Sabrina Ward HarrisonThis 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.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonYou can follow us on Instagram at Sabrina Ward Harrison and at Trent Reynolds Art. And now, here's this week's episode.
Hello. Hi. Hi. Hi.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonCould we do the whole podcast like this?
Hi. Hi.
Trenton ReynoldsYes.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonHow long could we talk like this? would people still listen to us
Trenton Reynoldswell Sabrina I don't think I'd last long
Sabrina Ward HarrisonI would have to be very, very intentional. It takes a lot of mouth muscles.
Trenton ReynoldsAnd cheeks. And cheeks. Hi.
Hi.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonHey, happy holidays.
Trenton ReynoldsHappy holidays. Oh gosh. This, this, 'tis the season. 'Tis the season. Can I share a little bit of body failure? Yes. Please. It's one of those things that I tend to return to So I recorded a video fairly recently and was re-watching it, and it was a live video. And it looked like I had a little something on my mouth, and I couldn't figure it out. Turns out my body has decided to grow a patch of white whiskers right at the edge of my mouth. Such that it looks so that it looks like I've got like a little milk mustache or a little something on my mouth. Oh, interesting. And, you know, of course, I can't. What am I gonna do? Gonna use beard dye on a little spot? Anyway, it's like my scruff is the same length as it always is. - Yeah. - But for some reason that little patch has gone white and it looks like I need to clean my face. face weird hashtag body fail aging aging is awkward yes yeah awkward that's that's better hashtag yeah like i get my eyebrow white hairs my eyebrow those are the worst yeah
Those are weird. How dare they? Yeah.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonI heard this funny interview. Tim Ferriss interviewed Jerry Seinfeld. I heard it on his podcast last week. And the end of the interview, Jerry's saying how, like, God gives you until about 43 and and he lets you go. He's like, I'll be with you. And then at about 43, he's like, you're on your own.
Trenton ReynoldsGood luck with that.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonIt's like, that's really relatable. It's like, okay. It's like, it took you this far. You got it from here.
Trenton ReynoldsYou've had a good run.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonYou've had a good run. Good luck to you.
Trenton ReynoldsI'll let you take it from here.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonYeah. Oh, my gosh. It feels so different. I just just turning 45. I mean, I feel suddenly like more tired and like thinking, oh, my gosh, is this really is this really what's changing? I mean, everything's changing, but it is it is odd.
Trenton ReynoldsI think there's something like how that reflects in your attitude. Like, I feel like just generally. Before, I would just kind of go along with things, even if I wasn't totally comfortable or... My comfort just didn't matter as much. Right. Yeah. Or my wellbeing. I just kind of go with the flow, right? I wasn't exactly that. And now, I don't know. like just like a family activity. We'd go be doing something, you know, and I'm not really into it, you know, but whatever, this is just what we're doing. And now I'm more likely just to go, no, I don't want to do that I don't know maybe I think there's like a physical component and also just like a mental like I'm done we're just not going to do that anymore that's not on the menu sorry I don't know, like when you were younger, you were with friends and they're like, let's go bowling, right? Right, right, right, right. And you don't really care about bowling. You don't really want to go bowling. But yeah, you got time, right? You got time.
You can do it.
Trenton ReynoldsI'm going to go bowling. It'll be fine, right? And now it's like, I think if somebody said, let's go bowling, I'd just be like, no.
No, thank you. I don't have time. I don't have energy.
Trenton ReynoldsAnd I don't really like bowling. I'm not going to go. Sorry. No, thank you. Maybe that's a good example. Yeah, that's totally a good example. That being said, last time we had a family reunion, I do believe we went bowling. Actually, not the most recent one, but anyway. So maybe that's not entirely true. I still go bowling.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonBut here's a random thing that I'm completely on this kick of Survivor. Never watched it when it's aired, but decided I just deep-dived into Survivor and watched probably eight seasons of it. And it's kind of like watching a sports game or something where it's completely not anything that I do, I'm interested in, but totally takes my mind off of any work. related stuff. And I like the social strategy part of it. And I'm watching the last, the most recent one, which is season 40, which is 20 winners who've all won the game, which is, so they're really good at it. They're all competing against each other for $2 million. Oh my goodness. It's really strategic and just, oh, it's good.
Trenton Reynoldsbut and it's all it's all about like undercutting and outwitting and all that yeah but you have to
Sabrina Ward Harrisonyou have to form these alliances and you have to like perform friendships and then but you you're all it is a little like chess where you're thinking you know three steps ahead of yourself and um and then people all have different some people are really good at the physical you know some people are really good at like the puzzle part of it some people are good at just uh really good at social strategy and, you know, great relationships, but you can't, the whole thing is you can't stand out too much. So you're really trying this line where you can't be too good at anything.
Trenton ReynoldsRight, you want to be good, but not threatening. And then the last, yeah, and the last people that are,
Sabrina Ward Harrisonthe jury is made up of the last, like, 10 people that, so they all decide who wins. So you have to be aware of when you're eliminating people, how many people you're backstabbing because they're ultimately voting whether you, who wins. It's really interesting. So anyone listening, that's something. Curious. - Survivor. - Survivor. What about you?
Trenton Reynolds- I don't think I've ever watched a full episode of Survivor. - No, I never had
Sabrina Ward Harrisoneither before.
Trenton ReynoldsThe only TV show that we are watching with any regularity is The Mandalorian. I haven't heard of that. It's a Star Wars thing on Disney+. It's okay. I haven't been... I don't know. It's nice just kind of mindless and fun to watch the characters. And like the making of, they do this making of with every season they post, you know, like a behind the scenes type thing. And it's incredible some of the stuff they're doing. So, and I wanted to tell you about one of the things. One of the things that they do that's new is they have up in Northern California, I Lucasfilms, whatever, Industrial Light and Magic, they have this room that's entirely made up of LED screens, or LCD screens, like TV screens. They're all connected. So the whole room becomes the set. like they do virtual set in the, so they're shooting against a virtual set, like on the screen. And it's, the screens are so high quality that it looks like real life. Is that what you're saying? I'm trying to grasp that. So instead of shooting in, instead of shooting in front of a green screen and then putting the virtual stuff in after the fact, the actors are actually in the real environment But the environment's all on a room of TV screens.
Yeah.
Trenton ReynoldsNow, if you get a chance, it's on Disney+. And I'd say even watch that before you watch the show. Which, what's that one called? The show is The Mandalorian. And then it's just like the extra feature, like... And it's anyway, and then there's a bunch of other cool stuff that that's kind of mixed into it where they're shooting with a video game engine. So the camera was that is shooting the actor sync is in sync with the virtual environment. So when you move the camera, there's parallax in the background that matches the real life person. What's parallax mean? Parallax is like how the distant scenery moves in relation to the thing that's closer to you. You know how like something that's far away that's moving really fast looks like it's moving slower than something that's really close? Yeah, right. So that's the kind of that difference in the rate of movement of something farther away versus something close to you. so anyway uh they so so it's this combination of uh virtual uh virtual set and real life action and they're able to make it look like it's all together the cool thing is that the actors actually have something to act against yeah it's like acting in this empty green screen so i think anyway it's fascinating i'd highly recommend watching just the you know behind the the scene stuff. But that's pretty much all we have. That's all we have time for.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonAnd has anything eased up over there? Any feeling, any hopeful elements of life?
Trenton ReynoldsAny hopeful? No, man. It is just work right now. I mean, the lockdowns are going back into effect and parks have closed again and on top of that you know weather's a bit colder and i don't know like i was out i was out taking a walk i don't know if i've maybe i don't think i've ever been to a park before but i've been to a park before and i've I think I've talked to you about this, but I was out taking a walk a couple weeks ago by myself, had a mask in the pocket. There was nobody out. It was on a city street, but there was nobody out. And except for this one woman who's across the street, probably 30 feet away, right? She's wearing a mask. I'm not wearing a mask. I cross the street well before I pass her, so I'm just to be respectful. And she yells out, wear a mask! Which I totally respect that. A lot of people are very concerned. But at the same time, it just kind of symbolized to me like... there's just this low level fear and low level, like everybody's out there can hurt me. Yeah. Yeah.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonYep. Yep. Yeah.
