My friend Jem and I went on a bit of an Artist Date, as prescribed by The Artist’s Way. I was feeling the need for some inspiration, something to cause my brain to make different waves. I took a day off work, and in the morning we went to a coffee shop and worked on our drawings:

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Then in the afternoon we went to the Indianapolis Museum of Art:

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Unfortunately, while they did have some cool kinetic sculpture (including work by Alexander Calder, the inventor of the mobile!!!!), those were in areas where I was not allowed to take pictures. I was able to shoot this wall, which is kind of cool, if not a seminal work by the originator of the mobile:

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Fair enough, the other stuff is in my head anyway, where it will do the most good!

The whole idea behind an Artist Date is to take the art half of yourself (or maybe it’s the art 7/8 or the art 3/4, whatever – you decide the exact equation) out and treat it well, show it a good time. In return, the art portion of you will grow and flourish and start helping you do really awesome stuff. It’s also part of a practice called “refilling the well,” where you replenish some of the energy needed to run the creative engine inside of you.

There were honestly some kind of scary moments in the museum, like when I realized I was writing down tons of names of sculptors, but almost nothing about photographers. What does that mean? Does it mean I’m not going to be doing photography? Does it mean I’m supposed to be a sculptor? Does it mean…well, what DOES it mean? I mean, that lamp, the one with all the brass on it – how do you do that? And those clocks! The clocks with the copper, brass, and steel faces! Those were gorgeous! How…can someone make a living like that? How do you make something so precise and so gorgeous? Many questions, no immediate answers. I guess that’s part of the price of admission with this stuff. (Actually, the IMA is free, which means my confusion and fear cost me nothing. Huzzah!)

Overall, I really enjoyed myself. I got some new ideas for sculpture work, and found out some fun stuff about the Art Nouveau movement. Things could get more interesting. I think we’re entering dangerous inspirational territory here. At any rate, Jem and I have refilled the well, so look for some fantasticness to occur here in the near future!