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June 1, 2016 by Kat

Leaving Italy Behind

Every relationship, every experience, every phase of life shapes us. The sum total makes up who we are, becomes part of our story. 

Some experiences are more significant than others, of course. Some have a “before” and an “after” you can pinpoint as a moment of transformation. Some are more gradual, affecting a subtle change you don’t notice until weeks, months, years later. 

Living in Italy was a before/after time for me, for sure. After I returned, everything referenced back to it. I had changed dramatically and emerged shiny and new. It was not just the travel and experience of living and working in another country, but becoming an artist too. Rediscovering and reconnecting with that essential part of myself.

Classic Italian Transport, Parma, Italy

The time and experiences since moving back home to Oregon have brought more subtle transformation. It’s not the same type of before/after. Italy was like a flash flood, radically altering the scenery. The last five years in Oregon have been a gradual reshaping, like a river over time alters the landscape. Bit by bit I continue to learn, grow and transform… And hardly notice it.

Until recently, that is. Recently there have been a few signs I’m leaving my Italy experience behind… 

I’ve sold my scooter. It was a great idea and I’m glad I learned how to ride it, but it turns out I like to bicycle better. I still love a good scooter sighting, but they are few and far between.  

I’m rewriting my artist statement. It references the change in my art, moving from Milan, Italy to Corvallis, Oregon. For urban scenes to forest elements. But that was five years ago now, and the change isn’t happening anymore–it’s happened. I need to talk about what’s relevant to my work now.

I took my eCourses down off of my site. A Sense of Place and the Find Your Eye series were all very timely, coming from my photographic experience and artistic growth while living in Italy, but it has become hard to promote them when the art they teach isn’t even close to what I create now. 

And with these small steps and signs I realize that my experience in Italy has been folded in to the mix. It’s been integrated into what makes me Kat. It’s no longer this huge thing, so momentous that everything has to reference back to it. It’s part of the greater whole.

That’s a good thing. It’s not that I have forgotten my Italy experience or I don’t want have the big before/after moments in the future, it’s that I want to continue to learn and grow all the time. I want to continue to transform while living in my little town, in my regular, everyday life. And I can. 

I know I can, because here I am, five years post-Italy, creating and teaching a different type of art and living a life based on choices which are right for me today. Still an artist — thank you time in Italy, for showing me that — but an evolving one. 

So maybe that’s my final Lesson from Abroad: We keep changing and growing, no matter where we are. If you had told me five years ago where I would be today, I wouldn’t have believed you. 

Where will I be five years from now? Who knows. I certainly don’t. 

All I do know is that I will be different. My art will be different. My life will be different. It will be interesting to see how everything turns out. 

Filed Under: The Kat Eye View of the World Tagged With: creative journey, Italy, Lessons from Abroad, scooter

March 15, 2016 by Kat

What We Don’t Talk About

I have a secret. Well, maybe not a secret, but something I try not to talk about here. I try to talk about photography. About creativity, and art. I try to talk about things that will encourage others to engage in art, because I so deeply believe we all need art and creativity in our lives. And I deeply believe that iPhone photography is one of the most accessible ways to create art in our modern world. So that’s what you hear about here.

 

What you don’t hear is the whole story. I try not to talk about how busy I am, how much I have going on between work, and family, and my creative business. I try not to talk about how hard it’s been to find time to create art lately. About how full my calendar is with a teenager in high school, and how much more stressful it is to navigate the ups and downs of an adolescent. Not to mention the projects and travel for work the last few months. I enjoy many great opportunities and challenges in my corporate job, but it all has an impact on my time and energy.

That’s life. 

I don’t talk about it because I feel like it’s something we are all dealing with. It feels like whining. First world problems. These things are all my choice, and I could make different choices. 

But if it’s more than me dealing with it, why not talk about it? Why not talk about strategies for maintaining personal, creative time when busy? Why not discuss efficient ways to grow as an artist, to grow a creative business while meeting other commitments in our lives? Why not open a conversation here, and get more thoughts on how to manage living as an artist/parent/spouse/student/employee/<fill in the blank> in our modern world? 

What do you say, are you interested? If you are, I’ll start talking about these topics more, but I need you to chime in. I need to learn from you too. 

Living a creative life is more than making art. It involves the whole person, living in the real world. It’s time for me to acknowledge that truth. I am more than my art. You are too.

Filed Under: The Kat Eye View of the World Tagged With: balance, creative journey, Creative Life Conversation

January 5, 2016 by Kat

If not now, when?

[N]ot later, not someday, not in a few years, not when times get better, not when life becomes easier, but right now.

— Elizabeth Gilbert in Big Magic

  
Those were the words, read an early December morning, that spurred me to start my #30edits project. And here is image #28 in that project, Interconnected, created an early January morning about one month later.

I love this image. It might just be my favorite of the series. Whether you can tell it or not, it’s a personal image. It speaks to my dual nature, that of engineer and artist. The two are interconnected in surprising ways, just as the organic and geometric are in this image. 

Who would have thought, twenty-eight edits in on the same image, I would create something so personally revealing? Who would have thought, twenty-eight images in, I would be creating anything that felt new and different at all?

