Starved for Color?  Feast on More Color

Winter serves up gray and dark in the northern latitudes.  I find I get starved for color and my attitude goes dark.  The solution?  Easy, consume more color.  Nay, feast on color. The last three winters, I have gotten a cold.  One of the causes may be not consuming enough color.

If you live in the gray darkness, you know.  Enough suffering.

To be happy, healthy and energetically creative, you might try feasting on color.

Fun Ways to Get More Color

Take field trips.

• Art museums and galleries.
• Conservatories.  The Volunteer Park Conservatory in Seattle has displays of blooming plants all year.  Poinsettias prior to the Holidays, feed me red in profusion.  The cactus garden blooms.
• Fancy hotels have color and you can sit and enjoy coffee or tea.  I like to sketch in the opulent lobby of the Fairmont Olympic Hotel.
• Even the mall has color.  I find malls drain me in about five minutes so I avoid them, but it you feel more energetic  when you travel through them, you will certainly find color.

Look at Art Books & Travel Books I like to look at print versions, but you can find some pleasure on-line.

Winslow Homer is known for his seascapes with cold gray New England skies, but check out his watercolors he painted while in Bermuda.  Google this: Winslow Homer Bermuda.

Eat Color; Breathe Color Eat foods that have colors that please you. Breathe Color:  Look at a color you like, then imagine inhaling it and letting it diffuse throughout your body, finally, filling a sphere of color around you.

My Favorite Way to Get Color – CREATE ART.

• Decorate your home:  Hang color on your walls.  Get colored pillows for the couch.  Bring blooming bulbs and flowers into your home.  Of course, get colored lights.
• Fold origami with colored paper.  Youtube.com will serve up dozens of instructive videos showing you how.  Your library will have fun resources, too.
• Paint or draw with color.  Crayons perform brilliantly at this.  Use big pieces of paper and add color to the page in ways that feed your heart.

Digital Art for Phones, Tablets, and Computers With the ubiquity of tablets like the iPad and smart phones, chances are good you own one of these devices.  You can find a wonderful piece of free software to play with creating art.

I created this feast of color to the right using Microsoft’s Fresh Paint on my Windows 8.1 tablet.

If you have Apple devices, you can get the Brushes & Paper apps.  Both have been recommend by Apple fans.

If you still have Windows 7, you might  try –  MS Paint that comes with Windows 7.  I have found it unsatisfying.  I’d rather use real materials.

I like much about the recent digital versions:  Instant use.  No prep or clean up.  The big deal though is painting with LIGHT.  Since light is in short supply, it makes the feasting easier.

The image above fills the whole screen when I create it and fills me with colored light. With the digital versions, I have the option of printing the image on a nice color printer with good paper.  I can then hang it on the fridge or on the wall to continue the good color feasting.

Read My Books

You can get my art books for more tips on drawing.

Drawing the Sacred: Communing with the Sacred through Drawing – An Illustrated Journey   Paper Back Version       Kindle version

Sketching, Poetry, and the Sacred Present Moment: A Magically Potent Way To Savor Your Life   Paper Back Version    Kindle version