Trenton ReynoldsHey, Room in the Trees listeners. Today's episode is a little unusual. We spontaneously decided to record a Zoom conversation. So the audio will be a little bit different today, and some of our conversation might not make sense unless you know that there are three of us present, that Sabrina and Sean and... me. So if you would like to see the video version of this episode, you can do so on Facebook if you follow either Sabrina or me. And I will also include an embed of the video at the website roominthetrees.com. And here is the episode for today.
This is Room in the Trees, a podcast about living a creative life. Room in the Trees is hosted by Trent Reynolds and me, Sabrina Ward-Harrison.
Trenton ReynoldsShow notes including pictures, links, video, and more for every episode can be found at roominthetrees.com.
You can follow us on Instagram at Sabrina Ward Harrison and at Trent Reynolds Art. And now, here's this week's episode.
Trenton ReynoldsSo, Laura left town on Saturday morning. So, I've had Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Thursday. And now today up until I fly out at four o'clock. So I've probably spent too much time alone. And I might need to re-socialize for a couple of minutes to be human again. I don't know.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonYeah, that's great for you from having four kids and your wife nonstop. Yeah.
Trenton ReynoldsWell, and it has been, especially with COVID, it has been nonstop. Like we're always all home all the time with very little, you know, breaks of any kind. So, yeah, it's been huge. But actually, I mean, it was a huge blessing. And I'm very grateful for Laura for giving me this time. Just because I have a really hard time turning inward and being reflective and contemplative when I know that there are these other responsibilities so close at hand. It's like I know that when I finish doing whatever I'm doing in the garage, teaching or whatever... that I ought to be going home and helping out at the, at home and, you know, with the kids and stuff like that. So it's hard for me to make time to do what introverts often do best. And that is just like sit and stew in my thoughts. So that has been, especially after the, after my, this first course ended, I just felt a need to have a little bit of time to, to think about it, you know, to, to, think about what worked, what didn't work, you know, where to go next and stuff like that. So in that regard, it's been, it's been really, really helpful. And I've also gotten a lot of work done.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonSo you want to share anything about kind of reflecting on the course or.
Trenton ReynoldsYeah. I, I sent out a survey after the course was done just to get a kind of feel of, of how people responded, you know, what worked, what didn't work. And I got, The feedback matched my own kind of a personal assessment of it. And I think it was tremendously successful in terms of the instruction part of it.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonLet's take a moment for that. Tremendously accessible on the instructional part.
Trenton ReynoldsYeah, yeah, yeah. And I'm not just saying like from me and my, you know, my ability as a teacher, but the ability to communicate information in the right way, in the right tone and, you know. So that all felt, I felt really good about it. I felt like I did about as good as I can do, which is as long as the technology doesn't hamper that, me getting to kind of function at the level I feel like I'm capable of. So that was a success, and I feel like people responded well to that. Everybody, myself included, was kind of pleasantly surprised at how meaningful the Facebook group was. But also, all of us seem to kind of agree that the Facebook user interface, how we interacted was just not ideal for what we're trying to do. Yeah, it never really is. You know, I wonder about that because I feel like if that part of the class really was nailed well, like that could be transformative in terms of like getting people to feel like they're heard to, you know, people feel like they're a part of a community. Whereas there was enough kind of resistance that it just felt like. you know, we did not get what we could have from those connections. But it was fantastic. You know, being able to, a couple of the people that joined the class have been listening to the podcast. So there was kind of an immediate kind of understanding and friendship. So, no, it was fantastic. It really was. And as I'm sure you've experienced, I'm just trying to assess, like, how many times a year would I offer this? Was it, was I trying to accomplish too much in a single class, which I kind of felt like maybe was the case, you know, it was kind of this fire hose feed of, you know, all my favorite art materials. which I'm very familiar with because I've been using it for a while, but they were, you know, coming up with, you know, five to 10 new materials per week. Didn't give people enough time to, to, to, you know, try them out. So that's exciting.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonThe possibilities there with how you can kind of, spread that all out where you could have these multiple multiple courses right
Trenton Reynoldsso I'm thinking now that maybe once or twice a year I have this raw materials course that's kind of an overview like this just this fire hose of lots of stuff it's more kind of personal maybe a smaller group and then flesh out or have other classes that kind of get into more depth on specific areas. Like maybe have one that's all about aqueous media, one that's all about collage, one that's all about resin.
