correct shade, then sold at a discount) for his paintings. Since this wasn’t a lecturing class, more of a hands-on learn as you go kind of thing, he would talk about his life and his art while walking around the room and providing critique on our technique.
A couple things he talked about in class have still stuck with me. Whenever he talked about chiaroscuro he would follow it up with “where there’s light there’s dark,” and to this day I can still hear him say that anytime chiaroscuro is mentioned.
The other thing is a story about how he did his homework backwards when he was in art school. He would have to turn in a painting and several study paintings that were meant to guide him on the large and final piece. As he explained it, he would be assigned to paint a scene, but prior to painting the whole scene he would have to paint some details within the scene on smaller canvasses that would help inform the larger work. Except he always painted the big painting first and then did the studies, and his teacher would ask him why the studies were better than the finished piece.
Typing this out, I think this story struck a chord with me because I related to the sentiment behind it, wanting to hurry up and do the big thing before having all the problems in the details worked out. Chiefly, I take this approach when I’m writing most of the time, and then spent an extraordinary effort going through the piece and trying to make everything work together and make sense.
It’s so much easier to do the studies, do the outline and the beat plotting before writing the novel, but the temptation to do the big painting first, to just start writing and figure it out later is something I’m trying to work on. It’s been my method for a long time, but I think doing this group writing exercise is inspiring me to work differently. It’s imperative that I deviate from my norm in order to work with the group. They need to know what I’ll be writing so that they can do their own writing. I’ve written 1,200 words at this point (of the 8,000 or so that I need to write for my part), but we’ve already written sketches and deep dives of all the characters and have fully outlined the plot. It’s remarkable how much easier it is to write when you already know what happens next. I mean, I still get to improvise and play with scenes, but the restriction of the outline has been way more helpful than a hindrance. I wonder why I’ve never thought to work this way before.
Sometimes there is freedom in restriction. This is why I still enjoy writing form poetry from time to time. I for one am glad you decided to focus on creative writing. I enjoy reading these posts. You’ve always had a way with words and communicating subtleties. That may not be worth as much financially as either of us would like, but for me it’s still worth a lot.