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Tag Archives: freedom

Freedom

03 Tuesday Jul 2012

Posted by createdforjoy in Make, Think

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

courage, encouragement, felt, felting, flat felt, freedom, landscape, make, paper, papercraft, roving, think, vellum, vintage, wet-felted, wool

freedom01

As a 17-year-old starting college, freedom meant one thing to me: escape. New experiences, different faces, starting over in a world that didn’t know me and couldn’t make my choices for me. That thirst for independence is a natural part of growing up, and I certainly had quite a bit of growing up to do. But I think I was missing an integral notion of what it means to be free.

It took me a long while to realize that freedom is not synonymous with control. The freedom to live, speak, and worship as I desire are priceless to me, and I do not take them for granted. However, personal freedom also means being willing to take chances: in work, in play, and most of all in relationships and letting people in close. Without the courage to love and ask to be loved by others, freedom looks an awful lot like just being alone.

For me, real freedom also means crawling out from under the stifling hood of perfectionism and expectation. Freedom does not guarantee pleasure, but it does ensure that I move forward and learn. To be free is to open myself up to mistakes with the conviction that I am also opening myself up to growth, to finding new ways and new passions.

I could cook only the recipes I already know; paint only pictures for which I have practiced the brushstrokes; stick with the books already on the shelf and the names already in my address book. I would certainly have increased measures of comfort and security in doing so, and that sort of smug satisfaction that comes from doing it “right.” But freedom? No, I would not have that.

sb-befree01

The piece of art above is titled Be Free, and it’s a multimedia collage using vintage papers, vellum, and a hand-made felted landscape. I have felted before, but never to achieve a flat, representational design. I love how it turned out, in part because I took a step into my personal artistic unknown to create it.

freedom03

Praying you find the freedom today to imagine and hope, to take risks and build in new directions.

Drink it in

03 Thursday Nov 2011

Posted by createdforjoy in Make

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

art, bottle, creativity, encouragement, freedom, make, paper craft

bottles04

This is one time when bottling up your feelings can actually lead to something good. :) This project was inspired by Sharon Soneff’s fantastic book, Art Journals and Creative Healing: Restoring the Spirit Through Self-Expression. I imagined myself a sort of existential advertising exec: if I could bottle up freedom, what would it look like? How would it taste?

bottles03

I think Freedom comes in many flavors: hope, courage, faith, truth, love, peace, joy, compassion… For me, freedom is found in my faith and in the love of those close to me; freedom is acknowledging my myriad imperfections and continuing to learn and grow in spite of them — on good days, because of them.

bottles02

To construct this piece, I started with an empty 4-pack of Starbuck’s Frappuccino (my husband happily accommodated me when it came to the emptying part :), a stack of cardstock, and a few pieces of ribbon and beads. I sanded and inked the cardstock to age it and bring out the texture, then added hand-made labels and logos.

bottles01

I finished by adding a little embellishment to the tops of the bottles and then wrote down the daily victories that represent freedom to me. I continue to add to the bottles, and I won’t consider this project complete until they’re overflowing.

bottles05

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