Yeah.
Trenton ReynoldsSo for people that don't really know what they want or want to just be exposed to a lot of stuff so they can kind of have their minds expanded what's out there, then maybe the overview is the way to go.
Right.
Trenton ReynoldsSo I've got a mini course that I've been that I'm planning and kind of was born from one of the lessons that I did in this class just on how to mix accurate color. So I think that's. Meaning, meaning like you see a color and you want to be able to mix your, your paints to achieve that color. Cool. Right. It's like a very kind of, I was never taught a good model for just, you know, that practical skill. How do I, how do I get that? Right. So just over the course of my years teaching, I've, I've come up with what I feel like is a, is a good, just practical approach to, to achieving, you know, that's golden. So yeah, I'm going to do that and that will be, you know, something that people can get for free on the website and then I'll offer a course that will Be like five videos that will get into more depth on the subject of color and basic color theory. So that's what I'm kind of working on next. And then maybe I'm thinking in January, I might or January, February might offer raw materials. raw materials again. And I'm also just like for the past three days, I've been doing a lot of just taking all the artwork I've created over the past two years in my studio and just preparing it for framing. And, and I'm going to just clear it out, make, make space for new artwork.
Sabrina Ward Harrisonso yeah that'd be something good to talk about a little bit because that's i think what a lot of people a lot of people ask like what do you do with older work and especially if you're not actively wanting to sell it or don't have this you know don't have it organized to sell like what do you what are you going to do with it i think there's like
Trenton ReynoldsAnd then of course you could always sell it or give it away. And I think you and I both have had, I think it's cyclical, right? I think you and I both have come upon times in our creative life where we've realized that we're surrounded just by too much stuff. And I think there's like, I mean, I'm remembering you getting rid of your, you know, the, or going through all of this stuff that you had in that storage bin, right? That was fine. Yep. And I remember we had this conversation and I'm sure this isn't a podcast somewhere where you felt this new possibility just by making room, literal, literal and psychological room, right? You just getting rid of all that stuff. opened up space to try something new or to create, right? But sometimes I feel like we accumulate so much stuff in our literal surrounding and just psychologically having that stuff there, no matter if it's in a storage bin or a garage or whatever, right? I feel like it keeps us from being able to create because we're so boxed in.
Yeah.
Trenton ReynoldsSo, and that's kind of what I'm feeling right now is like, I just feel like I've had these paintings around me for two or three years. And I've kind of been thinking, well, they're not quite done yet. I kind of need to work on them a little bit more, but in reality, I totally think they're finished thoughts and I'm ready to move on to something else and I just need to get rid of them. So, um, And that's the other thing about the kind of insidious part of it is, as you've said before, they kind of feel like your babies, you know, it's like, well, I, you know, I'm not ready to let them graduate and leave the house yet. You know, they're not, they're not old enough to take care of themselves. I need to protect them, right? What are they going to do without me? And that's hyperbolic, but there is some of that feeling in there of like, I kind of want them here. You know, there's a... There's kind of a comfort of having this work that you've created. It's evidence of accomplishment. It's evidence of, I don't know. So I'm realizing that there's a little bit of that too. It's like I just need to let it go and be in the world and give myself permission to be done.
Yeah. Yeah.
Trenton ReynoldsSo hard. Yeah, it is hard. It is hard. But I think for so many people, though, they're like we have all these voices in our head of like, I'm not really an artist. Like, who am I to sell this stuff? You know, is it really worth money? Like, should people actually be paying me for this stuff? I think there's a lot of that in creative people.
Yeah.