Ideas come to us for a reason. I was toying with this #30edits idea a week or two before starting. Maybe I would do it in the new year, I thought. Maybe then I would have time. It was reading those words in Elizabeth Gilbert’s book which spurred me to action. To take on the challenge before I new it was possible to finish. To take a leap of faith, put it out there, and get started. 

All I can say now is… Wow, I’m glad I did. This last month has been one of the most creative periods for me in the last couple of years. 

Do you have an idea you are toying with? Do you have something you have been thinking about starting? Maybe looking for the perfect time to start? Don’t wait. If the idea is there, the time is right. It’s come to you for a reason. 

Do it now.


I found out yesterday that my book, Art with an iPhone: A Photographer’s Guide to Creating Altered Realities, is now available for purchase and download on iBooks!! Yay! If that is your favorite format, then you are in luck–you can get it now. For the rest of us, time is close!

And please, please, please, no matter where you purchase, write a review. Reviews are a big help! Thanks!

Filed Under: The Kat Eye View of the World Tagged With: #30edits, creative journey

June 5, 2015 by Kat

My iPhone Photography Book is Available for Preorder!

Pond Lily Pad Green Painting Photography Kat Sloma iPhone Photography Singapore

“Lily Pond,” Featured on the Cover

No matter how far you are going on any journey, there are points where you have to pause and take in the view. This is definitely one of them for me: My book, Art with an iPhone: A Photographer’s Guide to Creating Altered Realities, is now available for preorder on Amazon!

Is that not the coolest thing? Let’s just pause and absorb that a little bit. I wrote a book. A book that is on Amazon.

I know I’ve talked about it for a good long while. I know I spent hours developing the material, organizing it, and sitting at the computer writing it. I know that I sent the manuscript off to meet the deadline several months ago… Even so, this makes it all the more real!

There is still a lot of work to do. There is editing and layout and distribution and marketing. The release date is not until January 2016. It seems so far away, but when I look at it objectively, it’s less time to go than it’s been since I started this whole adventure. And at the end there will be a real, printed book filled with my art and words I can hold in my hands. That you can hold in your hands.

Awesome!

And now, here’s where you come in… Run on over to Amazon and preorder it now, pretty please! That will help its search rankings which will help more people find it which will help me spread the love for this wonderful art form.

We all have the capability of creating art. I want to show you how with the phone in your pocket.

Filed Under: The Kat Eye View of the World Tagged With: Amazon.com, Art with an iPhone, artistic journey, book, creative journey

May 19, 2015 by Kat

Developing your Wisdom

Wisdom is like marinade. First you take what a book said, or what a teacher said, and then you mix it with your own ideas. Then you add experience and pour in a few buckets of tears. Add memories of lost love, a pinch of personal humiliation and a teaspoon of deep regrets. Add to that a cup of courage. Leave it to soak for a few years and — voila — darn if you have not become wise.
— Marianne Williamson, author of A Year of Miracles 

 

At the end of every yoga class, when we are all relaxed and open after the final shavasana pose, my teacher reads a quote for contemplation. I love this moment, when I’m able to stop and listen long enough for a new idea to sink in. When I’m able to quietly contemplate it against my experience; see where it fits.

We need quiet moments of contemplation. We need time to think through ideas, and transform them into our own. We need time for our experiences and lessons to soak in, to “marinade,” as Marianne Williamson says. 

Wisdom does not come through experience alone. Experience is an essential ingredient, but it also comes from the seeking of new ideas, and the contemplation of where they fit amongst the library of our experience. Those are the secret ingredients, nothing more is needed.

Experience + Ideas + Contemplation = Wisdom

Sounds easy right? Of course, it’s not. We get busy. We don’t have time for contemplation or energy to seek new ideas, two of the three essential ingredients. It’s easier to buy the ready-made wisdom, to let others tell us what to think, what to believe, how to live. It’s easier to go with conventional wisdom than to develop our own. 

Like anything else, the simplest recipes are often the best, and the hardest. 

Start with a simple quote for contemplation, like we do at the end of every yoga class. Let it sink in, see where it fits in your experience, how it might shift your perspective slightly. Journal or talk to someone else about it. Make it your own, file it away for future reference. 

It’s a simple beginning, but with this step, you are developing your wisdom. You should be able to follow your own path from there.

Filed Under: The Kat Eye View of the World Tagged With: creative journey

April 7, 2015 by Kat

Keep Creating

I’ve been quietly struggling with my art lately. For some reason, I’m adrift. I’m not clear about what direction I’m going, what I’m trying to learn, or what’s the next challenge.  And one thing I know about myself, I need learning and challenge as part of my creative process.

So… I slowly continue to create. To look at the world around me and see what catches my eye. I’m waiting for inspiration to show me the way. 

This one came along yesterday, and I love it. 

 

 But it feels as if I had to be dragged kicking and screaming along the entire way. It’s as if inspiration reluctantly showed up for a moment, then ran away. “That’s all you get,” Inspiration says, “I’m outta here.” No clues left as to how to get it to stay.

So, dear blog friends, I’m looking for a diagnosis, and a cure. What’s wrong with me? Is it the seasonal blahs? Is it a creative rut? What will get me out of this funk?

All I know how to do is keep creating. If I keep creating, maybe Inspiration will stick around long enough to show me the way.

Filed Under: The Kat Eye View of the World Tagged With: artistic process, creative journey, flowers, spring

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