inspirare "inspire, inflame, blow into,"Inspiration figures a lot in the book I'm currently reading: floor sample. It's the autobiography of Julia Cameron, best known for her the Artists Way, which I read years ago and totally bought into.
from in-"in" + spirare "to breathe"
I, along with the millions of others who are Cameron devotees, love the concept of creativity being linked to spirituality, the idea that we, as artists, are linked to something greater than our selves and egos, and that if we allow the creative process to be a spiritual process, our work will be more powerful and fulfilling as a result. We will be inspired and will inspire in turn.
On that tangent, I picked up the chisels again and began carving. Just "showing up to the page" sort of, in a different way. I decided to try and not worry about each line so much, to try and be a bit more instinctual about the process of carving, and I'm feeling pretty good about the results.

I was actually hoping to have the block done enough to be able to pull a proof this past Sunday, but we ended up at the Reifel Island Bird Sanctuary instead, wandering down marshy lanes and listening to bird song. Can't really complain about that either.
Here's some photos from the sanctuary. It's hard to capture the sense of space or the classic oil painting quality of the sky:



