The Painting Path, by Linda Novick

The Painting Path
Embodying Spiritual Discovery through Yoga, Brush and Color
Linda Novick

MY REVIEW ON AMAZON.COM
I loved this book! The Painting Path takes you on a journey of discovering your inner creativity. It is a wonderful combination of yoga and art, exercises and techniques, anecdotes and wisdom. Linda prepares you for each art project with specific stretches and breathing exercises that quiet the mind and relax the body. There is a cadence and calmness in her writing, along with humor and accessibility, that made me feel as if she was talking to me. Linda shares some of her own life experiences, adds interesting history about about famous artists, and includes thoughts from spiritual teachers, all of which contribute to her supportive, inspiring approach. I learned a lot and smiled a lot reading The Painting Path!

Available on Amazon.com:
The Painting Path: Embodying Spiritual Discovery Through Yoga, Brush and Color

"Sunburst" ©2007 Anne S. Katzeff

MY ARTWORK IN THE BOOK
Linda is one of my favorite art teachers. I met her in 2005, when I took her workshop, Painting & Yoga in the Berkshires, at Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health (http://www.kripalu.org/). I loved the experience so much that it has become a yearly retreat for me!

When Linda was writing her book, The Painting Path, she asked me if I would do one of the exercises and give her feedback. Intrigued, I did the exercise called “Many Colors, Many Possibilities”. The result was the “Sunburst” artwork that was included in Linda’s book.

EXERCISE DESCRIPTION
This experience was fun and relaxing. It also brought some surprises.

The relaxation/meditation brought my imagination to myself as a 5-year-old child, in my room, drawing graphic lines of varied diagonals, widths, and overlaps, with my crayons. I was happy, excited, and content.

After opening my eyes, I began drawing with cray pas. My other set of oil pastels were also on the table, just in case I wanted to use them, but I didn’t think that would actually happen. I never really enjoyed cray pas/oil pastels all that much in the past. My marks began as the same diagonals I was imagining myself making as a child, and they quickly evolved into a simple landscape: a huge sunburst above an oceanic horizon. The colors were strong and saturated with lots of brilliant reds, oranges, yellows, and purples. I loved the oily/waxy feeling of the cray pas. I began to experiment to see how the cray pas would behave when I tried different things like blending and overlapping strokes.

The experimentation continued as I drew the ocean. That’s when I began to use the other set of oil pastels, to paint the ocean. I was thrilled with the new range of colors.

I guess about an hour went by, then I had a beautiful, finished painting.

The surprise was how much I enjoyed the cray pas and oil pastels, and how the experience became an exploration into the behavior of the medium. I thought I might get more involved in the “quality” of the painting. Instead, I got involved in the process of creating and experimenting, having fun while doing it, and being complete unaware of time or anything measurable in the world.

LINDA AT KRIPALU
The Painting Path (usually in the summer)

Painting and Yoga in the Berkshire
http://www.kripalu.org/program/view/PYB091/painting_and_yoga_in_the_berkshires