Prompt 294. No Expectations

& Bianca Bosker on drawing her right foot

Hi friend,

You may remember that just a few weeks ago, I hosted a Studio Visit from my painting residency about survival as a creative act. It was such a joy to be in conversation with the community—to answer your questions about art and life, to delve into the creative process, to think about what we make and the why behind it.

If you’ve been around a while, you may recall that each Studio Visit ends with a creative challenge. When I interviewed my husband Jon, it was to make his ma’s red beans. When I interviewed my pal Elizabeth Gilbert from her church-turned-cozy-abode, it was to write a dialogue between your fear and unconditional love. This time, my Isolation Journals comrade Carmen, who interviewed me, surprised me by reprising this ending. “Can you give our beloved community a creative assignment to carry into the week?” she asked.

I thought for a moment, and what came to me was this: Take a class—an in-person gathering in your city, a virtual workshop, or a YouTube tutorial—in a medium you’ve never tried before.

From the early days of the Isolation Journals, we’ve talked about the value of creative cross-training, which is delving into mediums and genres outside of your comfort zone, and giving yourself permission—to explore, to try new things, to be a bad artist—as a way of cultivating newness and wonder. When I issued that invitation, it was amazing to see so many of you clamber on board. A community member named Rebecca said she had already written, “Sign up for a clay hand-building course,” on her to-do list, and so as soon as the Studio Visit ended, she did just that. “Looking forward to the low stakes/no expectations beginner’s mind approach,” she wrote.

Another community member named Heather said she had recently been through a long period of healing and recovery, and she felt it was the perfect time to explore a new creative practice. “So I flipped over my Stetson, intuitively scrawled creative mediums that would work with my current physical abilities, and picked a new path for myself,” she wrote. The word she fished out: singing. “The process brought much joy—there's a certain magic in using your hat for such purposes,” she continued, “but also the prospect of taking a singing class is equally exciting and novel!”

When I began painting, it was with no other goal than getting back to those childhood feeling of intrigue and curiosity and delight. I wanted to do something that was only for myself, with no expectations or the need for outward validation. But diving deep into the medium of watercolors, first during my transplant and again these last few months, has been so profoundly enriching in every aspect of my work and life. 

I believe deeply that the more we explore the possibilities of creativity, the more that energy flows into other areas, whether it’s what we cook, how we gather, how we problem-solve, or how we love each other and ourselves. So for the month of May, I’d like to invite this community to join me on this creative cross-training adventure. Each Sunday, in the newsletter, I’ll be sharing a guest essay and prompt related to visual art. This first one is a repeat from the early days of this project—called “Portrait of the Artist as a Right Foot” by my friend, the brilliant journalist and New York Times best-selling author Bianca Bosker. To embark on this adventure with me, read on.

Sending love,

Suleika

Some items of note—

• Mark your calendar! We’ve scheduled our next meeting of the Hatch, our virtual creative hour for paid subscribers, on Sunday, May 19th from 1-2 pm ET. Our community manager,

  Holly Huitt
  , will be hosting this time, meditating on lessons learned (and relearned, and relearned again). Hope you can join us!

• If you missed this week’s small joy (our weekly chat where we celebrate one small joy we want to hold onto), you may need to update your Substack app! This week I wrote about the counterintuitive joy of a migraine, which was eased by the one-two punch of my trusty old heating pad and my new canine hot water bottle. To be buoyed by our chorus of joys and to add yours too, click here.

Prompt 294. Portrait of My Right Foot by Bianca Bosker

(Originally published on May 5, 2020)

A few weeks ago, frustrated by a story-in-progress that seemed to be stalling out, I forced myself to step away from my desk. I checked the fridge several times (excellent cure for writer's block) and checked Instagram several times (terrible cure for writer's block). I vacuumed. Ultimately, I ended up on my couch with what I discovered to be a terrific companion: My right foot. For maybe half an hour, my foot posed, very patiently, while I drew its portrait. I don't tend to spend a lot of time examining those five toes, but when I did—it was like exploring a new neighborhood in a new city, full of surprises and the thrill of discovery. The veins! The bumps! The mysterious hairs, nubs, and nails! An adventure.

Later, while reviewing notes for a book I'm writing, I came across a quote I'd scribbled in a notebook. It was advice from an artist: “In order to arrive somewhere that feels fresh and new,” she’d told me, “you have to break down what feels expected.” I thought back to my foot, which I've seen every day, for decades. But looking isn't the same as examining. And examining isn't the same as conveying. That exercise of translating—in, say, words or images—the essence of what we perceive can deliver us to someplace fresh and new, even without ever leaving the couch. I experienced it, and I hope, now, it's your turn.

Your prompt for the week:

Draw a portrait of your right foot (or, if you prefer, the right foot of anything—a chair, a table, a pet) using whatever medium you'd like. After you finish the portrait, write a description of the foot as though it were a character you're introducing—its physical attributes, but also its personality and demeanor. Who is it? Where has it been? What does it want? What’s it like?

If you’d like, you can post your response to today’s prompt in the comments section, in our Facebook group, or on Instagram by tagging @theisolationjournals. As a reminder, we love seeing your work inspired by the Isolation Journals, but to preserve this as a community space, we request no promotion of outside projects.

Today’s Contributor—

Bianca Bosker is an award-winning journalist and the author of Get the Picture: A Mind-Bending Journey among the Inspired Artists and Obsessive Art Fiends Who Taught Me How to See. She is also the New York Times bestselling author of Cork Dork, which has been praised as the "Kitchen Confidential of wine." Learn more about Bianca’s work at her website.

For more paid subscriber benefits, see—

• Beholding the Body, an installment of my Dear Susu column about finding ways to reinvent our relationship to our bodies.

• Studio Visit with Jon Batiste, on how to not only survive failure, but to gain confidence in the process.

• On Creative Cross-training, a reading and two prompts from a past meeting of the Hatch to help you explore creativity in a new way.

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