art

Big details, small picture.

21st September 2017 by Jax Blunt 2 Comments

One of the screener questions used in the pre autism diagnosis questionnaire is whether you’re a big picture or a small details person.

I have no idea how to answer that question.

As I’m sure I’ve written before (although I can’t put my cursor on where or when to link) when I was a systems programmer I held the entire system in my mind. To do that though, I had to take it apart to see how it fitted together. So I had to go down to details to follow the connections to know the system. Does that make me a small details or a big picture person? Or could it be that big pictures are made up of small details and the question is nonsensical and the fact that someone is asking it at all in a diagnostic sense just goes to show how little we all understand each others’ ways of thinking?

I know that not all autistic people are systems programmers. But I wonder if actually connections and relationships, between things, concepts, people, details and their systems that is the thing we all do?

(There’s probably research and articles on this. I haven’t looked. )

I can get lost in the details of a flower. A dewdrop. A spider’s web. Even a dust mote in light. I can sink into its beauty, its essence, the way it holds all the world in itself.

And is still just a dust mote.

‘To see the world in a grain of sand. ‘

That too.

Sketching.

24th December 2016 by Jax Blunt 3 Comments

I’ve a little moleskine book I’ve been drawing in for some time now. It’s easy to look back and see how much I’ve improved.

Noses are still difficult, but I’m getting proportions of faces better I think. There’s starting to be expression in the eyes – or am I looking at it too hard?

If I were to make new year resolutions I think one ought to be to find art and writing groups, to get regular objective feedback on my work. I find groups very difficult though, so I’m really not convinced I’ll get to it.

Hard to know what to do for the best.

For the moment, feedback will have to be via social media, and here if you feel inclined.

What Autism is

29th October 2016 by Jax Blunt 5 Comments

To me.

(I can’t define it for anyone else. And if you don’t experience it, you do NOT get to define it for us or to draw us as suffering monsters. If you could refrain from that, that would be nice?)

Back to me.

Actually I think you *can* see it in my face. It’s that little worry line between my eyes. Having to concentrate really hard, and still not quite getting it.

It’s a lack of confidence, constantly at war with the single minded focus on an interest. At the moment my interest is art, and objectively I can see I am improving, but I crave external feedback as well, and I want to be the best.

Numbers, stats, rankings, they’ve been an obsession on and off for as long as I can remember, fed by the unhealthy actions of the educational system that didn’t quite know what to do with me.

Primary school had strengths, lots of them. A small school, 100 children or there abouts across 7 years. Teachers knew us well, we often spent two years in a class, and there was a lot of flexibility, so it didn’t matter quite so much if you were found reading books under the desk when you were supposed to be doing maths. We kept chickens and had a big school field, and playing football with the boys might have been slightly odd, but it wasn’t the end of the world.

Secondary school was more challenging, and perhaps they should have noticed then that I was floundering, but I don’t think people really knew about autistic girls in the 1980s. Certainly not bright ones, who could mostly make the right noises, even if they weren’t quite at the right times. And being horsey was a way to excuse being unfashionable and friends were a small number but still some.

Autism is never quite fitting in. Being the only girl at karate, and the only girl in the security team. It’s drinking too much at college because it slows your racing brain when nothing else does. It’s finding an identity beyond anxiety and depression but oh so late. It’s wondering what I could have been, could have done, if I’d known, understood, forgiven myself, known how to pace myself better.

Autism is not my excuse. It’s never an excuse, because I don’t need one. I am. And I’m still learning how to be the best me.

Autism is maybe a strength, if I can work out how to focus it to help me past all the bits of me that don’t work so well. Autism just is.

Other people have written about their own experiences, like flojo

Diversification.

12th October 2016 by Jax Blunt Leave a Comment

That’s a big word for splitting yourself up into lots of different pieces isn’t it? Tell you one thing, I’m going to have to get a whole lot more organised.

Hm.

Anyway, I’ve launched the new reviews/competitions/money making/money saving site over at Not Just Kids Stuff. There’s a Shopkins giveaway running, so you might want to pop over and check it out. There’s also some stuff about swagbucks, and a bonus soup recipe, so how can you go wrong? (Share, like, follow it on twitter or by email or whatever. Please. It’s slightly scary launching a new site so far down the line of blogging it turns out, and terribly small social media numbers are even more scary.)

I’m working on the interwebrescue site. The idea is that it’s somewhere for people to find me when they want a quick web fix – like kicking a recalcitrant forum back into shape, rescuing a wordpress that’s having a bad day, that sort of thing. Or holding your hand through a scary DNS change or disentangling terminology that’s got you confuzzled. I’m paused just now trying to write the pages – I’m very not good at bigging myself up it appears.

I did design a Kofi button though 🙂 For all those tiny little jobs that aren’t quite worth an invoice, or when you’re just grateful for an article or some advice, I’ll be installing one of these. It’s like the paypal donate button, but somehow a bit friendlier.

I gave up on the biro section of my daily drawing challenge and segued neatly on to inktober instead. So it’s all still happening on instagram (check out the pics in the sidebar). I’m also using sktchyapp to practise a bit more – people share pics that you can then use as reference photos and upload to the app so that the originals can see. Well worth a go if you are into drawing.

Still kind of stacked up on things I’m supposed to be blogging about, but I’m working through it. I kind of have a plan, and what’s more I’m kind of following it.

First time for everything I suppose 😉

Learning to draw: my journey so far.

13th August 2016 by Jax Blunt Leave a Comment

As I mentioned a while ago, (dear 15 year old me) I have spent most of my life convinced I couldn’t draw. When I took up photography a while back, I started seeing things differently. And then I started drawing.

To begin with, I wasn’t quite sure what to do, or what I was interested in drawing, so I just kind of pootled about doodling things. I used the book that Big was using, Anatomy for the Artist (Amazon affiliate link), but I didn’t get on with it as well as she did.

I have, however, very much enjoyed doing a variety of things sparked off by picture books. Like Lily and Bear, and the nowhere box. And of course, Augustus.

Really, what has worked for me is getting *good* art materials and experimenting. I’ve built up quite a stock 😉

My day to day carry kit looks something like this.

That’s a Winsor and Newton watercolour sketching set, some Derwent Pencil water pens, my Staedtler pigment liner pen set (that particular set exclusive to Cass Art) and a set of mini pencils that came off a draw by numbers set. They’re the only bit of this that aren’t high quality, given that the sketchpad is Moleskine, but if you shop around carefully, you can get quality at a really good price. For example, right now, Cass Art have a clearance sale, although their prices are competitive all the time. Their shops are treasure troves of artistic inspiration if you’re ever near enough for a visit too.

My experiments at the moment are inspired by an excellent book, Just draw it, that I found at the library. I like the way that it suggests a technique and links it to an artist, so not only are you getting to try something out, you’re getting to learn about artists as well.

So here’s my attempt at a Zen portrait. Not sure I’ve quite got the technique down.

Here’s the book in question.

And probably the best suggestion of all, to keep a sketch book, and just keep drawing.

What I’m trying at the moment is speed drawing, inspired by various Olympic sports. My rugby players don’t look this good though.?

I guess what I’m learning at the moment is that if you don’t try, you don’t have any chance of succeeding. And the more you try the more chances you give yourself to produce something you like. Which have been good lessons to learn.

Disclosure: Amazon and Cass Art links are affiliate links.