A Look into Trudi Sissons' Fake Journal

Above: A page from the 2009 fake journal of Trudi Sissons (©2009 Trudi Sissons). Click on the image for an enlargement. Read below for additional information.

Trudi Sissons wrote a couple days ago to tell me she had just stumbled upon this blog and immediately sat down to participate. I love to hear that!

Here's what Trudi had to say about her process:

I have had an 'alter ego' for a few years now. Her name is 2 and she is the artist in me wanting a simple life with two dresses - thus the name of my blog - Two Dresses Studio. Two summers ago, I completed two workshops (no pun intended) with Nick Bantock on Salt Spring Island. He taught me to let go of my 'inner critic' and I have done a paragraph or so about the death of the IC (as in "iK') But, I realized he'd been born again when I read through some of your posts, so I thought I must have a little talk with IC.

I wasn't prepared to take on a bird, but I loved your 2009 IFJM journal, so I started with watercolor (H20 Twinklers) and mapped out a feather. My IC was alive and well, and initially even bigger than I ever recall. But slowly, Two got the best of him and eventually, the brush moved outside the lines and complementary colors went the way of the dinosaur. Well, even the feather morphed and up popped Mother Earth. You never know when you let yourself go!!!

Trudi has posted another page to her fake journal at the web link I've provided above. You can also see her photography and collage work, plenty of fun things to look at and be inspired by.

But perhaps the best inspiration from Trudi today is the way she just jumped in and didn't let the internal critic hamper her!

All of us get a little cocky sometimes. We think that we have things under control because we have been productive creatively for long periods. Then we see something, a glimpse perhaps, if not a full-blown situation, which shows us the internal critic is alive and kicking. Don't be discouraged by that quick glimpse, just use it as a check point to do diagnostics and get tuned up again. Silence the internal critic at the first whimpering or needling noise. It's faster and easier than waiting. All the time you gain is time you can put back into your art and life.

Oh, Trudi did one other thing that I have been recommending, she kept her time expenditure under an hour. Don't set out to spend hours and hours on a new project such as this. A missed session will put you overwhelmingly behind.

Remember, 15 minutes, even 10 minutes a day. That's all it takes.