Focus - Inkblot Alchemy #20

Hi there, I'm Kim Das Holm and this is Inkplot Alchemy where we use our creativity to draw something out from chaos. Now, what will we find in today's ink blot that spread in strange and interesting ways and I can already see so much here. Perhaps you can see a few things as well. So while we keep looking and seeing the possibilities, allow me to explain what inkplot alchemy is for. I have an intro to read here and I keep fumbling it, but I've made the ink plot so I just have to go through and read the damn intro even though I'm a little bit tired. Let's try again. Two times every week, I draw something from a random ink blot and release the video unedited and unscripted, except for this little intro script. [gasps] I may have ideas of what to draw, but the ink always decides the direction. It might get dark, it might get silly, it might get personal, it might get political. If you want to see the whole If you want to skip the whole process, then you are free to do so. The final image is marked in the video. If you want to come along, then random ink drawings is not just drawing. It's fun. It's play. It's magic. It's inkplot alchemy. Now, please, if you see something in the ink plot, comment below and see if it's the same as what I'm going to draw. [snorts] So, uh, that went well. I am very tired today. I am exhausted. Not tired from the lack of sleep a single night, but just from [sighs] uh spreading myself too thin for too long. And I did have a good and long summer break, which helped. And then I went straight back to spreading myself too much. A and what has exhausted me the most the last few days is simply Oo, I like how the ink is spreading here. >> [snorts] >> What has exhausted me the most the last few days is simply taking responsibility for overextending myself and doing the hard job of cutting things that I want to do things some things that I'm obligated to do but but um there's still time to get out of some things that I wanted to do for fun, some things that could earn me money, some things that I wanted to do for others, and just writing the messages and making the calls and saying, "No, no, sorry. I I I [sighs] [gasps] I'm not going to be a part of this. I'm I have taken on too much and I need to get back to focus. And right now I need to start focusing because while I've been talking I've moved the ink around a little, but truth be told, I don't know what I'm drawing yet. [snorts] I see a very distinct eye here. Like there's an a mountain and it's got a single eye. But I also see the start of a figure here that can go up and have a face. But damn it, I like that mountain eye. And mountains are relaxing to draw. So then I can continue with this fan brush. and just use one of the tips of it to draw these mountain shapes. These snow on mountain rocks forming shadow patterns. Then I can go in and drag out more. [snorts] Will I keep that mountain eye? I don't know because it's very it's not very it's very hidden. So it might it might just go away. That's okay. [snorts] That's okay. I I think I've been reading a lot of the comments on the Inkplot Alchemy videos. A and people really like the videos. People really like the name change. Everything is very positive. But whenever I do any videos about making art from a random shape, you get first of all you get these comments that are not unpleasant but but but but just a bit weird. saying, "Oh no, I saw a putty cat. I think I saw a putty cat in the ink blot, but you didn't draw the putty cat." I think that's what they're saying. Uh, and that's okay. I I I welcome that. I even have incorporated it into the opening script and but there are these other comments sometimes once upon a time saying that ooh now that was clearly a cat and what you draw it didn't even retain any of the original ink plot. The the the thing to understand is that when I Let's change the tool. Where are my other brushes? They're here. They're here. [clears throat] So, when I'm making these, whether it be the daily ink monsters or this ink alchemy or or any other art where I incorporate random elements, the point is never to change the ink blot, the random element into something. uh even though alchemy would suggest that it is it's not to sort of uh build upon that that that ink blot a and show the shapes that it naturally had like making bunny ears on ink blot and saying, "Oh, it's a splotty bunny." That's okay. But that's a party [snorts] trick. That's a party game. That's something you can do at home. You can make a ink plot or a random squiggle. And uh you can challenge each other to change it into something with maybe you get 10 seconds to do it, maybe you get 30 seconds to do it, maybe you get a set number of lines. That [snorts] is a fantastic party game. A and party games with art are fun. more people should do arty party games. It's a way to be creative. That's great. That's not what I'm doing here. Uh what I'm doing is to try to have the random element inspire a piece of art. The end result is [snorts] a piece of art that should stand on its own as a piece of art, even if you don't know how it was made. And I can't say that I I succeed every time. Most of the time, I think I'm pretty close. I I think I make some [snorts] fun images, some good images, whether or not you know how the sausage is made. the sausage making. What we're doing here is sort of a recipe for allowing new and surprising artworks. So even when I decide beforehand that this is going to be this or have this theme or or like in October, maybe I should do Halloween themed art from ink blotss all October. Does that sound like a good idea? Comment below. Sorry. That's something I can do and that would be a fun challenge. And even though if I have a theme and I I know that okay, [snorts] today will be a werewolf or today will be this specific scene from Dr. Jackekal and Mr. Hyde or or from Dracula or from a Lovecraft story. Even though I know all these things, the randomness informs directs the art. That's the point of the inklot alchemy. It is not [snorts] to make uh balloon animals. It's to make gold. alchemy. I I I am for something being unscripted and said off the cuff cuff of my whatever the cuffs are. I'm very happy wi with with making the uh birthday party magician to uh medieval alchemist joke punch line there. I I I'm very happy with how that came together. [snorts] Okay. So, we have these mountains. And we have these areas where I mean this is one of the things that I like the most about [snorts] working with these randomness techniques is that I just have these tiny tiny readable zones in the artwork. Um, so my my my job here is to make