Tag Archives: art

Back to the Drawing Board

Sketch1_SusanLHart

I’ve been toying for awhile now with the idea of adding some illustrations to my stories. This means I need to brush up on my drawing skills; I’ve been away from making art for quite some time.

I love wildlife, so this morning I just randomly picked a photo of a bird to work from. I’m not 100% happy with it, but as a quick first attempt, it’s not too bad. Yay! It’s like riding a bike.

I will post some more sketches as I practice. (Sorry for the quality of the photo – in future I’ll scan the work – this will get better.)


Sketch 1 | Susan L Hart 2023 | Susan L Hart.com | Learn to Draw ebook

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Famous Flowers

Saucy sunflowers,
bright yellow faces laughing,
bound for Monet fame.

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Imagine, one day you’re just a normal sunflower, minding your own business and enjoying the day out in the garden. Someone plucks you and chucks you into a vase with some other unsuspecting flora, with the expectation that you pose prettily.

Next thing you know, centuries later you’re famous. Who knew?

Sunflowers, Claude Monet, 1881

(Haiku is from my HartHaiku.com archives, July 20, 2019

Susan L Hart 2023 | HartInspirations.com

The Intellectual v.s. The Artist

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HartInspirations.com

Van Gogh & Our Potentiality

This past week I was very fortunate to visit an immersive exhibit of Vincent Van Gogh’s art. Being already a big Van Gogh fan, and so therefore knowing something of his history and work, mostly I was curious about how anyone could compress the infinite experience of “Van Gogh” into limited time and space. For Van Gogh is not just bigger than life because he became famous, and he did not become famous simply at the whim of some influential art dealer who could persuade his clients to open their wallets.

In actual fact, Van Gogh despaired that anyone would see or appreciate what he was trying to say to the world, and he died poor and believing that no one ever would. What was he trying to say to you and I? For my part, I see a message that life is big, precious, beautiful, and yes, sometimes tragic, but when we see the challenges and despair of others, we develop compassion, we become a more integral part of humanity.

Part of the exhibit was a 1/2-hour movie display of his works in an immense room, as his paintings undulated and merged in and out, coming to life as they projected onto all four walls, the color and life also spilling down and outward onto the floor and the viewers. The objective was clearly to bring the viewers inside the art, so that they could perhaps more easily feel it and become part of it. I wondered as I watched the delighted viewers, no doubt some of them experiencing Van Gogh for the first time, what they were feeling? If I could come up with one word that would encapsulate the experience, what might that be?

The word CREATIVITY came to mind. Creativity is the very essence of who we are as humans, and we may not be able to quite put it into words, but we FEEL it. Deep down we know it as a certain truth. We ARE creative, part of a mysterious creative force, and endowed with our own creative power through our minds and hearts to manifest a better (but not yet imagined) world. There is great joy in feeling the power of that, and it showed on the faces of the viewers.

Here’s the other part of that thought. Is it possible that Van Gogh’s immersive exhibits are so hugely popular right now because we know at a deep level, but not yet fully admitting it to ourselves, that there is a force at work of late that is trying to destroy our creative power? Van Gogh’s work is not just simply an antidote in troubled times, but rather it is a view of what is possible, our POTENTIAL.

I would say that is true, but it is for you to decide. I see the juxtaposition of the world they want for us, the ones who make the rules and use coercion and force to “create it”. They project a cold future of transhumanism, where we will have completely lost the warmth, love, connectedness, and most importantly the full creative potential of who we are. They are trying to convince us that we are defective, when nothing could be farther from the truth.

So my final question to you is this: What kind of world do you want to see in your future, and for the future of all children who will inherit this planet? For my part, I’m on the side of Van Gogh.


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Susan L Hart 2022 / HartInspirations.com


Loss Unveils the Masterpiece

Michelangelo knew …

A most powerful
tool of the Master Sculptor,
Loss is.
It was the taking
away that unveiled
breathtaking David
to the world.

“I saw the angel
in the stone and
set him free.”
Inside every raw
slab of marble
a masterpiece waits
to be revealed.

We are all
magnificent works
of art in progress,
and losing a beloved
is perhaps the
greatest Master
chisel of all.

We gasp, clasping
our hearts when
our loved one dies
or leaves us.
How will we ever
risk to love again?
And yet, we do.

For in our loss
we learn to cherish
the value of love.
We understand
the power and
importance of “now”,
and we grow.

Love is the fine grit
that hones the
rough broken edges
to a polished glow.
The answer to our
growth lies within
the problem itself.

Michelangelo, you said
God guided your hand,
and in the taking away,
you revealed
astonishing beauty.
David is your work of love,
and a lesson for us all.


This poem is an excerpt from my ebook called Becoming Bigger: Realizations of Self & Humanity, and was first published in 2017 in an anthology called Seven Degrees of Wisdom: Welcome to Our Circle.


© Susan L Hart |  My ebooks

Susan L Hart 2022 / HartInspirations.com