Inside the Spin-Mosaic Studio

Facing fears is not a popular topic and there is no roadmap to get there. Sometimes, we spend great strength trying to stay laser-focussed in an exhaustion of avoidance. At all cost, we swerve out of the way, not knowing the peace or beauty that can come if we take a chance to view the fear from a different angle. Take a chance to wade in our fears from a safe vantage point. Artists are visual people. We must seek out opportunities to change visual perceptions and image associations that connect to our fears, before calm can be found in the midst. Here is one story of a fear I held onto since childhood. Story-spoiler, it has a happy ending full of cookies and hugs, and wading in Eden-like stream waters of a roadside ditch culvert. [...]

Living as Artist in the Heartland of Indiana, Christi Ziebarth shares memories of teaching art in a rural Amish community and lessons taken to heart by friendships that crossed barriers of being different. As a requested sequal to the former blog post, she shares how her little English daughter came to wear an Amish bonnet in the featured photo. Christi shares her journey of returning to rural roots and learning to exhale as seasons of life speed along faster than our hearts can take in. "We don't need quick." is a lesson learned from the Amish that has carried over into professional studio art and beyond. [...]

Every artist is entitled to their own source of inspiration. When I list my inspiration, I list names -- names of former art students. Many of my former students wore bonnets on their heads or suspenders across their shoulders and were more familiar with horses and buggies than with cars or school busses. They were Amish. Prior to full-time studio work and prior to teaching high school art, seven years were invested teaching elementary school in the heartland of America: Indiana. There is much to be learned from the Amish way of life. Even the children have refined the skill of speaking truth with pragmatic innocence. This article invites you to join my memories as I peer over the shoulders of several Amish students while they worked on drawings in my art classroom...and the conversations that were overheard. I would not be the same artist today without their quiet wisdom. [...]

There are tiny tiny details that artist's obsess over sometimes. In this tiny 6" x 8" journal sketch, the gaze of the eyes seemed quintessential. I could not settle or walk away. Weekly SUNDAY Sketch journals contemplate Art-as-Prayer and truths that float in the currents. This week is themed with two young elephant pups. One is uncertain while the other gives a steadfast nudge of encouragement. This article traces the theme of walking together in friendship along trails of life and what it means to encourage with a spirit of steadfast love. [...]

As I begin to share about my own journey within the context of finding your own, please know that I am not writing from a platform of being an expert. I share as a witness to the creative journey of others and myself. My platform comes in the form of a desk, a stove, and a studio.    Desk? I am new to growing up "to be an Artist". 2 years ago I shifted forward in my own journey from high school Art teacher to full-time studio. There are still a lot of bumps in the road as I figure out where my work belongs and [...]

Artist, Christi Ziebarth, addresses the topic of "Overwhelm" in a context of responding to the question, "Is it possible to watch so many tutorials and inspiring videos that you kinda lose your own ideas, style and confidence? Can anyone relate, or am I the only one?" This will be a series of blogs addressing topics within the broader topic. No matter how experienced, skilled, or unskilled you are, this is a sensation we all experience at some point or another...or ongoing! Lets tread water together! [...]

What's new in the studio. What happens when what's "old" becomes "what's new"? [...]

Within the art world is a pinnacle aim to reach for that flows in the undercurrents of uniqueness: being different is cool, but sometimes disqualifies. Are you different? Being different can live within simultaneous truths: being too much but not enough at the same time? In a paradigm-framed-positive, Artist, Christi Ziebarth discusses irony, isolation, and a few true stories that artistically orbit the glory and gloom of misunderstood art that does not fit standard categories. What do you do when your work is misinterpreted, miscategorized, and disqualified...with glowing compliments...over and over again? What does an artist do when you have (finally) found your niche', but your niche' is still a round peg in a square hole. Artistic mantras resonate, "Be different. Express yourself at all cost." Yet, there is both a pull and a push to echo songs that have already been sung where proven sales and acceptance reigns above expression. Where did this artist go? [...]

Artist, Christi Ziebarth shares a journal sketch of contemplation on the artist's eye of the soul. In the same way that music can only be heard and not seen swirling around in the air around us, the eye of the soul is a personified instinct of the artist. What might it look like? Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. [...]

Artist, Christi Ziebarth, reflects on thoughts of one-color monochrome work studies. [...]

When on a Safari, more animals can bee seen by going 10 miles an hour than by going 30. Color can be like that--- something we think about as a "filler". Color goes inside shapes in the same way a coloring book is filled inside the lines. On the contrary, the spirit of a Colourist contemplates and creates beyond the function of color and celebrates each tint, shade, and hue outside the confines of what shape it may be attached to. Color needs to be acknoledged for but emancipated from internal or external associations. A new monochrome mosaic series, the impetus of an Indianapolis commission with Arts for Learning of Indiana, slows the pace and rhythm of color. The study of color is like that. Sometimes we, as artists, just need to slow down our process and enjoy each: one at a time. Commonly called, "monochromic", the spirit of a "Colourist" calls each color an epiphany. In the same way many tesserae come together to form an intricate mosaic, each must be handled, considered, appreciated, and arranged in precision. Could re-introducing yourself to the persona of each color one at a time, infuse new life into the rhythm of your composition? [...]