this here readable as mountain tops because then this will be readable as um treetops. A and the elements in between will suddenly start appearing as if they are planned. As if. Oo, don't drop the brush, Kim. As if they're planned. As if. as if I made this ink spatter in order to be this thing. And of course, I did not. [snorts] Okay. I still don't not know quite where I'm going with this. So, we have a few things we could do. We could do something in the foreground, but I I'm still seeing the face. I'm still seeing the face. So, I think I want to do something with that face. A and I have to try to keep it subtle because that's why the face is working. So trying to hit hint at nose without really drawing the nose. And now, as I'm saying this, I'm realizing I'm drawing the nose. Well, I'm saying don't draw the nose. [cough] [clears throat] [sighs] >> [snorts] >> This is even though I'm very as I said exhausted a and I'm have cancelled so many plans over the last few days and I I'm in this very like [sighs] this state of mind. Th this still feels right. The complexity, the the difficultness of this piece feels right because it feels like a piece that demands focus. That's what my life demands now. It demands focus. And uh I think this is starting to become one of the those pieces I do that I somehow feel have some [snorts] sort of spirituality to them. So that means I need to make room for an ENSO symbol. and and I I explained the idea about the Ensel symbol um in one of the previous inkplot alchemy videos. I don't remember quite which [snorts] uh maybe it was the one where I actually did the name change and announced that it was going to be called Ink Plot Alchemy from now on probably that one. But I remember seeing a comment from someone saying, "Oh, thank you for explaining your circle signature." That is not my my signature. My signature is the thing I put down in this corner with a pencil. It's a little symbol, a little self-portrait of me with a hat and glasses in a sort of looks like it's Japanese kanji or something like that. That is the signature. The Enso is a symbol from um Sen Buddhism and from I think it's used in Shintoism as well and and it is used in a lot of Sen Buddhist and Shin to art. And some time, probably in my late teens, I took that symbol and I appropriated it for my own use as my own spiritual, atheistic, religious satanic symbol or whatever my own art magic symbol. A and while the the meaning of how I use it is still related to the Sen Buddhism where I lifted it from, where I stole it from. Uh I don't dare say that it I'm doing the Shinto practice or the Sen Buddhist practice because I'm doing my own practice. It has but my own meaning and it is definitely not a signature. Anyone can do it. uh it's not mine but but when I do it it has its own purpose for me a and the way I do it is I you use it at the end of a process at the end of something, a drawing, and I use it in order to check with the gods that are not the cosmos, luck, chance. um to check whether or not the drawing has a right to exist when I do spiritual things that I suspect are spiritual. And the rules are that if I do this circle and it feels right, it feels good, it feels okay, then I'm allowed to keep the drawing. I'm then then I'm allowed to put it into the world. [sighs and gasps] But if I'm not feeling the enzel symbol that it takes too much trickery to get it to feel right or it just feels off or or or uh I don't get it in like like a smoothish motion just this ah this didn't feel right. Then I have to tear up the drawing. And I I didn't make the rules. I only made the rules. And the rules means that one day on one of these inkplot alchemies, I will probably draw something and have to tear it up. Maybe today maybe today. So that's how I use it. And it symbolizes, you know, everything and nothing, alpha and omega, one and zero, inside and outside, heaven and hell, eternity and the moment. um timelessness. It symbolizes everything a circle symbolizes for me and my meaning is my own. You can make your own meaning. Uh, my meaning is somehow related to the traditions I took it from, but I don't quite know because I took it with uh 16 17 year olds understanding of these things and I haven't really gone in and double checked because this is what it means to me. Okay, I think that I want to do a few small things here. This is becoming sort of a maybe one more Odinlike figure. Why Odin and mountains? I don't know. It's this one eye. And I want to do a little dot. Yeah, I thought maybe do the ravens. Yeah, I can do them. Very tiny. Maybe these are ravens. Maybe they're not And then I'll do the endso. And if it works, I get to keep the drawing. But before that, I think I want to add Do I want to add a tiny bit of No, I don't want to add anything. Let's do the end. So, breathe. That feels good. I was at this point certain that it wouldn't feel and then suddenly, yeah, that feels good. That means that this one is done and we can [snorts] take off the tape. tape and we can give it a name and we can sign it. I think I'm very happy with this one. And I will call it damn it. I will not call it damn it, but I I just realized I've forgotten which number this is. And I always double check which number it is. Let's little see here. Oh. Uhoh. Uhoh. I need to actually go to my YouTube to check which number it is. That is very unprofessional of me. I think it's 19. Or is it is it 20? Let me see. It is 20. I almost wrote 19. Oh, it is called focus and I didn't focus so I wrote a little bit wrong and it's inkplot alchemy number 20. 20 of these small things. So that is inkplot alchemy number 20 focus. And if you like the art then it's available for sale at denihorm.com both as a print and the original. And I release all my art for free use under a creative comments attribution license. So you can print it and you can um change it and you can do whatever you want with it as long as you properly attribute me as artist. And if you think that's cool, the best way to support is of course by buying art, buying prints or using the art. We also have a Patreon, but you know that it is what it is. If you want to learn how to do this, then I'm very close to finishing a course called Mastering Ink Through Negative Space. It will be a very good course. I I'm very proud of the work I've done on it. Um, it's releasing very soon. There is a wait list. So uh you can sign up for the weight list and you will get some percentages off when we launch the course. That helps us gauge the interest and prepare and just helps us do the business stuff. [snorts] So that's it for today's inkplot alchemy and I'll see you in a few days.