Trenton ReynoldsAnd, you know, somehow we've got to flip that mentality into something where it's like, you know, you're actually going to be blessing people's lives. You're going to be making their life better by putting this out into the world by them having it in their home. I cannot tell you how many times I've walked into somebody's home and they've had original artwork on the wall. And maybe I didn't even like the artwork, but the fact that it was made by somebody, right. I knew that there was a soul there. There was, it wasn't just, you know, kind of a print that was bought at, you know, Bed Bath and Beyond with a little bit of, you know, gel medium to make it look three-dimensional. Like I knew, I knew somebody had poured their, their life into it. And that, And I just personally believe, and obviously I'm kind of biased, but I personally believe there is meaning inherent in that. So just having it sitting there doing nothing in your garage or in your house is depriving the world of having that kind of soul and spirit to boost people in their homes. Anyway, I think we could do a lot better just generally as creative people in the recognizing that what we do has really significant value. All right, enough talking about me. Tell me what's going on with you guys. You guys have been on the Ice Age Trail. I think that's a good metaphor for, you know, just life, the Ice Age Trail. Tell me about your Ice Age Trail that you guys have been walking.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonWell, how did we find it? Well, we found it because we were supposed to get married on that day. Right. And we think we were sitting here like we want to go somewhere. We went to look. Did we look Google search for waterfall or something?
Sean McCabeI don't know what it was exactly. But one way or another, we wound up at Gibraltar Rock.
Mm hmm. - It's gorgeous.
Sean McCabe- Yeah. On a day where there was barricades up blocking the driveway and we happened to be on a motorcycle that you can see where other people had driven through the grass between the ditch and the barricades. So it was the parking lot that was blocked off from the main highway. The trail was actually still open. So, which we didn't know until we happened across a gentleman that was up there and he had his two walking sticks and a backpack and a walkie talkie. And he was out, he was, he was actually going on the trail and here, I think I was still wearing my chaps on the motorcycle, like huffing and puffing to get up this hill, you know, carrying all the gear and then set it down and he comes out of the brush. It's perfect. Guy by the name of Kent. I think it was Kent. Yeah. So it was good. It was wonderful. And talk about metaphor or however you want to put it. So we were there and we were very appreciative of the situation and like the moment to just be in that moment, right? Which was good because the next time we showed up, it was entirely different. The place was overcrowded. It looked like six flags or something like that. There was a line of people and there's cars everywhere and there's biting flies. And, you know, it was completely different. So we were supposed to actually be there when we were there, have the experience we had, meet the individual that we met, just... that you can't recreate those moments. So you should really just capitalize on where you are in this breath, because trying to, to do this podcast tomorrow at the same time, circumstances will be different. You know, it's raining outside right now and it's kind of cold and chilly and you're here. And then, If we were to try and let's get through this real quick, we'll just do it again tomorrow. Tomorrow it's going to be different, no matter what. So I guess that's what I'm kind of reflecting on with that experience. It was interesting and you can edit this or whatever, but I'm like so on fire. I just came from meeting with a guy who did 14 years in prison. He was a guy that was in the same group homes I was in at the same time I was in. I got a call from a local central office. The guy was reaching out. He wanted help. He'd been in prison. He got out. He got drunk and his life's just falling apart. It's me. with different circumstances. He turned left, I turned right. In 1989, we were in the same house down the street through a house. I didn't know him. We're talking, we were in the shelter right across from Plymouth, same time. His dad left when he was at the whole story. So like, as I'm walking in here, like all this is bubbling under the surface.
Wow.
Sean McCabeAnd before when I was the happiest, it was always about the story that I got to play a part in the story. And recently self has kicked in and it's a lot of what about me and my legacy and how am I going to be remembered and it's like whoa whoa whoa the story was never about you. It was about the story right his story. and that I get to play a part in it, which is great. You know, even if you're the janitor who's sweeping up the stage, you got to play a part in that play. Whereas I want to be the main character. I want the story to be about me, and that's never worked out well. So, yeah. it's kind of a rambling of thoughts that have all kind of, but there's all this going on and that pain is the touchstone of all spiritual growth. And I'm feeling that today. Like I'm really humbled that I'm like, why aren't I where I think I should be? Well, why ain't I where I earned? You know, that that's the truth. Like I haven't been storing away for a great life. It's only been in the last 13 years that I've actually been trying to contribute to society. I've been taking my whole life. And here, finally, I have this recognition in this moment. So I'm going to capitalize on it in this moment. And I'm really grateful. I got life better than I could ever have planned. It's better than I could have earned. And really, really grateful that I get to share it with someone. And she was explaining to me along the lines of, but I remember you or something along those, you know, like, instead of worrying about what the world thinks, you know, Like, what about the people that are nearest to you? So, anyways. I just, that was kind of, I've been waiting to throw that up. I feel much better.