Trenton ReynoldsAnd I don't know, part of me is like, of course I'm going to wear a mask when I feel like I might be endangering somebody, but if I'm by myself on the street, you know, so far away from you that it's, you know, impossible that I would have any negative effect on you. I almost feel like I'm obligated to not wear a mask, so I don't kind of feed into this sense that threat is everywhere. You know what I'm saying? Right, right. I don't know. I kind of hesitate to say that out loud here, because I don't want people to get the feeling that I am a person who doesn't want to wear masks.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonBut I think your points are very good, and your point about that low-lying feeling everyone's got is – can hurt you or something like that is that's what I think he's been wearing because I noticed this like we're not saying hi you're not passing people in Madison are so friendly and yet now everyone just like looks ahead you're obviously not seeing anyone smile and you're not saying
Trenton Reynoldsanything to each other expression yeah just seeing seeing these eyes peeking out on top of them yeah
Sabrina Ward Harrisonand I wonder how things will change I hope it will go back but it's it feels so different, especially in a town that's so different than that. Yeah, it is.
Trenton ReynoldsSo I think it's been affecting me, I think, more than it's affected Laura. But psychologically, I just, I have a really hard time with that. But hopefully everybody, you know, get vaccinated and we'll be able to get back to something like normal sometime. And we'll be able to walk up and say, Hi. Let me get real close.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonI hate close talkers. Just so I can say, Hi.
Trenton ReynoldsClose talkers.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonOr just anyone that gets too close. Yeah, close talking... Just right there, like, okay, okay.
Trenton ReynoldsYeah. And there's such a little margin of error, right? Like one inch is enough just to be too close. Yep, yep.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonIt's a very thin margin. Yep. That's the one.
Trenton Reynoldsyeah so you've been doing some lives yes so um i've decided that every week uh i'm gonna do a just a live critique that's so neat so i guess i'll just put it out there that if there's anybody in the in the room in the trees audience that is interested i'm doing a live facebook critique every week on thursday at 11 pacific standard time 11 so how does that work people can submit how do they submit work right so if if if
somebody is on my email list and if you want to be on my email list you can go to dablon.com d-a-b-b-l-e-o-d-a-b-l-e-o-d-a-b-l-e-o-d-a-b-l-e-o-d-a-b-l-e-o-d-a-b-l-e-o-d-a-b-l-e-o-d-a-b-l-e-o-d-a-b-l-e-o-d-a-b-l-e-o-d-a-b-l-e-o-d-a-b-l-e-o-d-a-b-l-e-o-d-a-b-l-e-o-d-
Trenton ReynoldsB-B-L-E-O-N.com and there are a couple different ways on there. You can submit your email to my email list. I send out an email requesting submissions and then anybody that's on the email list can submit a AP. least for me to critique. And I say this on the broadcast, but I prefer that they be images that are either works in progress or that have been recently finished. Because I think there's-- I noticed this in the class. There's a kind of an energy that happens when you know that the work that you're looking at is something that that artist is working on right now. instead of looking at something that's two or three years old. I think there's kind of inspiration and kind of momentum that the audience, like the people that are looking at it, pick up on. So that's the idea is that this is a critique for works in progress or recently finished.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonI feel like I want to submit something to you and get your feedback about it. - I feel like I'm bad at it.
- Do it.
Trenton Reynolds- I feel like. - I think I'm a. - Yeah. - I don't know. I feel like I'm pretty, I'm not mean about it. And hopefully I just give feedback that's you know, actionable, that's practical, you know.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonI have a piece that I've just turned upside down. It's a big piece and I feel like I'm gonna, and I'm like, I feel like I can just have to do a few bold things to just clear it up. It's a large one I was working on all summer long and I turned it upside down because I feel like the blue is like the lake. So I wanted to do this like orange sky. So, but it is, it's that whole like, going over what you've been attached to. And so I've kind of halfway gone over it now, and so I'm staring at it right now. Like, just have to go over it and go for it. But it was...
