7.8.15

Back in America.  Unfortunately, I wasn't able to make as many updates here as I may have wished to during my six months away, but I was still able to get some work done nonetheless.  Which is kind of amazing actually, I think, because of how much school work I had to do!  My Japanese intensive study program ended up totaling in 440 hours of classes, five days a week, three hour sessions each, on top of lots of studying, memorizing, and practicing.  I had a lot of fun there, and Tokyo is really an amazing place to be.  I was never bored and I was always happy to spend the day out and about from morning until night.  I'm hoping to try to get back there as soon as I can.

Now that I'm home I'm in a bit of a tough patch, I guess.  I have to take a few steps back and kind of look at things from a bigger span view, and not just 'what should I do next?'

 It was easy to bring my paints overseas and work overseas.  Luckily, using watercolor is very easy to transport from one place to another without worrying about big canvases or heavy paints.  Painting there also felt kind of surreal.  It was weird to be in a place that I've always wanted to live, while I was also doing something that I enjoyed doing.  It was strange being able to go to language school, which for a while could only have been something I would dream of doing.  I think overall my end goal for myself would be to be able to teach art there.  It's kind of a big goal, and I think that's why everything where I am now seems so small and dull.  I came back and realized the lifestyle I could create here isn't interesting and isn't going anywhere.  I live in a tiny town without much to do and it's extremely uninspiring.  Everything around me actually, that I've lived through for years and years, seems terribly boring.

I had some opportunities with my art that I didn't have here.  I was able to give paintings to some of my idols, and had one remember me and even thank me for giving it to him.  It's inspiring to be able to have some of the people you look up to a lot have something of yours.  

And the art world there is very different than here.  It's more easily accessible in terms of shows and museums you can go to.  There are more of them, and once I even paid as little as 130円, less than $2.00, to see a wonderful four-story modern art museum.  It's also inspiring whereas I was there for six months and I didn't even get to see everything I wanted to see.  Hoping I can save my curiosity for when I go back, which I really am hoping to do.

I guess in a way I can be happy that I have all these opportunities to go be a part of, as long as they're available and as long as I put my mind to it.  But right now I'm about to go through a painful period of time where I have to stay put where I am till at least the middle of October.  What will I do?  Hopefully something.  I think as I mentioned earlier, being back is really difficult.  I did manage to just revamp my sketchbook page on my website though, with some of the sketches I had done while I was in Tokyo.  In a few weeks I would like to get started on some paintings again.  I'll probably start with either doing paintings of some of my sketches, or paintings of the smaller illustrations I had done while I was away.   I don't think I have all the sketches posted here, so feel free to take a look!

Also very open to talk about anything about any of my experiences from Japan, and don't be shy to send me an email or a message (if you have me on other social media and found me through that) anytime!