That's awesome.
Trenton ReynoldsReally, really well said.
Well said. Yeah.
Sean McCabeBesides, if you remember, there's a lot of bad guys in history that nobody will ever forget. And I don't want that kind of story. I don't want to be remembered if it comes down to that.
So. Right. How cool.
Sean McCabeWrite a book, she says. Write a book.
I think so. Do some art. Yeah.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonWe can talk about the filming we've done here too. Oh, yeah.
Sean McCabeWe've done some filming. Can you?
Okay.
Sean McCabeWe're risky. No, no, it's not. The only thing risky about it was a lot of open jars of paint. Sabrina wanted to shoot a little demo for her class. gave me a chance to see her inner element. And it was good. It was, you know, I don't know about the cinematography of it because I was the one doing the shooting. But the real key for it that I saw was that instead of trying to start and finish a project, right? Instead of, you know, like, I don't know where to start, so I'm not going to start, was that at the end of this, you weren't supposed to have a finished product. What you're supposed to have is something that would then take you to the next level, something that you could cut up and it would be used for something else in which that wouldn't be a finished product either. It takes the pain away or the fear of like, well, I can't get it perfect. You're not supposed to get it perfect. It's not supposed to be finished. You're supposed to do something. And in doing that, instead of trying to create a piece of art, like allow the art to start to flow and to start to get into it. I don't know. It's transformative when I see her teach like that because... it starts to make sense to me. And if I can pick up on it, then people who are actually really like, I wish I knew how to do this. I didn't wish that I knew how to do it, but now that I've seen it, I'd like to know more. So tell them about it, baby.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonJust so fun to teach this class.
Trenton ReynoldsWell, tell me again, how would you describe the class?
Sabrina Ward HarrisonFull Color Life, and it's about... really exploring color and memory through writing and different creative exercises. And it's really coming at creativity sideways and writing sideways to get to the heart of the colors of your life, like the range of colors, not just like the bright full color life, happy, happy, but the tones and textures of your life and made up your life. And how to build a content that can be applied to anything creatively you're doing whether it's decided designing it you know picking up paper a living room to look to painting. And so, Just like the kind of things that we see in the comments from this, it's like I'll go forward to them and then back up. But for example, this is a kind of common I would see I saw on the Facebook page. Okay, so mark making. So there's a mark making project assignment. This is the kind of this is the freedom that people are coming out with now. Okay, so I've got a Brussels sprout stock and a bottle of wine, the bottom of a bottle of wine. Okay, what else? Just a freaking Brussels sprouts, Brussels sprout stock was incorporated into like, it's totally legitimate. I'm like, these guys are getting free. Yes, yes. Yeah, and then walking, you know, painting and using their feet and just saying that they were, you know, able to cry and let go. And there's a lot of loss that people have had. And just and then other people that have been, you know, art directors, designers who've gone to art school. A lot of people there who've gone to art school and said, we studied you in art school 20 years ago. And now just to be. being taught and it really is what they, you know, just breaking the rules of what they kind of came out of art school with. So it's just really been a joy. And so I've also let given myself permission in the process. Like I'm going to, I'm teaching it scrappy. I'm not going to make it. I'm making it as I go with things. I've been really passionate about teaching for a long time and I, I gave myself the permission, so it's six sessions, and so I decided to double it and do six extra sessions on top of it so it could just kind of fill itself out where people could do breakout. We could do meet and do writing and breakout groups, or we could do just open studio sessions. where hence the open studio that happened here, where I said, Sean was over and I said, do you think we could just shoot something quickly? I got to kind of do a demo. And we did the painting exercise And it was so funny and messy and spontaneous. And, you know, we didn't have any plan. And I didn't have the right clothes on. So there's midway I'm putting on pajama bottoms. I'm like crawling around on the floor like crazy. You're in the moment. You're not on the phone. You're getting lost in the experience and it feels good to do it and to see this happening. So ultimately as a teacher to evoke that I can't get people to get free without getting free myself.