Trenton ReynoldsI think that's an excellent thing to do. Even if you're doing representational work, it doesn't necessarily even have to be abstraction. Flipping it around or turning it or looking at it in a mirror so it mirror images the image. Oh, that's a good idea. like it gets you to see glaring problems that you just can't see when it's oriented the same way you've been looking at it since you know since you started I know like digital artists do this do the exact same thing where the like on a Wacom tablet you can have a shortcut so that it flips the image that you're working on horizontally so it's, you know, reversed your image and digital artists will do that like they'll just flip an image periodically, work on it that way reversed and then flip it back. So you kind of keep yourself your perspective fresh, then you don't kind of get that blindness that happens at something too long. Anyway, I think that's a really good suggestion.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonWhat other things do you suggest for people when you're giving critiques? What else is helpful for people to think about?
Trenton ReynoldsActually, today, this was only the second week that I did it, but I decided to today take two artists that I found on Instagram as kind of points of contrast on this idea that I've been, you know, introducing in my classes for years and that is looking at your artwork or artwork that you're trying to analyze through the lens of the balance of unity and variety so if you look at a piece and it's something just not quite working thinking of of this tension between unity and variety. If it's confusing and doesn't quite gel, finding areas where you can remove some variety, like where there are five shapes, combine them into one, where there are five colors, combine them into one, color. Or where if you feel like your image is boring and kind of falls flat, looking for anything in the painting where there is sameness. So maybe all the brush strokes are the same thickness or all the shapes are separated from each other the same distance. or wherever there is sameness and finding ways to introduce variety. So instead of just having the same blue that you use everywhere, try doing variations of that blue where some are a little bit lighter, a little bit darker, a little less saturated, stuff like that. So I don't know. That's always been something that I think of is like, is it boring? If it's boring, then I need to think of introducing some variety. if it's too chaotic and not you know united enough or not making sense somehow then reducing the variety and uniting things more so anyway that's
Sabrina Ward Harrisongreat I feel like there would be a great thing for you to have it like a PDF that's downloadable for people that are listening Hmm. PDF. PDF. PDF. PDF. For you. I want you to have it. Well, I know that we people talk about like having a PDF, you know, when you're listening to a podcast or like, you know,
Totally.
Trenton ReynoldsSpeaking of PDFs, I did want to also mention that I am working on a mini course or mini class on color. And it's just like going to be a practical... you know, addressing color not in the kind of theoretical but just in like practical application how do we mix colors accurately. What are the basic color schemes, what does that mean, what's the difference between glazed color and mixed color, you know, like, just, just kind of the nuts and bolts of how color works in. paintings so I'm working on that and I'll have probably four or five PDFs for oh that's great different color exercises and stuff like that that I've found really useful yeah so hopefully I'll have that post
Sabrina Ward Harrisonfull throttle, like let's just tear the band-aid off, like let's get friggin' free. You know, people would just, lots of people that, because it wasn't focused around making a book, it was, it's almost like a prequel to Liberate, so it was much more about really creative liberation. Just let get out of that stuck place, that place of like, or just that you have the art supplies you've had them for so long, or you've you went to art school and you haven't sort of been, but done, gone back to your work and you're, you've, you know, haven't done art in a long time or just pushing through those blocks and just making and making and making and just using different stuff. And, you know, um,
Trenton Reynoldslike just you're so you're so good at that i am i wonder there's there is you are you are yeah the there are both there's so much psychology yeah right it's not just like the practical reality of going and you know getting the supplies because you already have the supplies they're already there so could you give a couple examples of the kinds of I don't know. What do you do in the class to help people get there?
