REVIVAL
The secrets to unlock your next creative breakthrough
Dear reader,
I’m coming off the high of a wonderful turnout at my Creative Mornings Paris talk last Friday. Thanks to everyone who turned out. You can watch it here. I’m sharing a revised written version of my speech because the exercise of revisiting my work through the lens of the chosen theme revival was truly enlightening. Enjoy!
2 years ago, I was so sick. Long covid. Double pink eye. No matter how much I rested or how much antibiotics I took, I just couldn’t get better and feel good. I was in the middle of writing my newest book Thinking in Watercolor. On paper, I was a successful watercolor illustrator and published author, working for over 10 years creating images for brands like Vogue, The New Yorker, WSJ. But in reality I had a small child at home and was falling into the old cliché of motherhood. I was losing myself. I was in bed trying to pry myself up to start my day when I watched the opening monologue of the Oscars hosted by Jimmy Kimmel. I gasped “I know what I need to do. I NEED TO DO STANDUP COMEDY”.
I’m sure you’re thinking “Jessie, you were already suffering and you willingly signed up for public embarrassment?” Standup was something I inherently knew I could do. To relive again, I had to look to the past to mine for material and consult my inner theatre kid to give me the confidence to get on stage. At 37, I had the courage to bomb if I needed to (and I did!), I accepted I was naturally funny, I was humble enough to accept the process of starting at zero and I had enough crazy stories to fill up a 5 minute set. Even though I had a stress-induced fever performing at my first open mic, I knew I had found a new passion in life. And my all around creative spark, she was back.
A revival is a restoration of life, consciousness, force, vigor or strength. RE-VIVRE (for the Frenchies). To live again. This is something I had to implement into my life when the going gets tough and when inspiration is not the lightning strike you want it to be. Today I’m going to share how the act of looking back has helped me move forward, generate work and find my ever-evolving voice as an artist. And sometimes the secrets to finding your next idea may very well be in front of you.
My latest book Thinking in Watercolor: A Daily Practice to Unlock Your Creativity & Discover Your Inner Artist (Artisan Books) was written for a younger version of myself through the extremely helpful lens of retrospect. I had moved to Paris for what I thought would be a one-year Audrey Hepburn fantasy of glamour, high culture and an escape from the 2008 financial crisis. Instead, the bubble quickly popped. My new mission in life was to care for a verbally abusive French four-year old with a one-per-day Nespresso capsule allotment. My life was dictated by the demands of my host-mother communicated via passive-aggressive Post-It notes that she would leave on my pillow at night. I was longing to find a voice as a young artist, but I was completely stumped. I couldn’t draw anything other than what was in front of me. I loved painting with watercolor but I didn’t know what to draw. And if Paris was the enviable place where artists seek refuge and inspiration then this was not it. I was lost and completely miserable.
I’ve heard it said that writers need to live their lives before they have enough to say. But it’s just as vital for visual artists. I had the gift of time and the ability to create in the present thanks to my notebook and my dear set of Winsor Newton watercolors. I loved the looseness and detail I could capture in just a few moments. It forced me to have a real POV on this storied place called Paris, painting all of its many unpleasantries. And I was coping by finding humor through discomfort. In this case, before I could revive myself, I had to live first. By understanding my own voice, I quickly garnered attention from art directors and editorial clients.
Flash forward a few years, I was going through a dry patch work-wise. Projects weren’t coming in as they used to and I had a lot of extra time in my studio. After over 10 years of painting watercolor on paper, I had a ton of mediocre, scrapped watercolors. I learned how to animate a few years earlier, but didn’t like the added computer time to my day. I started cutting up various spring-themed watercolors from my archives, collaged them together and started filming short watercolor films. Once again, something clicked. This morphed into building black and white replicas of Paris and a Marie-Antoinette-worth trompe-l’oeil feast for the senses. I literally revived a decade of work into the third dimension, transforming it into something completely new.
Where am I revival-wise at the moment? Good question. Desperately seeking out revival! To do so, I am currently searching for my next book idea by mining old emails and journals. I’m also feeling insecure about the future of illustration, about not finding an idea that resonates and the eternal struggles of balancing art + commerce. But alas, I also have time to paint for me, to bang out chicken scratch sketches, binge literature/movies/exhibitions and accept that the slow moments are the most important part of finding THE idea.
To wrap it up, here are a few pragmatic takeaways.
“Inspiration is for amateurs. The rest of us just show up and get to work. If you wait around for the clouds to part and a bolt of lightning to strike you in the brain, you are not going to make an awful lot of work. All the best ideas come out of the process; they come out of the work itself.” -Chuck Close
Creativity is not a passive act. There are no cutting corners as an artist. When your skill level doesn’t meet your taste level, it can be maddening. You have to power through. To this day, there’s a conflict in every painting. Trust the process and power through; that’s the only way to get better.
Passive creativity & active creativity.
Passive forms of creativity (walking the dog, having coffee with a friend, cooking, exercising (aka getting your body in the right state to sit down to do the work) are all valuable parts of the creative process before I actively create. They get my mind and spirit in the right place to create. If the muse isn’t striking like lightning to actively create, loop back to passive creativity and don’t feel guilty about it.
If creativity is a tree, how can you grow a new branch? What could it be? How can you lean into the FUN factor of something you loved as a kid? It’s not about investing in a side hustle, but really just about finding the joy in a parallel activity.
Revive the inner child and embrace all versions of yourself.
It all goes back to your inner-child… My mom took notes from when I was a kid. One that struck me the most was “Jessie likes cutting things up and gluing them together”. Fast-forward, that is what I do for a living. I never knew how to process all the ideas/colors/emotions I was working on from an early age. I seemed to be too weird, too much, too different in the world around me. I would slam the door to my room and build imaginary worlds to satiate my boredom. The younger version of myself loved to be on stage, loved dancing and book making. The good news is you don’t need to reinvent the wheel to find your next creative breakthrough, but just look deep within.
Was this inspiring? Please share with a friend. Subscribe. Watch the full Creative Mornings talk here. Comment below how you’ve revived yourself and your work. Purchase my book Thinking in Watercolor.
Wanna learn watercolor with me in Paris? I’m teaching a masterclass at Les Ateliers Lamartine June 5th. Tickets are going fast. More here.
For decades, I have been a therapist taking comfort in my watercolor pallet and art. These days, I have the joy of combining the two and leading workshops called “Pallet of Possibilities: Finding Peace through Artistic Expression.” My target is not commerce but, healing through letting go.