Right.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonRight. And then showing that. And so I'm on this, my face is like bright red and I'm going, I'm just going to share this video with these people. And I'm, and I also, you know, I'd gotten some state of the art studio. I want to show the fact that like, I just had to make this situations where it was like filming, getting this tail and like, okay, so I found this table out on the street. Here's my DVD of "Reality Bites." This was a good film. Okay, let me roll this back out here. Okay, we don't have space. Let me just use this tracing paper. And then this jar, I ate this entire jar of honey and we'll use this for water. And it just, people really, really, it helped. And it took a lot to just, Other times I filmed things like that, but it was a much more orchestrated process. And it wasn't, this was such a fun and it was a really, for me, it was, it was such a connecting time for me with Sean because I felt very seen and accepted and in it with him. And that's so important to me. It's beyond what I could have imagined to getting to have as a partner so. to see you really got it. Oh, yeah. Yeah.
Sean McCabeTotally. I dig the idea of showing somebody, you know, you tell them, I need you to get free, and then you move into the lesson, and it's like, wait a minute, how does it look for you to get free? Yeah. And then it's, well, I don't really know what I'm doing now. You don't cut. Nope, you keep going. Why? Because in real life, people stop and they go, oh, I don't know where to go next.
Yeah.
Sean McCabeokay, we're going to do this. Just even if it's wrong, do something. And that I think was, that's where that authentic, genuine, it may not be for everybody. It's for me though. I dig that.
Trenton ReynoldsI think that is such a, such a part of our time right now. You know, I, I have spent a lot of time researching camera equipment and, you know, technology and how to make it look, professional, right? Look at really polished. But, you know, I feel like we're seeing all around us that people really long for and have an appetite for authenticity. They don't want to see something that's polished, that's cut down to the perfect, you know, time and, you know, that all the expressions and all the, I don't know, like... A kind of tangent related to that is how in digital recording now and audio recording, it's so easy to like lift up people's voices if they go a little flat. It's easy to, if somebody gets, hits a bad note, they can just, you know, pop in and fix that one note and not have to rerecord. Then I remember hearing about, I think the bassist of Led Zeppelin. I can't remember. He was recording with another band called. and he hit a bad note in the middle of the recording, and they asked him if he wanted to go back and re-record it, and it wasn't a bad note. It was just he kind of buzzed a little bit, and he didn't want to because, you know, the authenticity of that recording, of that take, was part of the soul of it. And I think we all just are kind of tired of not really knowing what we're looking at, not knowing what's real and not knowing what's been edited and polished for us. And I don't know, I can totally see that. And I don't know, I think I have to fight that impulse to want to not put anything out until it's polished, right? Because I think... You know, people really want to see what it actually looks like, not what I want them to think it looks like, you know. But I think all of us struggle with being vulnerable like that, like showing what's going on in real life. Something Sean said, Sabrina, when you were out was kind of struck me, and especially just considering what Sean was, the story you were just sharing, you know, just about life and being in the moment. Sean was saying something about how you're not trying to take people in a lesson from the start to a finished product. You're just guiding them in a process and then what you come away with becomes the starting point for the next step, right? Or it just becomes material, right? And I think that's such an important life lesson, you know? For each of us, like, you know, I feel like we all develop this expectation. I think it's all in like all these things are interrelated. We, we develop this expectation that we're supposed to end up a certain place and look a certain way. And that, you know, the, that the end result is you know, we're so set on this vision of what we have the end result being that when we actually do something amazing, we can't see it because it doesn't match up with what our expectation is or, you know, what we think it ought to look like. And I don't know, I think the combination of both what Sean was saying about You know, living in the moment and just being able to appreciate and see what you have right there right now and value that. And then also, you know what you're doing, Sabrina, man, it's gonna make me get weepy a little bit. Um, and just letting yourself be there and make stuff and not wait until it's the right moment. You know, like there's so much of, so much of our culture right now needs that. You know, we need to stop, you know, looking at what everybody else is doing and deciding that, you know, what they're doing isn't right. but not do anything ourselves. I don't know. I'm starting to conflate a lot of different ideas here, but I don't know. Everything that you guys have been saying, just in terms of your individual experiences and your experiences together, seems like this perfect combination of, you know, the kind of healthy living that is, you know, so lacking right now.