Sabrina Ward HarrisonWell, I think it's a lot of the combination of the writing that we do. We were doing a lot of free writing, but then breaking it into smaller little clusters of two or three people so people could share with each other. So it was a lot of color and memory. And then just like my... Sean did a lot of the filming or did all the filming, which I hadn't had someone really just film me working before and had just kind of uncut hour long, um, or 30 minute long sections of me just talking through my process and just not edited, not planned, just kind of coming in and talking about, um, you know, how I, how I'm, how I'm, my collaging process and just my thinking, my whole methodology. And because he's has a great, you know, he's inquisitive and asking great questions and, there's just like a freshness and a rawness and I think people felt like and because I'm not in some like state of the art studio space and it's not like lit you know it's just real that I think people it helped people feel like less inhibited and I think I just create a space for people to feel like they can just let go and the community aspect has been so powerful and really neat it's just like it's it's a really neat it's hard to describe it would be neat to have people on that took it and how they would describe it liberation definitely came up a lot so that was neat to see
Trenton ReynoldsI think it's interesting there are some classes that I've taught for years in the context of a like finding ways to allow people that messiness and allow people that, I don't know. Do you know what I'm saying? Like, has, have you found that you've been able to let go? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I would say so. And feel more comfortable with having less control or trying to exercise as much control in structuring what the experience.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonYeah, I think that's partly transitioning from in-person to online and to bring that forward into online. That's been new for me. And then from online to then filming things on their own and then sharing those and not... over thinking I have to edit it very much where before, so I have presentations I give that are like, I share my screen and I'm giving presentations and concepts and talking through stuff. And then, but there hasn't been that element of raw uncut footage of me teaching or sharing or showing my process. So that's the next level of it. So I think when people watch that, they feel then even closer and, right there with me.
Right. So,
Sabrina Ward Harrisonand, yeah.
Trenton ReynoldsAnd that's kind of, it's, it's, it's anxiety inducing, is it not, to, to like, put out, you know, stuff that's, you know, doesn't show you being perfect, it shows you strategically,
Sabrina Ward Harrisonstruggling through yeah yeah but it's so but so it's liberating that's also liberating for me too because i'm like thinking and i think it's having someone who's i feel sean's so accepting and delighting in the randomness of what i'm doing in the but it's also not just random but it's like seeing what i'm starting with and where i go with it that he's excited by it and i think that emboldens me to go you know like all right great I'll just share that which before I think if I was shooting it on my own I would just overthink it and overthink it overthink it and overthink it and overthink it
Trenton Reynoldsso that is definitely where I'm at yeah I overthink so much but it's such beautiful stuff you're
Sabrina Ward Harrisonnice.
Trenton ReynoldsBut I think what you're finding and what's been really instructive for me is that I think people have an appetite for that rawness and that authenticity. I don't think people really care as much to see something polished. There's kind of a minimum level of quality that probably needs to be there, but really people just... are starving for real.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonYeah. I got buckets of it over here. I can run out. Send me a bucket, please.
Trenton ReynoldsBucket of it. Two buckets of reality.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonI think, yeah, I think... Would you ever be able to have, like, Laura come in and just... shoot you like super casually?
Trenton ReynoldsPossibly. Or... I don't know. That's... And ask you questions. It's also just like where we're at right now with the kids. We're starting to get to a point where... Right. You know, our youngest just turned three and she's... You know, so they're all probably old enough where we could... I don't know, there's a little bit more flexibility in getting time, but you know, it's just trying to keep them, you know, cared for is probably the biggest barrier. No, I would love that. I would love for us to be able to like, have that be something we do together, both ways. I would love her to, you know, be trying to capture what I'm doing and also me trying to capture her kind of what she's about. So it's hard to make fun with the chill-ins.
Right.
Trenton ReynoldsHopefully that opportunity will open up as the kids get older.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonYeah, you've just got a couple decades. Couple decades. Pretty much, that's what it feels like. That's what it feels like. No, it's going to...
