The Importance of Setting Up a Space

Today's post is about setting up a creative space and how dedicating the time and effort to do it has helped me in many ways. 

Before I begin, I want to introduce the newest member to my creative space- "The Ribbon Twirler", 4"x4", acrylic and available! She is my 3rd painting in the "30 in 30" painting challenge - which, if you want to participate in you totally can sign up for it at Leslie Saeta's Thirty Paintings in Thirty Days Challenge Blog. 

I've been painting a lot since about June of 2015 and I was starting to accumulate a lot of BIG paintings, and sadly they have just been shoved into a closet. I did put them in two pop up shows, AND even had a dear friend hang them up temporarily in their home, but they made their way back to my coat closet...until today. 

Today my husband and I realized that we NEEDED to fill up our wall spaces and brighten our apartment and so we went at it full fledged. We hung up all of my paintings and they look wonderful. We both commented that the place just FELT better. More organized, more appealing. Of course I found a way to worry - "Do you think I'll look like an artist who is obsessed with themselves?!"... No I am not, not anywhere even close to that BUT it does feel really good to physically see all of my hard work!

So we decided we shouldn't stop with the big paintings, because I've also been working small too and those babies got hung up in the kitchen. The kitchen is also my dining room. Oh, and did I mention my studio too? :) 

Getting Organized

Before I started the challenge I organized all of my brushes, palette knives and other fun tools into little canisters on my art cart.

My husband is the bomb and he also hung up this "light fixture", if you will. I am kind of obsessed with bird cages, and since it wasn't really serving a purpose, we decided to hang up this light inside the bird cage and WOW, what a difference! If you are in a creative space without lighting, you need to fix that ASAP. I'm telling you, it improved my mood, my energy and I'm sure it will prevent my eyes from going crossed! I bought one at Home Depot for like $20 and I just made sure it was a natural white light bulb.

Here's my 30 in 30 cork board...it'll work, until I bring out the bigger canvases.

This little rack shown below has saved me some space. It could work for you if you buy paint tubes that have the display hole. I'd like to find a longer one with bigger spaces between so if anyone knows of one, please leave a comment! 

Thanks for reading! Check in tomorrow for day 4!