Yeah.
Trenton ReynoldsSo well done, guys. You're hitting it out of the park.
Yeah.
Sabrina Ward Harrisonthere's this concept about Esther Perel is this woman who speaks a lot about relationships and really wise, wonderful, just great, just great TED talks. And she talks about that in partnership, how, you know, she talks about marriage and relationships and long-term relationships and she said about how in partnership, you have to have enough space, spaciousness between yourself that you can truly see the other person. And when she asked hundreds and hundreds of people, when are you most attracted to your partner? And it's never like, oh, when they look like this or something, it's when they're in doing something they really love doing. And they're in the moment doing that. And it's just when it comes down to like when they are, that's when they're the most radiant. And so when I think of when I heard that, I thought about so it's our responsibility as being a participant in a relationship to to be aware of that. it's not for him, for Sean to make me feel radiant. It's for me to do what I might, brings me alive. And so that I can be radiant for myself and my life and also in, in my relationship.
Trenton ReynoldsNo, I get it. Yeah. You, you did a great job that I think you're,
Sabrina Ward HarrisonThat vulnerability of doing that, like what I did the other day on the floor, that was in my radiant self.
Trenton ReynoldsYeah, it was. You got to see it.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonI know. I got to see it.
Trenton ReynoldsSend me a link, please. I'd love to see it.
Sean McCabeOne or 12 minutes worth of video on a, you know, what, 15 or 20? It's pretty great. Yeah.
Yeah.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonSo that comes down to what I want my students to experience is like what they need to do to bring themselves alive in their life right now. So it's like they want to have healing in their life. They want to have release. They want to let go of the sadness and this ache. They want to reconnect with their kids. They need to be doing this for themselves.
Trenton ReynoldsI think, and that word is really resonating with me, radiant. You know, we want to be, we want to radiate. We want to not just be something where we're like absorbing all this negativity and like becoming a black hole of energy, right? We want to like feel like, you know, we're contributing. We're being projected out and being part of the world and united with the world rather than.
isolated.
Sean McCabeThere's something around whether it's social media or just we as people with the airbrush and the really fine polished. And I see that and I'm scared to try because I know I can't put that out. So I don't do anything. And I think there's something along those lines, like just, you know, So I dig it. I absolutely dig it. And that being vulnerable, that, you know, part of me doesn't want to, I'm no good at running a camera. And yet, she was willing to trust me to, you know, And he'd further go on to explain to me later, obviously, that the only wrong thing is to do nothing. So, yeah.
Trenton ReynoldsI think there's a lot of wisdom in that, for sure.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonAnd the other part, too, is about the critical, just to share another part that I think is interesting to share is that I'd done some filming over the summer at Sean's place and just set up the camera while I was painting and I started just trying to put it together to share with people. And instead of saying, okay, so now this is what I'm doing now and I'm putting this on, like, okay, this is the voice going out of my head saying this. This is the voice saying this. Now I'm thinking, and I'm just sharing it with them and just voiceover talking about how every single voice is saying this is stupid. This is no, no. But it was about the making of it whatever I needed to work through my heart whatever I was going through. I need to be doing, I need to be doing it down that bunker at that time, you know, this stuff. And so that was another key part again it's like not about the freaking finished piece.