Trenton ReynoldsNo, it already has. This year, really, I mean, having a kid in diapers and having kids waking up in the middle of the night, once you get past that phase, it gets so much better, so much easier.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonYeah, and you had a solid series of years of that just constantly.
We did.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonThere's another thing I shared on the weekend of just a totally overworked piece, and just it's hilarious just how – I'm like, well, maybe someone will just want it. There's a lot of different people in the world, and Sean's like, eh. It's like – maybe this was just a demo. I'm like, well... Elements of it are definitely, I love, but the whole thing together, it's a lot of mishmash.
Trenton ReynoldsIt's so good to have people like that in your life. Because I, you know, oftentimes, like, all my paintings, I don't think I, like, I've always got that little bit of, eh, I don't know. Yeah. You know, it's good to have somebody there that can say, yeah, that one perhaps... Just hold on to that one.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonAnd it sucks when you've overpassed one over the other. Because I'm like, I loved it just how it was originally, and you can't go back.
Oh, it's brutal.
Trenton ReynoldsIt happens so fast. You can just totally destroy it. It does.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonAnd I loved it. I loved it at the beginning. so it does make you want to once you have a wood panels because you think well can I just cut this up and like sections of it I just
Trenton Reynoldsyes you can you can sure wood panels you can cut them up and then but if they've been glued the back gets a little trickier you can you can cut them off the cradle and and then recradal them. But yeah, that is a little trickier.
Sabrina Ward HarrisonTomorrow is a big studio organization day. So my friend Jesse is coming up from Chicago and we are going to work together on just every once a year we do this together. I hire her to come up and kind of consult and strategize about some organization with my archive of stuff and supplies. And it is hard because I wish ahead of time I had the solutions like, okay, we need this many shelving or we need. So I don't have that part of it. It's very easy for me to get. I don't like the word over. Blah, blah, blah. that word, but it just can make me, drive me nuts with it. But you know what's up? People absolutely love it.
Trenton ReynoldsThere's a word that has come up, I think, in parenting. I can't remember where it came from, but instead of overwhelmed, saturated. Saturated.
Sabrina Ward Harrisonyou're saturated that's good that's good i'm saturated yeah that's how it is it feels overstimulated with it just too much yeah like i can't see the way well that's awesome so it's a mixture because you want to spend time with your i just haven't seen her in so long at the same time it's that it's but you know it's like we all have our things that we're just there's things I could just do and I like it would be so satisfying to do
Trenton Reynoldsyeah when I'm saturated I tend to unwind by organizing that's that's how i unwind and i think that's probably how you get yeah
Sabrina Ward Harrisonyeah anyway because i can't see the path with stuff like yeah and she was like is there a container store near you like oh let's see how do how have i never spoken with this person
Trenton Reynoldscan she come on the podcast sometime she sounds like she is a Yeah, let's have Jessie on. She's a long-time listener. I want to learn from her. She's an organizer.
Cool.
Trenton ReynoldsThat's a lot of work, but it feels so much better when you get that done, right?
Sabrina Ward HarrisonYeah, yeah. What about you this week?
Trenton ReynoldsI am going to be... I have gotten a bunch of paintings prepped and they're ready to sell. And I'm really happy with... They look awesome. Great. I'm really pleased with them. And I've just been kind of dragging my feet on getting them posted and, you know... getting the word out so that's definitely one of the big focuses and then i'm hoping to be close to done if not done with this color course by the end of the week so that's exciting and
Sabrina Ward Harrisonyou'll post it on instagram yes everywhere that i can think of well should we kind of wrap things
Trenton Reynoldsup for yep i think just uh hang in there
Sabrina Ward HarrisonThanks 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. And check out the show notes at roominthetrees.com
Trenton Reynoldswhere you can also get in touch if you have any ideas you'd like to share. If you like this podcast,
Sabrina Ward HarrisonPlease consider showing your support. You can become a subscribing patron at patreon.com forward slash room.
Trenton ReynoldsPlease help us grow our audience by rating us or writing a review on iTunes. To do that, you can use the link roominthetrees.com forward slash iTunes. ♪ ♪