Trenton Reynoldspiece. So, you know, there's this phenomenon I know that we've talked about on the podcast before, but I think it's relevant here. And that is like at art school, there's a phenomenon where art students, their work will start to look like their teacher's work, right? And there will be, you know, a group of students whose work look like this teacher, another group of students whose work, they kind of become their followers, right? And I think that happens because they don't know how to judge value, how to judge good and bad, except by the authority, which is their teacher, right? So they start to mold their practice and their aesthetic to mirror what they assume is good. And that is, you know, what their teacher is doing. And I think it's a disservice that we do just in general in education to not... constantly be helping students return to themselves, you know, to try to take their knowledge and not use that as a tool to get them to be somebody else, right? But rather to enhance and become themselves more fully, right? I just, I feel like we don't do a good job of of focusing on that aspect of it. It's like all the, it's, you know, you go to go to a school to become something else almost, you know, or to become, I don't know. I, I, but so much of what you're saying is like, man, I wish they just would teach that in schools. I think we'd have a healthier, you know, healthier art students and they'd come out the other side, not feeling horrible about themselves, but rather, you know, having the tools to really discover and probe deeper into who they actually are, you know, to you know, become more of themselves and realize that that's what the game is, is to become more
Sabrina Ward Harrisonyourself. Yeah. Henry Miller says my goal is something that they said in my goal in life is to become more and more myself as ridiculous as that may sound. you know, just to ultimately come more and more into yourself. And that's the aspect of in a course like this, there's two kind of overarching projects. But I really was adamant that there's not a specific way to do them. And I kept it open-ended enough. I gave the example of when I was in college, School and my 3d 3d class and we were asked to make a three-dimensional autobiographical book and the key was it could be something as small as you wear around your your neck or as big as something you walk through and that how cool and those were the parameters and so it left this spaciousness of Well, how would I tell like what would the shape be? three-dimensional shape be in my life and as a book and And so I kind of gave them that example.
Trenton ReynoldsSomething that I would like to maybe have a full conversation about at some point is the balance between giving assignments. So people have something to work toward and to feel like they accomplished something during the class, but not having it become that the assignment is the point. You know what I'm saying? I feel one thing that I totally... failed on in this class is after the first week, so my class was Monday was instruction. Wednesday was me doing a pre-recorded video, responding to anything, any questions that came in about what I talked about on Monday or any clarification or anything they wanted to know more about. And then Friday was a critique. After the first week, nobody really had anything for me to critique. which was totally understandable because it was just the first week. You know, they didn't, they were just kind of getting acquainted. But I thought, well, maybe I should give some kind of goal, like some assignment so that each week we have something to talk about on Friday. And so I just arbitrarily thought, well, we've got five weeks. Maybe I'll say, you know, we're going to work towards having five finished pieces by the end of these five weeks, right? Right. But then almost immediately, and I got this feedback from some of the people that they just started obsessing about five pieces. You know, like, oh, I can't finish five pieces in five weeks. Or how am I going to do this? Or just like this anxiety set in. Right? And, you know, I couldn't have cared less about five pieces. Like, it was not about, like, that number was arbitrary. Like, who cares? You know, but so anyway, I... I spent a lot of time thinking about how can I, but at the same time, if we get done it with five weeks and they haven't finished anything, I think for a certain group of people, they'd feel like, well, why did I take this class? I didn't finish anything. you know, or that itself, you know, the inability to finish something might make them, you know, feel like they're, you know, that it was not a success. So that, so like, I don't know, for me, that's a, that's been a kind of a tricky balance to find is I want them to come away feeling like they had completed something. They have something to show for the effort, for the money that they paid. Yeah. But I don't want that to start to become the fixation. Do you have any thoughts on that? I guess general thoughts and--
Sabrina Ward HarrisonThe way I came at that one this time was I wanted them to come away with something they could use as a reference. So the thing that they're creating can ultimately be beautiful. it's going to be practical for referencing it with what other things are going to do. They can make the shape of it be a deck. It could be a scroll. It could be the back of a door. It could be in a book shape. It could fold itself out, but it's something that they can use.
going forward.
Trenton ReynoldsI'm thinking now in this moment that maybe, you know, and what I would like Facebook to be able to do that it's not very good at is to be able to be a repository, like a journal for people where they could upload pictures of their experimentation.
Right.
Trenton ReynoldsAnd then have a, have kind of a, progression of the things that they learned over the five weeks and to be able to see that progression and also to be able to share that with other people and see other people's kind of in a more linear way, you know, or in a way where they can see it all together instead of like having to search for their previous images and stuff like that. but you know so they can see that they've accumulated a lot of raw material going back to the name of my my course right that they they've accumulated a lot of new ideas and and the the stuff that will then they will then to be able to uh employ to to create their work that
Sabrina Ward Harrisonyou know you think about the pressure of the gym coach um where they give you these different routines and exercises and then you come away with this like pocket of all different options like i'm going to mix this with this and you do with hamstrings and biceps this day and you have this resource of these raw materials and something in there that I could see being, like I would love a burst of knowledge about resin that I could turn to.
Sean McCabeThat's probably the most analogy so far is like the coaching. Yeah. Because they're not responsible for, for you having a dynamite in shape body, but they're responsible for sharing and partying on you. So here's the difference, right? So you got guys that are gym rats that work out really great, that's awesome. And they can't teach anybody else how to do it. They're just like, I don't understand why you don't get it, just do what I do kind of thing. Then you got people that are not in great shape, but they know how to train people. You find that individual who's an artist that can also impart on other people what it was that I did. And then I'll walk you through it. And when you come out of the other end, you'll have a better idea of how it is that I do what I do. But it was never my I never promised you a finished product My thing was that I'm gonna show you how it is that I did that's why you came to me If you want to go to bed bath and beyond and buy something and hang it on the wall if you want something on the Wall, that's perfect. You know when it's a print. There's no heart and soul in it But if you want to express yourself and pour your heart and soul into something, I'll show you how I pour my heart and soul and this stuff. And like, like I want to go to Trent. I want, I want to see how it is that he does what he does. And I come out the other end. I don't feel like I've been taken advantage of or anything else. I feel like that guy showed me how it is. Maybe that's not my jam. Maybe I'm supposed to do something in a different media. I'm going to try the next course because he gets into something different on that one, but coming out of it, you know, I want you for you, you know, not... You have something specific, as does Sabrina, as do I, that has been imparted on us and it's ours. It's a talent, right? Whatever that talent is that we've been blessed with, it's ours to express and share and everything else or to squander. You know, plenty of people squander their talents. You know, I love that idea that you talk about. That's passion, that heart and soul into a piece of material that you can appreciate that. I do anyways. I appreciate it.
Trenton ReynoldsOh, goodness. Well, Sabrina, I have a good friend who was actually my supervisor up at the high school. He's teaching now up in a high school up in Marin County up north.
Wow.
Trenton ReynoldsBut he what he's been doing that I think is just a really good idea is he has his students create a Google slideshow. And then every week they post an image to the Google slideshow with some text describing what they did. And then, you know, they update it each week. So at the end of the semester, they have a slideshow. a visual and written kind of progression of their, not just visually what they did, but the ideas and their thoughts behind, you know, how the decisions that they made. And I was just thinking if I, if there could be some kind of equivalent where that can happen in at a larger scale that I don't have to try to, you know, fuss with 20 people coming up with Google slideshows and figuring out how to get those on the website and share them. And like, that seems like a really good model, you know? Yeah. Yeah. So for the next, for the next couple of months, I'm going to focus on coming up with a couple of these many, many courses and see how that goes.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonIt is the future. I'm so excited about it. I'm so excited about it. I mean, I'm wrapping up this course. I'm halfway through. I just feel like I just started it.
Trenton ReynoldsYeah. And I think that's maybe the biggest takeaway for me is like, you know, it's one thing to kind of understand something intellectually and another thing to actually experience it and And for me, the takeaway is that there really is a lot of potential here. That teaching online isn't just a second best option in time of COVID. There are actually some really compelling advantages to teaching this way. And there are obvious disadvantages, but that's always going to be the case. You're always going to have compromises. And I don't think this replaces in-person interaction anymore. But man, it really does have some amazing transformative ability, you know, abilities. So, you know, and I can see just and I experienced people really benefiting from it in ways that I don't think could have happened even in, you know, a traditional classroom. So that's so cool. You did it. It's cool stuff. Yeah, no, I'm excited. A lot of possibility. Anyway, you guys, it is, I do have to, I got to go, got to get back to doing some framing before I head out to Utah tonight. But it was fantastic to catch up. So you guys look, look awesome. You look happy. You look at peace. You look comfortable. I'm grateful. Go team.
Yeah, go team.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonSay hi to Laura and the kids.
Trenton ReynoldsI will, I will for sure.
Thanks for listening. We'll be back next week. In the meantime, you can follow us on Instagram at Sabrina Ward Harrison and at Trent Reynolds Art.
Trenton ReynoldsAnd check out the show notes at roominthetrees.com where you can also get in touch if you have any ideas you'd like to share.
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